s are agreed that in the early
fossiliferous periods the sea must have prevailed much more
extensively than at present. Scripture also expressly states that the
waters were the birthplace of the earliest animals, and geology has as
yet discovered in the whole Silurian series no terrestrial animal,
though marine creatures are extremely abundant; and though
air-breathing creatures are found in the later Palaeozoic, they are,
with the exception of insects, of that semi-amphibious character which
is proper to alluvial flats and the deltas of rivers. It is true that
the negative evidence collected by geology does not render it
altogether impossible that terrestrial animals, even mammals, may have
existed in the earliest periods; yet there are, as already pointed
out, some positive indications opposed to this. The Scripture,
however, commits itself to the statement that the higher land animals
did not exist so early, though it must be observed that there is
nothing in the Mosaic narrative adverse to the existence of birds,
insects, and reptiles in the earlier Palaeozoic periods. I have said
that the Bible, which informs us of a universal ocean preceding the
existence of land, also gives indications of a still earlier period of
igneous fluidity or gaseous expansion. Geology also and astronomy have
their reasonings and speculations as to the prevalence of such
conditions. Here, however, both records become dim and obscure, though
it is evident that both point in the same direction, and combine those
aqueous and igneous origins which in the last century afforded so
fertile ground of one-sided dispute.

6. Both records concur in maintaining what is usually termed the
doctrine of existing causes in geology. Scripture and geology alike
show that since the beginning of the fifth day, or Palaeozoic period,
the inorganic world has continued under the dominion of the same
causes that now regulate its changes and processes. The sacred
narrative gives no hint of any creative interposition in this
department after the fourth day; and geology assures us that all the
rocks with which it is acquainted have been produced by the same
causes that are now throwing down detritus in the bottom of the
waters, or bringing up volcanic products from the interior of the
earth. This grand generalization, therefore, first worked out in
modern times by Sir Charles Lyell, from a laborious collection of the
changes occurring in the present state of the wor