Creation and Its Records Part 14

(6) AND G.o.d SAID-- (i.) Let the earth bring forth the living creature after its kind ...

the beast of the earth _after its kind (Carnivora)_, cattle _after its kind_ (_Ungulata_), and everything that creepeth on the ground _after its kind_.[1]

And also--

(ii.) Let us make man.... So G.o.d created man in His own image--in the image of G.o.d created He him; male and female created He them.

(7) Then followed the day of rest.

[Footnote 1: See page 178.] [Transcriber's Note: Chapter XIV.]

-- 2. _The Order of Events considered._

It was convenient first to bring these later Creative Acts together before beginning any remarks about any one of them.

It will now be desirable to notice what occurred, because here the question of _order_ is concerned. I could not avoid a partial statement on this subject at an earlier page, nor would it be quite sufficient simply to refer the reader back to those pages. At the risk of some repet.i.tion, I will therefore consider the subject here. It will be observed that on the older interpretation, which pa.s.sed over the special act of G.o.d in _designing_ and _publishing the design,_ and descended at once to the earth to the process of producing the designed forms, this order was matter of great importance.

Granting the supporters of this view that the six days are unequal periods often of vast duration, with or without important subdivisions, they are bound to make out that each creation began, and was at any rate well advanced, _before_ the next began. We ought, in fact, to see a period more or less prolonged when the whole of what is indicated in the _plant_ verse was well advanced, _before_ any marine or fresh-water life appeared at all.[1]

[Footnote 1: There was "evening and morning" of the third day, i.e., beginning and _completion_, and also the whole interval of the fourth day, _before_ the command of the fifth.]

All attempts to make out that this _was_ so, have proved failures. It is a.s.sumed, for instance (and justly so), that life on the globe began with low vegetable forms; these represented the "gra.s.s" of the text, and it is suggested that the "fruit tree" is represented by the Devonian and Carboniferous _conifers_. This in itself is a very strained view. It is recollected that the terms used are not scientific, but for the world at large; but without confining "fruit tree" to mean only trees having _edible_ fruit, still the appearance of a few first species of _conifers_ in the Devonian, can hardly be called an adequate fulfilment of the requirements of the pa.s.sage. But even so, myriads of fish and other animals existed _before_ the Devonian and Carboniferous plant age.

The animal forms that so existed, have therefore to be _ignored_, or are a.s.sumed to have been created without special notice: and it is said that the Mosaic period of "moving creatures of the deep," fishes and monsters, only began when the rocks begin to show _great abundance_ of sh.e.l.ls, of fish, and subsequently of huge reptilians which prepared the way for birds--which gradually make their appearance towards the Trias.

But the Devonian "age of fishes" (Devonian including old red sandstone) was far too important a period to be thus got rid of; and it is difficult to understand _why_ the narrative should exclude all the extensive and beautiful (though often little specialized) orders of marine life--all the Corals, the Mollusca and Articulata, which had long abounded--especially some of the Crustaceans, not an unimportant group of which (_Trilobite_[1]) had also culminated and almost pa.s.sed away before the Devonian; to say nothing of the fact that _land_ "creeping things" (scorpions among _crustacea_, and apparently winged insects) had occurred.

[Footnote 1: It is remarkable that the Trilobites rapidly culminated, so that we have the largest and most perfect forms, such as _Paradoxus_, with the lowest (_Agnostus_) in the same beds in Wales (Etheridge's "Phillips' Manual," Part II. p. 32).]

It is a special difficulty also, that if _insects_ are included among the "creeping things" of the _earth_ then various families of the "land-creation" (sixth day) became represented _before_ the great reptiles of the "water-creation" (fifth day).

The fact is that a glance at the subjoined Tables (which are only generally and approximately correct) will suffice to show how the main features of the progress of life-forms differ from what is required by the older methods of reading Genesis. To reduce the table within limits, I have grouped together all the lower forms of life in the animal table, viz., the sponges, corals, encrinites, and molluscs. It is sufficient to say that these appear in all the rocks except the very oldest--the Caelenterata beginning, and the Molluscoids exhibiting an early order in _brachiopoda_, which seems to be dying out. Crustaceans and insects appeared as early as Silurian times.

