ter is four times and one third that of the earth his bulk eighty times and a half that of the earth. Two satellites have been discovered belonging to him; of the first the period is 8 days, 17 hours, 1 minute, the second the period is 13 days, 11 hours, 5 minutes. His orbit is inclined to the ecliptic, 90°. This planet, by his great distance, was unknown till the powerful telescopes of Mr. Herschel discovered him; consequently the ancients were entirely unacquainted with him. III. Elevation of the orbit of the planets, as seen from the sun these are estimated by comparison with the orbit of the earth, from which the orbit of Mercury differs more than that of any other planet; and is therefore at once the smallest, and the most irregular, as his eccentricity is greatest, and, as the elevation and depression of his course is also greatest. The orbit of Jupiter differs but little from that of the earth. In fact, with regard to what differences might have existed, the whole of the planetary courses may be regarded as nearly similar. Their quantities of variation from the ecliptic is as follows: Mercury 6° 59' 20" Venus 3 23 5 Mars 1 52 Jupiter 2° 20′ Saturn 2 33 30 Georgian 90 IV. As the foregoing figure is under a necessity of supposing, what is false in fact, that the courses of the planets cross each other [i.e. form knots or nodes] in the middle of the elevation, it is the design of the thin lines, marked with the names of the planets, to correct this idea; accordingly, by attending to them, it appears, that the intersections of the planes of the planetary orbits with that of the earth, i.e. their nodes [such planes supposed to be extended so as to meet the earth's orbits,] are as follows: 14° 43′ The ascending node of Mercury in 8 Taurus, of Venus in Gemini, of Mars in Taurus, 13 59 17 17 7 29 21 13 of Jupiter in 8 Cancer, of Saturn in Cancer. The descending nodes are of necessity diametrically opposite to the ascending, and are marked on the plate by the names of the planets at length. The computation of the planetary distances is, number of comets is great; but these are selected as being most contradictory. We have thus explained what the term heaven imports in sacred history: we now turn, with the inspired writer, to consider those events which occurred on one of these planets, THE EARTH, which, he observes, was originally without form, and void. The most striking and prominent features of the Mosaic history, are the creation of the world we inhabit, and the destruction of it by a deluge of water: as both these histories have been attacked by the enemies of Revelation, who well knew the importance of Moses, considered as an historian, in relation to that divine system, we shall bestow more attention on these two histories, than on others of less moment. We are under the necessity of supposing, that our readers are informed of the existence, and in some degree of the application, of those instruments to which science is unspeakably beholden; we mean the telescope, the microscope, the barometer, the thermometer, &c. not that our reasonings will require any practical acquaintance with these instruments; but that we shall be under the necessity of appealing to them for the truth of our assertions. Those observations which they have furnished, together with their results, must be taken as truths, admitted truths, because excursions in demonstration of them would employ our time in a manner which is not the intention of these pages. Moses describes the chaos as a confusion, without mentioning any agent whereby this confusion was produced; he attributes it neither to fire, nor to water, neither to earthquakes, nor to explosions: he merely acquaints us that the earth existed, but in extreme disorder, the reduction of which to order, is the subject of his history. His subject does not lead him to say whether any or what changes were produced in the centre of the earth, or in those massive parts of it between the centre and the circumference; for any thing which appears in his narration they may remain as they were; but the external parts, the superficial layers of matters which compose the upper strata of this planet, these underwent changes of which the sacred historian has preserved the order, and of which he relates the consequences. The earth was without form and void: sightless [unsightly] and unprepared, say the LXX, a chaos, an unarranged mass of materials; confused, disorderly, discordant. The very heathen poets describe this chaotic state,. this primitive character of the earth. Ante mare et terras, et quod tegit omnia cœlum, "Before the sea, the land, the all-surrounding heaven were, the whole appearance of nature was the same undistinguished surface, called chaos; a gross unarranged mass, incapable of producing any thing itself, yet containing the seeds of all things, though dispersed." If we reflect a moment on this state of things, we shall see the reason of the order adopted by Moses in his narrative. 1st, The heavenly bodies were the works of God, therefore worship should not be paid to them, but to their Creator. 