supporters of which have been denominated Plutonists, or Vulcanists, and Neptunists, from the means to which they respectively ascribe these effects. Each of these theorists regard the globe as having been at first a mere chaos, and ascribe its separation into its various components, to the action of their favourite elements.* This chaotic hypothesis is supported, that the mechanico-physical philosophy may prevail with the most unbounded sway. Dr. Ure, however, thus combats the idea of a pre-existing chaos :

"The Theistical Neptunists would have us believe, that our globe existed in a chaotic state since the epoch, is indefinitely remote, at which its materials were crudely congregated by Divine agency. They further say, that the same creative power endued its constituent parts with peculiar attractive and repulsive forces; and then they desire us to believe, that these forces were set in mutual conflict, through uncounted ages, for the purpose of eventually bringing order out of confusion, and producing the crystalline and stratiform arrangements observed in the crust of the earth. Now, what is gained by granting these hypothetical premises? Nothing that I can apprehend: they merely tend to shew the presumption of man, who regards the primitive structure of this terraqueous globe a labour too intricate for the instantaneons fiat of Omnipotence."

"Again, had our earth pre-existed from eternity, in chaotic confusion, as some cosmogonists have taught, in chaotic confusion it must have eternally remained. The regular order and subserviency of its parts are irresistible proofs of an originating intelligence, which, acting with unlimited power, needed not to wait the slow progress of precipitation from a chaotic fluid, for the production of one, or any other planetary spheroid. On this subject, where sound reason must apply the principles of corpuscular science, the sentiments of Newton merit the deepest attention. It seems probable to me, that God, in the beginning, formed matter in solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, moveable particles, of such sizes and figures, and with such other properties, and in such proportions to space, as most conduced to the end for which he formed them. All material things seem to have been composed of the hard and solid particles above mentioned, variously associated in the first creation by the counsels of an intelligent agent. For it became him who created them to set them in order; and if he did so, it is unphilosophical to seek for any other origin of this world, or to pretend that it might rise out of chaos by the mere laws of nature; though, being once formed, it may continue by those laws for many ages! By nature, Newton means here the series of laws imposed on matter by its Author!"-pp. 9-18,

We consider this as a very successful exposure of the absurd idea which would ascribe every phenomenon, of whatever nature or description, to material agency, and reduce every operation to the laws of physics. But surely such reasoners should reflect, that the wisdom which could conceive a chaos, and the power which could subject it to laws, by the slow and gradual operation of which it is to be remodelled, and reduced to order and regularity, could as easily have perfected his own work, and have executed,

Of course the reader will perceive that we speak the old language-water is not an elementary, but a compound, body.

by his FIAT, that which he must ultimately complete. That physical events are subordinate to moral purposes, there can be no doubt; and this appears to be the view of our author, as the following passage fully attests:

"If this earth be a school of virtue to man, under

the direction of Providence, and if public calamities the short-lived race of the present day, what penal be requisite to maintain its moral discipline over

prodigies would be necessary to restrain the wickedness of Cain and his apostate brood! The inspired historian does not indeed give, in his brief sketch of antediluvian society, any details of such occasional manifestations of divine wrath, though the disordered fabric of the globe bears ample testimony to their repeated occurrence; but in his solemn account of the concluding catastrophe, he more explicitly ascribes the physical convulsions to the indignation of Heaven! He tells us, moreover, that Noah, favoured with a prophetic view of the coming calamity, built, by divine command, a vast editice of wood, to float himself and family through an universal deluge, from which no other mode of escape would be possible. That Noah was commissioned to declare, to the reckless mortals around him, the long-suffering of God, and to preach repentance, while the ark was preparing, St. Peter expressly informs us. We may readily imagine the derision with which the unparalleled architecture of the pious patriarch was regarded by his compatriots, and the insolent defiance with which they received the admonitions of the Almighty.

"That Noah's warning voice was seconded by miraculous powers over the phenomena of nature, we are not told. But as Moses, and all his great successors, were furnished with supernatural credentials of their prophetic mission, there is little reason to doubt that to Noah also such powers of controlling or predicting events might be delegated, as would strike terror, for a time at least, into the most depraved and boldest hearts."-p. 348, 349.

