to such a degree and so generally, that rain coul then have been formed, except at very great height when thus formed must of course have been liable vaporized again before it could reach the earth. D this period vast quantities of vapor must have been ex from the moist earth in the day time, or whenever th was warmest; and been condensed into dew at nig whenever the air became more cool. And this is what we are told by Moses, in chap. ii. 5, 6; at the the herbs and plants were made, "the Lord God ha caused it to rain upon the earth; and 66 there went mist from the earth, and watered the whole face o ground." The saying that it had not rained up to time when vegetation was produced, implies that it rain afterwards, which as we have seen must act have occurred soon after.

(14.) And God said, Let there be lights, or lumi bodies. Those here intended are the sun, moon, stars, as specified in verse 16.-In the firmament of heaven. Not simply in the heaven, nor simply in the mament, but "in the firmament of the heaven." heaven is properly the region of space occupied by heavenly bodies; the firmament may import the same it may mean merely the atmosphere. To be in the fir ment, is to be in sight, whether near or distant; to be the heaven, is to be in a certain region of space, whet in sight or not; and to be in the firmament of heaver to be in the visible expanse of the sky. By the rem of the clouds from the atmosphere the sun, moon, a stars became visible. This view of the subject is c firmed by an expression in verse 20, where we read of birds flying" above the earth, in the open firmament heaven." Having had waters above it, the firmam had been, as it were shut by dense clouds; but after heavenly bodies were revealed in it, it is described being " open; " and what can this import if not absence of the clouds ?...

To divide the day from the night. In verse 18, we ha as an equivalent expression, "to divide the light from t darkness." It is worthy of note that in verse 4 of th chapter, as explained by verse 5, we are told of this ve same division having been made on the first day, thou

it is not there described as having any relation to the heavenly bodies. I am persuaded that Moses describes things as they would have appeared to an actual observer; and that the sense here is, that by means of the sun being generally visible in the day time, and the moon and stars at night, the change from night to day and from day to night, which had been going on ever since light first reached the earth's surface, was thereafter seen to be connected for the most part with the appearance and disappearance of those bodies respectively.

(16.) And God made two great lights, &c. This verse seems to be merely explanatory. The 14th and the 15th verses tell us what God willed respecting these lights; the 17th and 18th inform us that he did what he willed; the 16th verse, standing between, seems to have been thrown in as explanatory. The time in which God made those bodies, I deem to have been in the beginning; as I am told that the verb may, with equal propriety, be rendered, "had made."

(20.) And God said, Let the waters bring forth, &c. (24.) And God said, Let the earth bring forth, &c. Fishes and land animals are here willed, or commanded, to be, as it were, born of the ocean and earth. Parallel with these verses are the 11th and 12th, in which we read of the earth's bringing forth grass, &c. But we ought by no means to infer from this language, that the vegetables and animals came at first into existence in any other manner than by the direct act of creation. For, aside from other considerations, we read in verses 21, 25, as the accomplishment of his volition respecting the animals, that "God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth" in the waters; and that He "made the beast of the earth, and cattle, every thing that creepeth upon the earth." And in chap. ii. 5, we are told that "the Lord God made plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew." Yet when a race of beings was to be produced whose prerogative it should be to "subdue" the earth, and exercise dominion over the animals, it was not said, Let the earth bring forth man; but we read, (26.) And God said, Let us make man. This seems to intimate man's superiority, which however is more defi

and

every

nitely taught in what follows:-In our image, afte likeness. The idea here intended is doubtless the sa is embodied in the teaching of an apostle, that "w the offspring of God." The correlative idea is pres in the affirmation that there is "one God and Fath all."

In scripture language generally, to be "the childr God," or to be "the sons of God," has reference to gious or moral character, or to what we may becom being imitators or "followers of God as dear child Jesus therefore exhorts his disciples to love not m their friends, but their enemies also, "that," says he, may be the children of your Father who is in heav that is, like him morally. But to be the offspring of or to bear his image, relates to what we are constitu ally, or by virtue of creation; it being true that "the a spirit in man," since God is not only "a spirit," "the Father of spirits," even "the God of the spirits all flesh." Man thus having a spiritual nature, and tined to an eternal existence, in a state of immortal is therefore said to be made in the image of God. whether this view of the subject is correct or not, it is doctrine of Moses that mankind now, as an apostle a expressly affirms, "are made after the similitude of Go For that which he tells us the Creator proposed to make his own image, and did thus make or create, was merely Adam, nor Adam and Eve, but man-the gen homo, the race.