2dly, The earth was chaotic therefore it had not existed in its present form from all eternity, as some philosophers held; neither, 3dly, was the earth itself to be worshipped: that which had been deformed ought not to be deified. The idolatry of the world at the time when Moses wrote, rendered such a caveat against infidelity highly necessary and appropriate. The chaos naturally supposes a mass of materials of different densities; some light, some heavy, some compact, some expanded; solids also, and fluids; all heterogeneously intermingled; materials of various qualities and properties, but all dissociated, all disordered: can it be fitted for inhabitants? The prelude to discharging this chaotic state from the surface of the earth was giving to the planet a rotary motion on its axis. We must therefore desire the reader to understand the history of Moses as implying, that some person of competent dignity, power, intelligence and benevolence, visited this disorderly mass, took his station opposite to a certain part of it, from thence issued his orders, and directed the whole of obedient nature. He first bids this globe revolve: of which the immediate consequence is, a vehement agitation among the superficial particles of the chaos, resisting the course of the globe; that is to say, by endeavouring to maintain their station, the lighter particles oppose the progress of the revolving matters around them: still, however, the globe continues to roll, and thereby this agitation is prolonged over its whole surface. Such is the account, which would be given by those who render the words, RUACH ALEIM, WIND of God, i.e. a violent wind, so violent as only God could raise and direct. Such is the rendering of the Chaldee paraphrast Onkelos, of the Rabbis Maimonides and Aben-ezra, of the Christian fathers Theodoret and Tertullian, of Episcopius, and others; and it is acknowledged, that the phrase is analogous to expressions used not infrequently in the Hebrew writings. But the majority of interpreters, with equal propriety, and equal correctness, consider these words as denoting a person, the SPIRIT of God, who moved, brooded, say some, as a hen broods over eggs, on the surface of the waters. For my own part, I think this person is understood to be stationary, fixed opposite to one point of the earth, which gradually, as it revolves, brings its whole surface, in succession, under the inspection, and the influence of this arranging power; the consequence of which is, that virtue from this spiritual agent visits the whole in successive progression. Now the natural operation of this agitation among the surface materials of the chaos would doubtless cause the heavier matters to sink; the metals, the stones, the earths would descend, leaving in the upper regions the lighter particles, airs, vapours, exhalations, and fluids, which being transparent in some degree, though mixed and polluted by various unsettled ingredients, yet would no longer oppose the emanations of light now gliding into them, among them, and through them. Thus it was God said, Light be, and light was: thus it was God separated the darkness from the light: 1st, By the rotary motion of the earth, one half of its surface only being exposed to the light at one time; the other half remaining in darkness; 2dly, by causing the opaque bodies to sink below those which were transparent, so that they no longer impeded the passage of light; 3dly, by establishing the bounds of the horizon, which now represented a state of night, in those parts of its surface which declined from the immediate visitation of light; and a state of morning, in those parts approaching toward the direct action of light. As natural day and night is now occasioned by the very same motion of this planet, i.e. its revolution on its axis, we may freely infer, that the same cause originally produced the same effect: and since one rotation now separates between day and night, between light and darkness, so it did then. That divine impulse which originally imparted this motion, still continues it, still produces the same effects; morning, evening; light, darkness; which still make one day; or, as it is in the Hebrew, "evening, morning, day, one." But the globe is not a sentient being itself, it is only a receptacle, a habitation for sentient beings; let us, therefore, inquire what principles are necessary to qualify it for the reception of animated existence, to whom we must attribute, 1st, individual life; 2dly, the power of continuing that life; 3dly, the power of transmitting that life in succession. If the dark and frozen regions of the poles were favourable to life, animal or vegetable, we might dispense perhaps with light and warmth as primary requisites; but, if at this day nature exults in the vigour of her productive powers under the genial influence of radiance and heat, then, no doubt, radiance and heat were originally necessary to enable the first individuals to receive their being, and to prolong their continuance after they had received it. OF LIGHT, AND ITS EFFECTS. Light was, as we have seen, the first principle bestowed on this new world, to prepare it for the reception of inhabitants; whether vegetable inhabitants, or animal; and I mean to insist that the order and progress of each day in the creation history is preparatory to the following days, with a correctness which has hitherto not been sufficiently understood; and it will be remembered that each day is coinci dent with a revolution of the globe. Light, then, is our first principle preparatory to life, if we ask, what is the stimulus of vegetable life? we must answer light: Do not plants come to perfection without light? no: Nor display their colours? no Nor enjoy the functions of their life? no. Do their seeds sprout without light? they are