tainty, moreover, of traces of design
in many of the would-be miocene or tertiary flint instruments (which
Prestwich is doubtful about).[103] He takes care not to tell us that the
Carstadt skull which gives name to a race, is a very doubtfully genuine
relic of one hundred and thirty years old, whose history is most
dubious. His evidence for the absence of the slightest approximation to
the simian type even in the oldest relics is cheering to the theologian,
though it loses its value when we know it is in the interests of his
foregone conclusions as to the unspeakable antiquity of man. The Nampe
image, the oldest relic yet discovered, "revolutionizes our conception
of this early palaeolithic age," being a "more artistic and better
representation of the human form than the little idols of many
comparatively modern and civilized people," very like those in Mexico,
"believed to be not much older than the date of the Spanish
conquest"--"and in truth, I believe, contemporaneous." [104]

As to his treatment of the Bible, it evinces everywhere the crudest
anthropomorphic method of interpretation such as we should expect to
find in a child or very ignorant person. In truth, Mr. Laing is in a
perfectly childish state of mind both as regards the Christian religion
and as regards philosophy, sciences, and all the subjects he dabbles
with.

For our own part we have at most a general idea as to what exactly the
Church does teach or may teach with regard to the interpretation of the
Scripture. That she has so far acquiesced in the larger interpretation
of Genesiacal cosmogony, that now the literal six-day theory would be
very unsafe, forbids us to judge any present interpretation of other
parts by the number, noise, or notoriety of its adherents. The
universality of the Deluge is by no means the only tolerable
interpretation now; though the doctrine of a partial deluge would have
been most unsafe a century ago. All this does not mean giving up the
inspiration of the record, but determining gradually what is meant by
inspiration and the record. What could be less important to Christian
dogma than the date of the Deluge or of Adam's creation? If it were
proved that the original text _in this point_ had been hopelessly
corrupted, as the discrepancies between the LXX. numbers and the Hebrew
hint to be true to some extent, it would not touch the guaranteed
integrity of Christian dogma. If Christ is the "son" of David, and
Zachaeus is "so