atisfactorily to answer
another, namely, What, in this special department, are truth and fact
scientifically ascertained?

There are, however, certain texts that appear to have a more direct
bearing on the successive periods of the geologist than any of those
that were once held to refer to the form of the earth, or to the nature
of the heavenly bodies, are now believed to have on geography or
astronomy. No one now holds that there is a geography revealed in
Scripture, or regards the cavils of the Salamanca doctors as other than
mere aberrations of the human mind. Nor, save mayhap in the darker
corners of the Greek and Romish Churches, are there men in the present
day who hold that there is a revealed astronomy. The texts so
confidently quoted by Turrettine, such as "The sun also ariseth and the
sun goeth down," are regarded in every Protestant Church as simply
tantamount, in their bearing on the question at issue, to the "Sun
rises" and "Sun sets" of the almanac. But while the Scriptures do not
reveal the form of the earth or the motions of the planets, they do
reveal the fact that the miracle of creation was effected, not by a
single act, but in several successive acts. And it is with the organisms
produced by successive acts of creation, and the formations deposited
during the periods in which these acts took place, that the geologist is
called on by his science to deal. And hence, while there are now no
attempts made to reconcile geographic or astronomic fact with the
Scripture passages which refer, in the language of the time, to the
glory of the heavens or the stability of the earth, just because it is
held that there is really nothing geographic or astronomic in the
passages to conflict with the geographic or astronomic facts, we still
seek to reconcile the facts of geologic science with what is termed the
Mosaic geology. We inquire whether, in its leading features, the Mosaic
does not correspond with the geologic record; and whether the _days_ of
the retrospective prophecy of creation are to be regarded as coextensive
with the vast periods of the geologist, or as merely representative
portions of them, or as literal days of twenty-four hours each? But
though we thus seek to harmonize the two records, we continue to regard
their grounds and objects as entirely different. The object of geology
is simply the elucidation of the history of the earth, and of the story
of its various creations; and its grounds are, lik