(27.) Male and female created he them. Some perso search the Scriptures diligently, if not daily, for the ve laudable purpose of hunting out discrepancies therein. A they find one, as they think, in Moses's account, inasmu as he here states that the race was created male ar female; yet in the second chapter he tells of a time whe there was a man, but no woman! Let such consider, they are capable of it, that an after-description of an eve and a description of an after-event are sometimes qui two things. Moses first relates in general terms that Go created man male and female, placing the former first He afterwards relates certain circumstances attendant o the creation of the one, and certain other circumstance connected with the creation of the other; and state

definitely, what he had before intimated, that the man was created first; and also mentions the additional fact that some little time elapsed after the man was made before the woman was formed.

Again: Some can not reconcile, with the account of man's creation in the first chapter of Genesis, the statement in the second, that " there was not a man to till the ground." Now what Moses really affirms, is, that there was no man up to the time when God made the herbs and plants. And we learn from the first chapter that man was made after vegetation was created. Where, then, is the discrepancy?

Some writers insist very particularly upon the fact that in the first chapter man is said to have been created, and in the second, to have been formed; and they contend that the first has relation to the mind, or spirit, the second, to the bodily organization. Now, in the language of Moses, to create, and to make, are convertible expressions. Thus he informs us that God said, Let the waters bring forth fish; and then adds that God created them. He tells us that God said, Let the earth bring forth land animals; and then adds that God made them. He relates also, that God said, Let us make man; and then adds, So God created man. Moreover he says in chap. ii. 4, "These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens," &c. To create, and to make, are, then, the same thing precisely..

(31.) And the evening and the morning were the sixth day: The period of time embraced in Moses's sixth view. So far as the production of living creatures is concerned, the work of creation by a direct process then ceased. The three verses following have very improperly been thrown into another chapter.

(Chap. ii. 1.) Thus the heavens and the earth were finished. They were created in the beginning; but the earth, at least, was not finished until the sixth day.

(2.) And on the seventh day God ended his work, &c. The sense intended, evidently is, that He had ended it. In chap. ii. 17, is also an instance of the imperfect tense for the preter-imperfect tense. We there read that the Creator "formed every beast of the field, &c., and brought

them to Adam;" which makes Moses seem to say the posite of what he had said, that the animals were cre before man. The true rendering then is, "had form &c. And it being a manifest fact that in these insta the preter-imperfect tense ought to have been used ins of the imperfect, is the statement incredible that cha 16, ought to read, "Now God had made?" &c.

And he rested on that day. What is here meant God's resting, is well expressed in Heb. iv. 11: "Fo that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from own work, as God did from his." That is, the Crea ceased from direct acts of creation. Note, God's Sabb as respects the earth, continues yet. Creation is still effec through the operation of the law of reproduction.

(3.) And God blessed the seventh day. Ordained that seventh period of time should possess a distinguish characteristic, analogous to a season of rest. And sa tified it. Set it apart to the purpose above mentioned.

We have now seen that Moses, after stating the ge ral fact that the universe of worlds owes its origin having been created by God, presents a view of the ear in a chaotic state, destitute of symmetry, void of inha tants, and unfurnished with any accommodations for i habitants had they existed; and that he ends with d scribing it as the residence of man, and so fitted ar furnished for his reception, as that he, by the aid of h intellectual and physical powers, is able to render it qui a convenient and desirable abode. Only some of the mo prominent of the processes by which the earth was thu improved, are by him presented. The principal of thes are the following:

Water was formed, and covered the whole surface o the globe; but darkness rested upon its face, for the atmosphere had so much of an opaque substance floating in it that the light of the sun had never penetrated through it. The Creator willed, and light reached the earth's surface; and by the diurnal rotation of the earth, day and night succeeded each other in turn. Still the atmosphere contained an immense volume of vapor reaching quite down to the water all over the earth. He willed, and the vapor arose, leaving an expanse of clear air between the ocean and the clouds. The earth was now, as to its