ows some
portion of the liquid rain condensed upon it to remain as a boiling
ocean. Then began the reign of the waters, under which the first
stratified rocks were laid down by the deposit of earthy and saline
matter suspended or dissolved in the heated sea. Such is the picture
which science presents to us of the genesis of the earth, and so far
as we can judge from his words, such must have been the picture
presented to the mental vision of the ancient seer of creation; but he
could discern also that mysterious influence, the "breath of Elohim,"
which moved on the face of the waters, and prepared for the evolution
of land and of life from their bosom. He saw--

"An earth--formless and void;
A vaporous abyss--dark at its very surface;
A universal ocean--the breath of God hovering over it."

How could such a scene be represented in words? since it presented
none of the familiar features of the actual world. Had he attempted to
dilate upon it, he would, in the absence of the facts furnished by
modern science, have been obliged, like the writers of some of the
less simple and primitive cosmogonies already quoted,[42] to adopt the
feeble expedient of enumerating the things not present. He wisely
contents himself with a few well-chosen words, which boldly sketch the
crude materials of a world hopeless and chaotic but for the animating
breath of the Almighty, who has created even that old chaos out of
which is to be worked in the course of the six creative days all the
variety and beauty of a finished world.

In conclusion, the reader will perceive how this reticence of the
author of Genesis strengthens the argument for the primitive age of
the document, and for the vision-theory as to its origin; and will
also observe that, in the conception of this ancient writer, the
"promise and potency" of order and life reside not alone in the atoms
of a vaporous world, but also in the will of its Creator.

CHAPTER VI.

LIGHT AND CREATIVE DAYS.

"And God said, Let light be, and light was; and God saw the
light that it was good, and separated the light from the
darkness; and God called the light Day; and the darkness he
called Night. And Evening was and Morning was--Day
one."--Genesis i., 3-5.

Light is the first element of order and perfection introduced upon our
planet--the first innovation on the old regime of darkness and
desolation. There is a beautiful propriety in this, for the He