The idea of successive "kingdoms" or "periods," each of which was _complete_ in its actual fauna upon earth before the next was fully ushered in, can no longer be defended.

It is in the _completion_ of one cla.s.s of life before the other, that the fallacy of the period theory lies--for completion is essential to that theory which supposes "the Mosaic author" to have intended to describe the _process of production on earth_.

But it is quite impossible to deny that there _is_ a certain observable movement and gradual procession in the history of life which is exactly consistent with what is most likely to have happened, supposing the Divine designs of life-forms were first declared in successive order at short intervals of time, and then that the processes of nature worked out the designs in the fulness of time and gradually in order, each one _beginning_ before the next, but only beginning.

I do not deny that it is perfectly _conceivable_ that the Creator might have designed the forms in one order, and that the actual production or evolution of the corresponding living creatures might not have been (for reasons not understood) exactly, or even at all, coincident with the order.

But it is impossible to deny the strong feeling of probability that the commands would _begin_ to be worked out, in the order in which they were uttered.

And here it is that the correspondence which undoubtedly exists, gives rise to controversy.

From one point of view it is just enough to encourage the "period"

holders to try and arrange a scheme; but it is just hot enough to prevent their opponents (justly) taxing them with straining or "torturing" the text and failing fairly to make out their case after all. From another point of view the correspondence is so far established, and so undeniably unprecedented (in human cosmogonies) and noteworthy, as to demand imperatively our careful consideration and compel us to account for it.

It will be observed, first of all, that the whole "creation" (omitting all incidental and preparatory works) is stated in _groups_ each having an order within itself.

_Group_ 1. G.o.d created (both land and water) "vegetation"--plants yielding seed, fruit-trees.

_Group_ 2.

In water, not necessarily excluding _amphibia_:--Great aquatic monsters; fish and all other creatures that move. In air:--Winged fowl.

_Group_ 3. On land generally--for some forms are amphibious:--Beasts (_Carnivora_), cattle (_Ungulata_, &c.), and other things that creep on the ground (the smaller and lower forms of life collectively).

The order _within_ the groups is evidently of no consequence, because the writer does not adhere to it in two consecutive verses dealing with the same subject; while the "versions" seem to point to some variations in the text itself as to arrangement, though not as to substance.

But as regards the order _of_ the groups themselves, it is, as I said, very natural (but yet not logically inevitable) to expect that when the results came to be existent on earth, those results should exhibit a sequence corresponding to the order in which the groups were created.

And it is never denied (in _any_ of the most recent publications[1]) that to this extent nature confirms the belief.

[Footnote 1: I have done my best to verify this from the well-known latest Manuals of Etheridge, Seeley, and Alleyne-Nicholson.]

I am aware that Professor Huxley's recent articles may at first sight seem to go against this; but that is not so on any grounds of actual fact, but of a particular _interpretation_--which I submit is wholly unwarranted.

For instance, it is insisted that the "sea-monsters" of the second group included _sirenia_ and _cetacea_ (dugongs, manatees, and whales, dolphins, &c.), which are mammals. In that case a portion of the command would not have been obeyed--a number of the designed forms would have been kept in abeyance--for a long time. And the same is still more true if bats--a highly placed group of mammals--were included in "winged fowl."

But both these interpretations are distinctly arbitrary, incapable of holding good, and also entirely ignore the conditions of a Revelation.

The narrative is not discussed or defended as an ordinary secular narrative, which is true according to the _writer's uninspired intention or the state of his personal knowledge_. It is defended as a Revelation.

The distinction is as obvious as it is important, directly a moment's consideration is accorded.

If we a.s.sume, for a moment, that G.o.d _did_ (on any theory whatever of Inspiration) instruct, direct, or enable the writer in making the record, then it is obvious that the writer either put down what he saw in a vision, or what was in some other manner borne on his mind. In any case, he could have had no critical knowledge, and no historical knowledge as an eye-witness, of the actual facts; and he may very well therefore have used language the full meaning of which he did not apprehend.[1] What alone is essential is, that the narrative as it stands, on an ordinary critical, linguistic, and grammatical interpretation, should not contain anything which is untrue. Suppose, for example, the word "tanninim" to be _incapable_ of bearing any other meaning linguistically than "cetacean," then the narrative might be objected to; but if it will bear a meaning which is consistent with fact, then it is no matter that the writer at the time had an erroneous, or (what is more likely) no defined, idea in his own mind of the meaning. And so with "winged fowl"--the objection fails entirely, unless it can be shown, not only that the writer might have thought "bats" to be included, _but_ that linguistically the word _cannot have_ any other meaning than one which would include bats.[2]

[Footnote 1: As is constantly the case in prophetic writings. Revelation tells of the remote past sometimes as well as the future, and in neither case could the inspired writer fully understand the meaning that was wrapped up in his sentences.]

