ery month. The stars are,
as it were, thrown in. And nothing can more sharply mark the doctrinal
purpose of the author, than the manner in which he deals with the
heavenly bodies, which the Gentiles identified so closely with their
gods, as if they were mere accessories to the almanac.

Animals come next in order of creation, and the general notion of the
writer seems to be that they were produced by the medium in which
they live; that is to say, the aquatic animals by the waters, and the
terrestrial animals by the land. But there was a difficulty about flying
things, such as bats, birds, and insects. The cosmogonist seems to have
had no conception of "air" as an elemental body. His "elements" are
earth and water, and he ignores air as much as he does fire. Birds "fly
above the earth in the open firmament" or "on the face of the expanse"
of heaven. They are not said to fly through the air. The choice of a
generative medium for flying things, therefore, seemed to lie between
water and earth; and, if we take into account the conspicuousness of
the great flocks of water-birds and the swarms of winged insects, which
appear to arise from water, I think the preference of water becomes
intelligible. However, I do not put this forward as more than a probable
hypothesis. As to the creation of aquatic animals on the fifth, that of
land animals on the sixth day, and that of man last of all, I presume
the order was determined by the fact that man could hardly receive
dominion over the living world before it existed; and that the "cattle"
were not wanted until he was about to make his appearance. The other
terrestrial animals would naturally be associated with the cattle.

The absurdity of imagining that any conception, analogous to that of
a zoological classification, was in the mind of the writer will be
apparent, when we consider that the fifth day's work must include
the zoologist's _Cetacea, Sirenia,_ and seals, [12] all of which are
_Mammalia;_ all birds, turtles, sea-snakes and, presumably, the
fresh water _Reptilia_ and _Amphibia;_ with the great majority of
_Invertebrata._

The creation of man is announced as a separate act, resulting from a
particular resolution of Elohim to "make man in our image, after our
likeness." To learn what this remarkable phrase means we must turn to
the fifth chapter of Genesis, the work of the same writer. "In the day
that Elohim created man, in the likeness of Elohim made he him; male and
f