We

The author has divided his work into three books; each of which is again subdivided into chapters, sections, &c. The first book treats of the primordial world, or creation; the second, discusses the phenomena of the antediluvian period, or what are termed secondary formations; while the third treats of the deluge, or that penal cataclysm which submersed the greater part of the primitive earth, and ingulfed the whole of created nature in its waters. shall now proceed to a survey of these phenomena, and submit to the reader a theory, not contradictory of scripture truth, but one consistent with and supported by revelation, while at the same time it not only confirms, but attests the truth of the sacred writings, and developes those properties of matter, and the physical powers, or rather qualities, by which the unerring wisdom of Providence planned, and finally consummated, the configuration of the globe.

It is a fact, which we know by experience, that matter appears to differ in many and essential properties, in the varieties presented to our view. Science has revealed to us that many of the varieties are but mere modes of existence. We find that the material fabric of our globe, notwithstanding the

variety of appearance and difference of character, which its different forms present, is reducible to comparatively a very small number of simple or elementary bodies. How far these bodies are really elementary is as yet but speculation, because hitherto they have not been decomposed or reduced. But it is not inconsistent with philosophical reasoning, to presume the existence of but one simple or real element; because the wisdom and the power which could endue a few elements with that variety of appearance, of form, and of character, could have endued one simple element with the capability of assuming all these various qualities; and therefore, it would have been inconsistent with the attributes of God, to have created more elements than were absolutely essential to the object in view.

Be this, however, as it may, matter, both in its elementary and compound state, is susceptible of three distinct and notable modes of existence; namely, the solid, the fluid, and the aerial, or gaseous. As an example, we may instance ice, water, and vapour, or steam, which are but different modes of one and the same entity. Science teaches us that each of these forms depends upon the relative predominance of one or other of two opposite forces; namely, attraction and repulsion. Where the former prevails, solidity is the mode of existence; where the latter, aerial is the mode. But when these contending powers are in equilibrium, or nearly so, then the condition is fluid. The force of attraction is that which, under various modifications, gives origin to cohesion, tenacity, hardness, crystallization, and gravitation. Had it prevailed exclusively, every thing would have been condensed into a motionless mass, and water and air would have been as fixed as a solid rock. This, therefore, may be regarded as the natural condition which the particles of matter have a spontaneous tendency to assume, and to which they would ultimately come, unless counteracted by the devellent, or repulsive force, named caloric, or matter of heat.

There appears to be very little doubt, that heat and light are but modifications of the same principle, or fundamental agency. Heat and light seem mere qualities -certain vibrations between the particles of matter. This follows from Sir H. Davy's beautiful experiment. Two pieces of ice were converted into water by their mutual attrition, in an atmosphere at the freezing temperature. In this experiment, since the heat required to convert the ice into water could not be derived from the surrounding cold medium, nor from the ice itself, the

capacity of which is low, we have no alternative, but to conclude, that heat must be actually generated by friction; and hence, as generated out of nothing, it cannot be any thing material, nor even an entity immaterial, or semi-material. It must, therefore, be a quality, and this quality can be only motion.

A very skilful mathematical analysis has satisfied MM. Fresnel, Poisou, and Arago, that the equations of the propagation of heat in solid bodies may be conciliated with the equations of the undulatory movements of an eminently elastic fluid.

When, therefore, the quiescent mass is pervaded by this vibratory motion, its particles necessarily renounce their contact, and being at liberty to move through space, greater or less, assume such forms as the equilibrium of the attractive and calorific power demands. Nor is fluidity, or absolute incoherence of the particles, indispensable for their changing the position of their attractive poles, and grouping themselves into new arrangements. Thus, if a mass of basalt be exposed to a high temperature, it will melt into a liquid glass, which, if quickly cooled, becomes a transparent, uniform, vitreous body. If this body be again heated for some little time, but so slightly as not even to have its substance softened, it will become throughout its whole interior a congeries of regular crystals.

Our author avails himself of these facts, to infer the original solidity, instead of the chaotic confusion, of the globe. Thus he says—

"When first the calorific energy was made to actuate the body of the earth, a mighty change would ensue. The central mass, composed most probably of the metallic bases of the earths and alkalis, as volcanic phenomena seem to attest, would fuse, the exterior parts would oxidize into the crust of mineral strata, and the outermost coat of all-the fixed ice-would melt into the moveable waters."