[Footnote 2: As a matter of fact, in the one case, if the writer's knowledge were of any importance, it is almost certain that he did _not_ mean _cetacean_ or _sirenian_. In the other case it is impossible to say whether he thought "bats" were included or not. It is not in the nature of things that the writer could ever have seen or even heard of a manatee or a dugong; nor is it likely that he had been a sea-farer, or could have seen any Mediterranean cetacean. As far as his own knowledge went, he probably had but a very confused idea. And if we refer to the poetic description in Psalm civ. 25, 26, we find "leviathan," though distinctly a sea creature, still one of which the writer had only a vague traditional idea, certainly not a _known_ Mediterranean dolphin, for in Job xli. the same term is applied to the crocodile.]

We have every right, then, to say that the "tanninim" of the text may be taken to refer to that great and remarkable age of Saurians which is not only of very great importance in itself, but becomes doubly so when we see its connection backward with the fishes, and forward through the Pterodactyles to Odontoformae (_Apatornis_ and _Icthyornis_) and modern winged birds (_Hesperonis_ for the Penguins); and through the Dinosaurs[1] with the Saurornithes, with the _Dinornis_ and the struthious birds; and through the Theriodonts with the mammalian _carnivora_.

[Footnote 1: And perhaps the pachydermatous mammals (Nicholson, "Zoology," p. 566).]

In that case the sequence of the two groups, plants and aquatic animal-forms, is explained. They come almost together--plants being probably actually the first, and mollusca, fishes, and saurians.

There is, further, no real dispute that the Saurians led up to the Aves, and that the third group (of mammals) follows all the members of the second group. The earliest known mammal (_microlestes_) is an isolated forerunner of not very certain location, the real bulk of the mammalian orders beginning in the Eocene. Seeing, too, how very closely one Creative command is recorded to have followed on the other, it is not in any way against the narrative that some land forms of crustaceans and insects (and possibly others) began to appear at an early stage, when the vegetable and water-animal forms had only progressed as far as the Silurian and Devonian ages. Nor should we wonder if mammalian forms had occurred earlier. I mention this because of the evident gap in the geologic record between the Cretaceous and the Eocene, and because in the article of December, 1885 (and elsewhere), Professor Huxley has used language which suggests that mammals may have existed of which the rocks give no sign. E.g. (p. 855): "The organization of the bat, bird, or pterodactyle, presupposes that of a terrestrial quadruped ... and is intelligible only as an extreme modification of the organization of a terrestrial _mammal or_ reptile." The italics are of course mine. And again (p. 855), "I am not aware that any competent judge would hesitate to admit that the organization of these animals (whales, dugongs, &c.) shows the most obvious signs of their descent from terrestrial quadrupeds."

I do not quote these words of so great a master as presuming to question them (even if, as a scientific verdict, I had any motive for so doing), but merely to point out as a matter of plain and fair reasoning, that if a Divine Creator had designed certain forms to be gradually attained by the processes of Evolution, it would not be necessary that any actually realized form or tangible creature should have existed as ancestors.

Logically, the necessity is _either_ that certain animals should have actually existed whose descendants gradually lost or gained certain features and functions till the forms we are speaking of resulted, _or_ that certain patterns or designs should have been created according to which development proceeded by regular laws till the forms in question resulted.

A few words as to the terms used in describing the contents of each group, may be added. It is obvious that the terms are intended to be exhaustive of certain main groups which are described sufficiently, without being cast in a form which would have been incompatible with the use (at the time) of a human agent as the medium of the recorded Revelation.

(1) "Vegetation" (of an indefinite character, but not bearing seed), plants bearing seed, trees bearing fruit with the seed in it--certainly exhaust the entire range of plant-life.