Conversing with a certain Phrenologist, not long since, upon the basis of the Sabbath institution, he had occasion to inquire if we believed the world was created in six literal days. Upon our expressing an unqualified avowal of that belief, he exclaimed, "Why you seem to be behind the times. Geology shows us that it was ages on ages in forming." Geology, the reader is well aware, is the great instrument which unbelievers are endeavoring to wield against the authenticity of the Scriptures. To its deductions they bow as to the oracles of God. There are certain formations, say they, which we conjecture must have been ages on ages in reaching their present state; therefore the Mosaic record is not true. Such is a specimen of their illogical reasoning. On such conclusions as this, no better drawn and no less speedily arrived at, the Bible is set aside, and infidelity triumphs. Against the science of geology, as a science, we have of course nothing to say; but in the use which men make of it, and the conclusions they base upon it, we hazard nothing in the verdict that they make fools both of themselves and their subjects. In this declaration, however severe it may seem, we are sustained by the following quotations. The first is from a "Discussion on the Authority and Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures," held in Philadelphia, in 1854, between Joseph P. Berg, and the noted infidel, Joseph Barker, in which the Bible is vindicated against the aspersions of the latter. On p. 251, Mr. Berg says:
"My opponent has spoken with learned precision on the subject of geology. He has doubtless large acquaintance with the subject, gathered from personal investigation, for as he walks by sight, and not by faith, it cannot for a moment be supposed that so consistent a casuist as my opponent, would, in order to invalidate the Mosaic history, quote Mr. Hitchcock and expect us to receive him as authority superior to Moses. As yet, however, he has not furnished the results of his own knowledge or experience. Perhaps he will yet do so. The details will no doubt be of thrilling interest! But let him do as he may, what a miserable piece of deception and presumptuous imposture is presented in this whole ado about geological testimony. Geology, as a science, is yet in its infancy. Its oracles are as contradictory as the sophisms of Atheism. They contradict one another and they contradict themselves. Whom shall we follow? Shall we go with Buckland, when in company with Cuvier, Le Duc, Dolomieu and others; he tells us the traces of the Mosaic deluge are indubitable: or shall we believe him when in his Bridgewater Treatise, he somewhat modifies his views? Shall I take my stand with Hugh Miller, when in his Old Red Sandstone, he teaches that 'the system began with an age of dwarfs, and ended with an age of giants?' or shall I follow him in his Footprints, another of his books, in which he reverses his former theory, and at the very base of the system, 'discovers one of the most colossal of its giants,' and instead of an ascending order of progressive development, asserts a descending order of progressive degradation? Which of Lyell's contradictory positions shall I take? There is one point at least, in which all are agreed, it is this: There is not a geological theory extant which would not be overthrown, and the whole science revolutionized by the discovery of a single new fact. Miller in his Footprints, p. 313, says, speaking of geology, 'It furnishes us with no clue by which to unravel the unapproachable mysteries of creation; these mysteries belong to the wondrous Creator, and to him only. We attempt to theorize upon them, and to reduce them to law, and all nature rises up against us in our presumptuous rebellion.' Now hear him. 'A stray splinter of cone-bearing wood—a fish's skull or tooth, the vertebra of a reptile, the humerus of a bird, the jaw of a quadruped, all, any of these things weak and insignificant as they may seem, become in such a quarrel, too strong for us and for our theory—the puny fragment in the grasp of truth, forms as irresistible a weapon as the dry bone did in that of Samson of old, and our slaughtered sophisms lie, piled up heaps upon heaps, before it.' This is the testimony of a man who is a geologist. Whether my opponent is, or is not, I cannot say. If he is, instead of asserting things as geological facts, it would be his duty to prove them, for he may rest assured his assertions will carry very little force of conviction, in a Christian community. The probability is, he is not a practical geologist at all. If he were, he would not preach Hitchcock, praise Hitchcock, and to all practical purposes, if not swear, at least affirm by Hitchcock as busily as he does! And is this the kind of evidence upon which the Bible is to be discarded! Are we to take the mutterings of geological wizards, who peep out of the dust, as louder and better truths than the dictates of this book, when the best of them, the man who stands in the front rank of geologists, admits that a stray splinter of wood, or the wing-bone of a bird, would be weapon enough to beat the brains out of the best system geologists have ever devised? Oh! what faith my opponent has in Hitchcock; and yet I have very little doubt, if the truth were known, other parts of Hitchcock's book might be used to show that in rejecting the Mosaic history of the deluge, he is at variance not only with the Bible, but with his own principles. Geologists must be more modest. Let them tarry in Jericho till their beards are grown; and when the science which they are cultivating is out of its cradle, and able to stand erect upon its own feet, the first impulse of its generous manhood will be to proclaim from the very heart of this great earth which Jehovah has made, that the Bible is the book of God as surely as heaven and earth declare his glory and show his handiwork!"
