is an irrefragable proof of his having
derived his knowledge from a supernatural source. How does it happen,
then, that Dr. Cumming forsakes this strong position? How is it that we
find him, some pages further on, engaged in reconciling Genesis with the
discoveries of science, by means of imaginative hypotheses and feats of
"interpretation?" Surely, that which has been demonstrated to be exactly
and strictly true does not require hypothesis and critical argument, in
order to show that it may _possibly_ agree with those very discoveries by
means of which its exact and strict truth has been demonstrated. And why
should Dr. Cumming suppose, as we shall presently find him supposing,
that men of science hesitate to accept the Bible, because it appears to
contradict their discoveries? By his own statement, that appearance of
contradiction does not exist; on the contrary, it has been demonstrated
that the Bible precisely agrees with their discoveries. Perhaps,
however, in saying of the Bible that its "slightest intimations of
scientific principles or natural phenomena have in every instance been
demonstrated to be exactly and strictly true," Dr. Cumming merely means
to imply that theologians have found out a way of explaining the biblical
text so that it no longer, in their opinion, appears to be in
contradiction with the discoveries of science. One of two things,
therefore: either he uses language without the slightest appreciation of
its real meaning, or the assertions he makes on one page are directly
contradicted by the arguments he urges on another.

Dr. Cumming's principles--or, we should rather say, confused notions--of
biblical interpretation, as exhibited in this volume, are particularly
significant of his mental calibre. He says ("Church before the Flood,"
p. 93): "Men of science, who are full of scientific investigation and
enamored of scientific discovery, will hesitate before they accept a book
which, they think, contradicts the plainest and the most unequivocal
disclosures they have made in the bowels of the earth, or among the stars
of the sky. To all these we answer, as we have already indicated, there
is not the least dissonance between God's written book and the most
mature discoveries of geological science. One thing, however, there may
be: _there may be a contradiction between the discoveries of geology and
our preconceived interpretations of the Bible_. But this is not because
the Bible is wrong