infinite, eternal, and unchangeable impulse of His own mind. The highest angels are infinitely beneath Him. Even they cannot fathom the depth of His councils. No wonder, then, that we should often be confounded in our attempts to scan His character, and comprehend His views.

We shall be better able to understand the extent of the difficulty, if we enter into particulars, and consider some of the ways in which the providence of God operates on His rational creatures. God is omniscient. He knows our frame, and "understands our thoughts afar off." He forms no superficial or unjust judgement of our character and motives, as we short-sighted mortals do in regard to our fellow-men. He knows, for instance, whether our actions proceed from selfish or benevolent motives; whether a sense of duty or a love of human approbation lies at the bottom of our conduct ;-whether worldly possessions improve or correct our hearts. He, therefore, knows, what we cannot distinctly know,—the kind of discipline we require to train us for heaven; and He accommodates the operations of His providence to this knowledge. He comforts us with hope, or encourages us with success, or blesses us with enjoyment, and causes His "candle to shine on our head," just to the extent to which He sees these earthly blessings will be really useful to us. And, on the other hand, He mortifies us with disappointment, or humbles us with disgrace, or chastens us with poverty, or warns us by sickness, or causes the loss of all that was nearest and dearest to our hearts, that He may thus call us to serious reflection, and break the ties which bind us to the earth, and lead us to place our treasure, and fix our affections, in heaven. And all this, He frequently does, without our being able to understand His reasons, because we are ignorant both of our own character and wants, and of the character and wants of others.

Nor is this all. God is acquainted with the ultimate consequences of all events. He traces every thing to its most remote effects. It is not merely the advantage of a day, or a month, or a year, that He regards. He

looks forward to the most distant futurity, and, with unerring certainty, calculates the precise bearing of every present event on ages yet to come. It is an awful consideration, that there is not an action of our lives, nor a word which we utter, nor even a thought which passes through our hearts, that may not be pregnant with important consequences,-with consequences which may not only deeply affect ourselves, but others; which may be productive of good or evil, not merely in our own immediate circle, but, sometimes, even to the community among whom we dwell, and the age in which we live. Nor does the influence necessarily stop here,-it may extend to distant posterity. These consequences we cannot see, but God estimates them all. Every word, every look of ours, the all-seeing Eye follows through all its effects on the character of our children, and friends, and neighbors; and thence, again, on the sentiments and conduct of others influenced by them; and, further still, on those of their children, and their children's children, to the latest generations. How infinitely is this beyond the grasp of the human mind!

Again, the Eternal not only knows the effects, but the relations and comparative value of all things. Men view events under a perverted aspect,-judging of their importance more by their nearness or their distance, than by their intrinsic worth. Through the false medium of passion or of prejudice, we are apt to magnify or contract the dimensions of objects, and to form an opinion of them altogether different from the reality. We shall be more sensible of this, if we reflect, for a moment, on the different sentiments with which we regard death, when we hope that this event is distant, and when we perceive or imagine it to be near; or, indeed, if we consider the general tendency of the mind to form a foolish attachment to temporal things, in preference to those things that are eternal.

But none of these prejudices and prepossessions obstruct or deceive the vision of the Almighty. Those things which occupy the attention of our worldly minds, He sees in all their emptiness and frivolity; the heavenly

treasures which we regard with such indifference, He views in their infinite magnitude and importance; and all these, with unerring wisdom, He adjusts (independent of the vain wishes of men) so as to promote the greatest good. Here is another obvious source of inadequate comprehension on our part.

We must further remember, that these unsearchable operations are not confined to the welfare of individuals. They embrace the interests of nations,-of the earth,of the universe! While there is not a living being in creation to whom the paternal care of the Creator does not extend, He views the world as a whole, and so regulates every part, as either to promote the happiness of all, or to visit them with retributive justice. What a wonderful conception is this! From the worm to man, from man to the archangel, all are linked together in the counsels of God; and, while there is not one of all these creatures whom He does not care for, as if there were no other being to occupy his attention, all are governed as one great family, of which each member has its own department, and in which one great design is constantly kept in view, the perfection and happiness of the whole.