Dr. Ure having deduced these conclusions from physics, confirms his theory by a reference to holy writ:

"The infusion," he observes, " of this quickening energy, seems distinctly indicated by the inspired historian of the earth. In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.' This last idea has been, perhaps, more truly rendered by Milton, in the expression, dove-like, sate brooding on the vast abyss, and made it pregnant! In the sublime conception, thus finely paraphrased, may we not recognise the impregnation of the torpid sphere with elementary fire-that principle of all material activity, that power which loosens the bands of primordial cohesion, and communicates the essence of plastic mobility to a refractory solid? But for this marvellous constitution, as displayed especially in water, the face of nature would have for ever exhibited a death-like silence, and a dread repose.' The globe would have been in an unchanging and waveless ocean crust."-p.7.

Infidelity has frequently urged, with an unhallowed triumph, the absurdity of the Mosaic account of the creation, because the sacred historian asserts light to have existed three days before the sun was created. It will, however, be found, on fair examination, that the cosmogony of Moses is in perfect consistency with the discoveries of modern science.

In 1802, Dr. Young proved, before the Royal Society, the following optical laws :"That wherever two portions of the same light arrive at the eye by different routes, either exactly, or very nearly, in the same direction, the light becomes most intense when the difference of the route is any multiple of a certain length, and least intense in the intermediate state of the interfering portions and this length is different for light of different colours." Now, this law, which is the basis of a new and admirable theory of light, has been since fully adopted by Fresnel and Arago, who have enforced and illustrated it by many deep researches. It demonstrates incontestably the separate existence of a luminiferous ether, which may be made to undulate not only by the sun and other permanent foci of vibration, but by an immense number of other causes, such as the friction or the gentle heating of many mineral solids, as also by several chemical actions independent of combustion. Hence then, this ether, as being in. dispensable to the operation of every luciferous impulse, and being, in fact, the substratum or subject-matter of light, as air is of sound in general, must necessarily have had a precedent and independent existence, as Moses has declared in his narrative of the creation.

It is established by many facts, that luminous impressions may be excited without any intercourse or reference whatever to the sun. Such are the phosphorescence of minerals buried since the origin of things in the bowels of the earth; electric light caused by friction, metallic contact, or the volition of the electric eel; the luminousness of many insects, worms, and marine mollusca, in the living state; the fibres of animals and vegetables after death; and the lucid points of the moon's disc, where the sunbeams never fall-all attest that light can exist without the agency of the

sun.

For instance, the luciferous action of dead fish may be not only transfused to water, but may be afterwards brightened by a certain quantity of saline impregnation; darkened by a still greater quantity of the salt; and revived again, in all its original brilliancy, by moderate dilution with water.

Thus, a wine-glass may be filled as it were with light.

"How unphilosophical, therefore," observes Dr. Ure," to infer the absolute want, or non-existence, of light, whenever our purblind optics cannot dis. cern it? And since we know that the luciferous ether may be thrown into visible luminous undulation without the sun or stars, and into invisible luminous undulation by the sun and stars, what reason have we to conclude that similar undulations do not agitate it at all times, independently of these focal excitants? Its elastic mobility, indeed, is such, that, from the instant of its creation, or first disengagement from the primeval substance of the heavens and earth, its vibrations must have commenced, and have continued with more or less frequency and intensity to the present time.

"Had Moses written the record of creation from the informations of sense, or Egyptian learning, he would not have placed the creation of light three days prior to thecreation of the sun, moon, and stars. Accordingly, this apparent inversion of the order of natural causes and effects, this supposed anticipation of a phenomenon before the existence of its agent, has become a stumbling-block to many evildisposed minds, and a stone of offence to the impious, instead of being regarded as a motive to deeper study into nature, and of humbler faith in its Author. When, however, in the progress of research, we come to discover that Moses has de.

scribed events in their just order of sequence, an order, which reason could never suggest to him, and which has lain concealed till our own days, even from the philosopher, we are then forced to conclude, that he was inspired with a knowledge truly divine."-pp. 22, 23.

Dr. Ure next proceeds to enlarge upon the nature of light, and to prove, by a great variety of experiments, instituted principally by the French philosophers, Arago and Fresnel, &c., the undulatory theory of light. We do not detail them, because they are of too abstruse a character for the general reader, and could not be properly understood without a tolerable intimacy with the mathematics. Indeed, the chapter upon light is the most abstruse in the whole volume. However, his concluding observations are so appropriate and satisfactory, that we shall transcribe them :