The following facts also from "Nelson's Cause and Cure of Infidelity," pp. 19-22, belong in the same catalogue as showing the utter fallacy of geological assumptions:
"An English traveler, Brydone, wrote and published a description of mount Etna. He describes her craters and her extended slope, covered occasionally for twenty miles or more, along the side of the mountain, with vines, villages, and luxuriance. These are sometimes destroyed by the river of melted lava which issues from the mountain above, many feet deep, and a mile—perhaps more, sometimes less—in width, bearing all before it, until it reaches the sea and drives back its boiling waves. After this burning stream has cooled, there is seen, instead of blooming gardens, a naked, dreary, metallic rock. Sometimes many eruptions occur in the course of a year, breaking out at different parts of the mountain, and sometimes none for half a century. The traveler found a stream of lava congealed on the side of the mountain, which attracted his notice more than others. He thought it must have been thrown out by an eruption, which was mentioned by perhaps Polybius, as occurring nearly seventeen hundred years since. There was no soil on it. It was as naked as when first arrested there. The particles of dust floating through the air had not fallen there, so as to furnish hold for vegetation, and these vegetables had not grown and decayed again and again, thus adding to the depth of the soil. Such a work had not even commenced. He tells us that on some part of that mountain, near the foot, if you will sink a pit, you must pass through seven different strata of lava, with two feet of soil between them. Upon the supposition that two thousand years are requisite for the increase of earth just named, he asks how seven different layers could be formed in less than fourteen thousand years. The chronology of Moses makes the world not half as old. The Englishman was jocular at this discovery, and his admirers were delighted at what seemed to them a confutation of the book of heaven. How many thousands through Europe renounced their belief of revelation with this discovery for their prop, the author of this treatise is unable even to conjecture. It seems that many parts of Europe almost rang at the news of the analogical theory. True, the traveler only conjectured that he had found the lava mentioned by the ancient writer; but no matter, supposition only was strong enough to rivet their unbelief. The author has conversed with those in America, and on her western plains, who would declare they believed not a word of the Bible, because there was no soil on a stratum of lava, which, in all probability, had been there long.
"Another learned Englishman, an admirer of the books of Moses, wrote to those who seemed to joy so greatly in their new system. He told them, that inasmuch as they seemed fond of arguing from analogies, he would give them an additional one. He reminded them that the cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii were buried by the eruption in which the elder Pliny lost his life, near seventeen hundred years since. Those cities have lately been discovered; and in digging down to search their streets, six different strata of lava are passed through, with two feet of earth between them. And the famous Watson tells them, that if six different soils near Vesuvius could be formed in seventeen hundred years, perhaps seven might be made elsewhere in five thousand years.
"Might we not suppose, that those who had renounced their belief of Christianity, after reading some conjectures concerning Etna, would have renounced their faith as soon as these Vesuvius facts were placed before them? No, it was not so. It was easy to descend, but they never re-ascended. Men love darkness rather than light. Thousands who snatched at the objection with joyful avidity never read the confutation. They never inquired for an answer. Those who read were afterwards silent, but remained unaltered. A lawyer who stood so high with his fellow-citizens, for worth and intelligence, that he filled many offices of trust, had his credence of the sacred page shaken by reading the imaginary system built on the surface of Etna's lava streams. He took the book to a friend, to show him what reason we have for casting off our reverence for the Bible. This friend turned over a few pages of the book, where this same traveler, after telling how many eruptions sometimes happen in the course of a month, goes on to narrate the following history:
"Our landlord at Nicolasi," he says, "gave us an account of the singular fate of the beautiful country near Hybla, at no great distance from hence. It was so celebrated for its fertility, and particularly for its honey, that it was called Mel Passi, the Honey Land, till it was overwhelmed by the lava of Etna; and having then become totally barren, by a kind of pun its name was changed to Mal Passi, the Mean Land. In a second eruption, by a shower of ashes from the mountain, it soon re-assumed its ancient beauty and fertility, and for many years was called Bel Passi, the Beautiful Land. Last of all, in the unfortunate era of 1669 it was again laid under an ocean of fire, and reduced to the most wretched sterility, since which time it is known again by its second appellation of Mal Passi."
"The lawyer was asked if his difficulties were in any way obviated by this rapidity of change from soil to nakedness, and from nudity to soil again, narrated by the same original discoverer of the whole theory. He answered in the negative, and continued obstinately to cast away the book of God. Thousands of cases happen continually, where the individual is as readily and as speedily turned into the path of infidelity, and when once there, continues to trace it with invincible pertinacity. Men, without knowing it, love darkness rather than light."