Nor must we forget, that the schemes of the Self-existent are not bounded by time, but embrace eternity. In the present world, the moral government of God is only begun. That may appear imperfect and disordered, of which we only see a part, when, if the whole were displayed and understood, every minute particular, and the united result of the whole, would be found to be the perfection of wisdom.

He who has seen a powerful and complicated system of machinery in operation, of which he was only permitted to examine a small part, may form some idea of the effect of so partial a view of the operations of Providence. He saw an apparently confused and unwieldy mechanism, of which he neither understood the principle nor the use. Wheels on wheels, moving in seeming disorder,-valves opening and shutting,-levers straining,-beams revolving, while fire and water combined their mysterious

powers. He perceived, in short, an immense expense of labor and ingenuity,—and all for what? He could not tell: He observed amazing powers in operation; he heard a grating and astounding noise, and that was all. But were he admitted into the upper apartments, where the effect of all these operations is displayed, what a different opinion would he form! How would he admire the talents which could so control the powers of Nature, as to give man a force immensely superior to his own, and add to the resources, and insure the prosperity, not of individuals only, but of the whole empire!

And so it is with the operations of Providence. Here we see but a part, and that a very small part, of the machinery by which He conducts the moral government of the world. Even if we could understand all the relations of temporal things, we could not understand their bearings on eternity. Some glimpses, indeed, Revelation has afforded us into that upper apartment, where the whole scheme is consummated, and where the ways of God are vindicated to His creatures; but how imperfect and how inadequate! Let us look forward with eagerness and hope to the approaching period, when the veil shall be removed from our eyes, and "we shall know even as we are known."

THIRTEENTH WEEK-MONDAY.

II. GEOLOGY.-SUCCESSIVE PERIODS OF DEPOSIT.

ASSUMING the existence of matter from an indefinite period before the commencement of the Mosaic creation, let us attend to the opinions which have been adopted by modern geologists, from views founded on the knowledge they have acquired of the crust of the earth.

It should seem, according to these inquiries, that there are three well-marked periods in the primitive history of

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our globe, during which the most extensive changes have taken place on its surface, and fresh deposits have been made. The order of time in which these changes have been effected, can be fixed, as is supposed, with considerable precision. We are first informed, that there was what may be called the Primitive era, or period of granite, when this species of rock, with other stony substances, and the wide-spread ocean from which, in the process of ages, extensive deposits of sand were made, seem to have covered the whole face of the earth, forming a cheerless and gloomy waste, destitute of organized existences, and void of life. This epoch is said to have been followed by another period of long duration, in which some violent convulsions have taken place, and active powers have been at work, effecting extensive changes, without appearing, during its continuance, to have settled down into a permanent state; hence called the Transition period. It is during this period, that the first rudiments of vegetable and animal existences seem to have taken their origin, as the lowest kind of organized beings are found embedded in its deposits.

“Beginning with the animal kingdom," says Dr. Buckland, "we find the four great existing divisions of Vertebrata, Mollusca, Articulata, and Radiata, to have been coeval with the commencement of organic life upon our globe. No higher condition of Vertebrata has yet been discovered in the transition formation than that of fishes." "The Mollusca, in the transition series, afford examples of several families, and many genera, which seem at that time to have been universally diffused over all parts of the world." "The earliest examples of Articulated animals are those afforded by the extinct family of Trilobites." These seem to have perished at the end of this series. "The Radiated animals are among the most frequent organic remains in the transition strata. present numerous forms of great beauty." Of the vegetable kingdom in this earliest period of organized existences, Dr. Buckland says, "In the inferior regions of this series, plants are few in number, and principally marine; but in its superior regions, the remains of land plants are accumulated in prodigious quantities." They form,

They