"The facts now detailed are amply sufficient to prove, that not only mere space, but that even the dense forms of matter, are pervaded by a lumini. ferous medium, by whose undulatory movements the phenomena of light are produced. To the creation of this marvellous essence, the divine mandate, Let there be light,' seems to refer. Its pre-existence was necessary to the luciferous functions of the sun, and the other foci of vibration. As we know that its undulations may be excited by many causes independent of the sun, we can find no difficulty in conceiving that alter. nations of light and darkness, constituting the evening and the morning of the first three days of creation, might have taken place. A far more vivid excitation of the luminiferous ether, no doubt, commenced when the solar globes were invested, on the fourth day, with their phosphoric atmospheres, to which, most gratuitously, a state of igneous combustion has been ascribed. This is a process of waste and change, unlike the frugal economy observed in the domains of nature. What brilliant radiations may be produced by transmitting the influence of a voltaic battery through a bit of charcoal, placed in vacuo, yet the carbonaceous matter is not consumed! This light vies with the sun, but is certainly not borrowed from his beams. How, therefore, should purblind sciolists dare to cavil at the Hebrew prophet for recording

in the sublimest language, that light, the first-born offspring of heaven, enlivened the wilderness of space, before certain ponderous and inert spheroids were ordained to modify its operations! As justly might they assert, that the electric power, whether substance or quality, did not exist till philosophy mounted its cylinder, to excite luminous pheno mena."-pp. 50, 51.

Dr. Ure supposes that the whole of our globe was covered with water, and that "the gathering the waters together into one place," as detailed in Genesis, has reference to this fact, and proves it. In this view he is certainly not far wrong, for chemistry enables us to understand the means by which God effected his purpose. We find that the crust of the globe consists of six substances, silica, alumina, iron, lime, magnesia, and potash. Now, the bases of all these substances, with the exception of iron-are capable of decomposing water, even when solidified in the state of ice, with the most violent action. In the caverns of the earth, the simple bases of these substances were, as hinted before, in a state of fusion; and if we suppose water, though in the solid form of ice, admitted, the most violent action would have ensued-explosions, eruptions, and earthquakes, and the consequence would be, the upheaving of the mountains, the formation of valleys, and the driving the waters into their marine beds :

"That silica and its associated bases, which are

oxidized at the surface of the earth, and thus deprived of their elementary activity, exist at a moderate depth beneath that surface, devoid of oxygen, in the state of simple combustibles, there is little reason to doubt. The phenomena of earthquakes and volcanoes lead plainly to this conclusion. The heat observed in subterranean regions, progressively increasing as we descend, renders it probable that these combustible elements exist there in a fluid state; an effect which would result from a very moderate heat, one greatly inferior to what is requisite for the fusion of their oxides."p. 91.

From the organic remains frequently found in various parts, we learn that certain races of animals were inhabitants of the antediluvian world, which are now extinct. And we also learn that many species of animals, which can now only inhabit the tropical or Indian climates, were at that time inhabitants of England. Now, although the fossil remains of many animals, and even plants, which can neither live nor vegetate in this country, have been proved to have lived in it before the deluge,-and these too, animals of a different description, and of much more enormous growth than any of the present era-yet it is singular that no vestige of human bones have been discovered. Hence then it would appear, that the antediluvian earth which formed the habitation of man, must have disappeared altogether, and has perhaps been ingulfed 2D. SERIES, NO. 5.-VOL. I.

in some of our great oceans; and Dr. Ure thinks, probably the Pacific Ocean occupies, as its bed, the great antediluvian cou

tinent.

"I readily concede that the territories occupied by the human race were permanently submerged at the deluge-probably some great continent, corresponding to the site and area of our Pacific Ocean, which still betrays, in multiplied points of its expanse, the embers of volcanic violence. On this principle, scripture truth is not violated; and thus also, we can perfectly account for the nonappearance of the bones of man, and his companion animals, the sheep, the goat, the camel, &c., among the diluvial exuvise of all the continents hitherto explored.

A universal deluge seems clearly proved by the utter extinction of the species of the primeval race of animals, a topic which we shall afterwards discuss at some detail. Were we not informed by Moses of the universal depravity of the progeny of Cain, as well as of the descendants of Seth, whom they corrupted, a depravity to which modern crime affords parallels enow to render the history credible, we should find some difficulty in reconciling with the counsels of a benignant governor, so tremendous a catastrophe, implicating not only the human race, but myriads of animals, in a com. mon destruction. But we read that divine justice outraged, and mercy spurned, at length required

their victims. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at the heart.'

Since Geology leads us to conclude, that the earth peopled by Noah's contemporaries perished at the deluge, complete harmony is maintained between science, and a just interpretation of holy writ."-pp. 472, 473.