pallid, feeble, enervated; they languish and die. A shrub, enclosed in a dark chamber, bends its hoping boughs toward any crevice whereat light attempts to penetrate: to this directs its leaves, to this inclines its stem; and if a leaf can reach the radiant beam, that leaf becomes verdant; that leaf may live while others less fortunate dwindle, pine, and die. Change the situation of this plant, direct the light to some of its other branches, they revive under the influence of the genial ray. If light be so necessary to plants, how much more to animals? If to the life of plants, how much more to the accommodation of animals? We conclude, therefore, that light is the first requisite of a habitation for sentient beings, and with the utmost propriety stands recorded as a production of the first day, the beginning of creation; GoD said, "LIGHT be," and LIGHT was. SECOND DAY. THE EXPANSE, OR FIRMAMENT. plicable, but moist, muddy, mixed liquids; liquids of various densities of these the most weighty sunk downward, and adhered to the globe of earth, while the most rarefied sprang upward to those spaces in the aerial heaven, whose correspondent levity suited their powers of expansion. This process was very much the result of that light which had visited the globe on the first day; the first day had prepared the gross atmosphere, the second day purified and completed it: the first day had determined the heavy materials to their situations on the inert mass, whence resulted compactness, induration, solidity; the second day drained still further the atmosphere of its feculencies, gave its vapours and fluids their due distinctions, enabled them to assume their relative stations, expanded the lighter over the heavier, and so spread out the firmament, the expanse, the atmospherical, vaporated, envelope of the globe, which on all sides surrounds it, and on all sides is the medium of its embellishment. The work of the second day, says Scheuzer, may be called the serenification of the atmosphere which surrounds the earth. We have thus advanced also toward a second requisite for the sustenance of life when it shall begin upon the globe; if living creatures are to be sustained by the fluids of the atmosphere, if they are to breathe the air, doubtless the air must be fitted for A second revolution of the globe shewed what their breathing, it must be cleared from noxious or beneficial effects had accompanied the first revolu- hazardous ingredients, from pollutions injurious to tion. The superincumbent parts of the mass had the vessels which inhale it, from whatever might imsubsided into somewhat of an orderly distribution, pede the duties of the parts adapted to employ it, and had advanced to a certain degree of clearness, and from all risk which otherwise might attend its and purification: and now, God directed the firma- operation; in short, it must be pure, not poisonous; ment to appear. and salutary, not deadly. The word firmament [ RAKIAU] signifies an expanse; it expresses two ideas: 1st, that of an expanded atmosphere surrounding the globe, which we might call, for distinction sake, the blue firmament; 2dly, that of a remote expanse wherein the stars are placed. We often speak of the stars in the firmament; of a firmament of stars: but we ought to remember that in these expressions we speak of what is apparent as if it were real, for the stars are not locally situated in our firmament, i.e. the blue firmament; they only seem to be so situated, because they appear there: they are separated by an interval of distance, an immeasurable interval of distance ! God spread out this firmament, by gradually clarifying the atmosphere; and into this region arose the lighter vapours, which floated among their strata, elevated above the surface of the earth, in propor tion to their natural buoyancy, while the grosser mixtures, and the heavier fluids, sunk by a kind of precipitation, to their correspondent strata on the earth below. This is what I understand by the phrase God divided, or separated, by somewhat of a chemical separation, the lower waters from the upper waters; where, we observe, that the word waters, is taken with great latitude, implying not pure waters, for as yet there were none to which that character was ap Air is a fluid, compressible, expansible, elastic; it is the vehicle of other fluids, which according to their nature diminish or increase its activity, and vary its properties by properties of their own. The atmosphere is an expanse of air, into which rise other vapours, where they form meteors which descend on the carth, rain, hail, snow; dews, mists, fogs: clouds are formed in air; and among clouds, thunder; lightning too flashes in air, and now air is the great distributor of whatever distant regions afford, to others whose expecting soil waits till it can receive the beneficent importation. THIRD DAY. SEA, EARTH, VEGETATION. Those flowing liquids which had been purified and liberated from obstructing matters by the operations appointed to the second revolution of the globe, were now enabled to pursue their natural motions, and to combine into considerable collections. God therefore directed those waters, whose weight detained them on the surface of the carth, to congregate in a fit receptacle. These the historian describes by the term, "waters under the expanse," meaning, all not raised into the atmosphere, all not mingled with atmospherical principles, all not exhaled into elevated |