has elicited from the universe itself. The
aspects in which apparent conflicts present themselves are threefold.
At one time it was not unusual to impugn the historical accuracy of
the Pentateuch on the evidence of the Greek historians; and on many
points scarcely any corroborative evidence could be cited in favor of
the Hebrew writers. In our own time much of this difficulty has been
removed, and an immense amount of learned research has been reduced to
waste paper, by the circumstance that the monuments of Egypt and
Assyria have risen up to bear testimony in favor of the Bible; and
scarcely any sane man now doubts the value of the Hebrew history. The
battle-ground has in consequence been shifted farther back, to points
concerning the affiliation of the races of men, the absolute antiquity
of man's residence on the earth, and the condition of prehistoric men;
questions on which we can scarcely expect to find, at least for a long
time, any decisive monumental or scientific evidence. Secondly, the
Bible commits itself to certain cosmological doctrines and statements
respecting the system of nature, and details of that system, more or
less approaching to the domain which geology occupies in its
investigations of the past history of the earth; and at every stage in
the progress of modern science, independently of the mischief done by
smatterers and skeptics, earnest bigotry on the one hand, and earnest
scientific enthusiasm on the other, have come into collision. One
stumbling-block after another has, it is true, been removed by mutual
concession and farther enlightenment, and by the removal of false
traditional interpretations of the sacred records, as well as by
farther discoveries in relation to nature. But the field of conflict
has thereby apparently only changed; and we still have some Christians
in consequence regarding the revelations of natural science with
suspicion, and some scientific men cherishing a sullen resentment
against what they regard as an intolerant intermeddling of theology
with the domain of legitimate investigation. Lastly, the great growth
of physical science, and the tendency to take partial views of the
universe as if it were comprehended in mere matter and force, with
similarly partial views of the doctrines of continuity and the
conservation of forces, along with the growth of a belief in
spontaneous evolution as a philosophical dogma, have placed many
scientific minds in a position which make