Now, there can be little doubt that the deluge was effected principally by the agency of those great volcanic emotions which were sufficient to upheave the beds of the antediluvian ocean, burying the antediluvian continent under its waters. If the sea, for instance, should penetrate in large quantity to the bases of the earths and alkalis in the interior of the earth, and especially if they were in a state of fusion, as already described, the explosion would be tremendous and awful in the extreme. If potassium, silicium, magnesium, calcium, &c., be merely placed in contact, there is an explosion with flame, and hydrogen gas is rapidly evolved. But if these agents should be mixed in large quantities, as probably happened at the period of the deluge, the effect would be tremendous, and quite sufficient to upheave the beds of the ocean, and inundate the continents. This effect would arise, not only by the violence of the explosion; but the heat would expand the rapidly disengaged hydrogen, and which meeting again with oxygen, and becoming fired from electricity, or some such means, would add to the catastrophe.

Till the brilliant discoveries of Sir Humphrey Davy, upon the nature and properties of the metallic bases of the alkalis and the earths, and their powerful and energetic

action upon water, physical science was wholly in the dark with respect to the theory of volcanic phenomena. But since this era, a wide field of knowledge has been explored, and the chemist who has witnessed the action of these agents, even in the minuteness of the laboratory proportions, is at no loss to conceive the direful effects of the proportions which must have been necessary to evolve those masses of rock, quartz, and other crystallized formations, the theory of which gives to the study of geology a peculiar interest; and enables us to explain, or rather to understand, those physical properties of matter, through which it pleased Providence to submerse the great antediluvian continent, with the entire of the inhabiting human race, in the vast abyss of the deep-probably, as our author suggests, the great Pacific Ocean.

Dr. Ure, too, is inclined to believe that the great bulk of the antediluvian animals, in all probability, became extinct at this general catastrophe. There can be little doubt, that the antediluvian race were of much more gigantic stature than the same species of the present era. It is also probable, that the land bore a greater ratio to the sea, during the antediluvian period, than at present, and therefore the means of subsistence was more attainable for animals of such enormous bulk.

There is one thing certain, that in the antediluvian era, the temperature of Europe and its neighbouring parts must have approximated to that of the present Indies. This is inferred from our finding the fossil remains of animals and plants, now inhabitants of the tropical zones only, under circumstances which leave no doubt of their having perished in the place of their nativity; and as having been found in Europe, they must have vegetated there. Now, the question is, how has this alteration of the temperature taken place.

Now, there can be no doubt, that many of the species-as the fossil elephant, the great martodon, the megatherium, the greatclawed megalonyx, and hyæna, the dens of which latter, in this country, have been explored most successfully by Dr. Buckland-are now all extinct. Nor does this view seem in contradiction with the scripture record:

"Had all our present animal tribes," says Dr. Ure," been propagated from the ark which rested on Ararat, or some other lofty mountain in Asia, how comes it that the kangaroo, echidne, orni

thorynchus, and wombat, are now confined to New

Holland? Not an individual of any of these remarkable species have been found in Europe, Asia,

Africa, or America. Their absence cannot be

ascribed to unsuitableness of climate, for the kangaroo and wombat have thriven well in England; and surely our immense continents offer them every variety of food and accommodation. Moses, by his silence on the great fact, of the face of the earth being revived by the creative Spirit which peopled it at first, can in no wise be said to contradict it. The critic who should construe omission into denial, would find abundant contradictions of that sort in all sacred and profane historians."-p. 501.

The monuments of antediluvian being, cannot be viewed without profound emotion. In exhuming from their beds the relics of the primeval world, we seem to evoke spirits of darkness, crime, and perdition we feel almost transported, as it were, along with them, to the judgmentseat of God, and hear the voice of many waters coming to execute the sentence of just condemnation on an "earth corrupt,

and filled with violence."

A

"Such a dismal ruin," says our author," of all organic beings, such a derangement of the fair frame of nature, seem to be irreconcileable dif ficulties in Natural Theism. For is not the wis dom of God impeached, in constructing a world on foundations so infirm; his prescience, in peopling so precarious an abode with countless myriads of exquisite mechanisms; and bis goodness, in plunging indiscriminately every tribe and family of his sentient offspring in mortal agony and death! creation replete with beauty and enjoyment, suddenly transformed by its Creator's mandate or permission, into a waste of waters, is a moral phenomenon which, certes, no system of ethics can explain. Here, metaphysics, the boasted mistress of mind, with all her train of categories, stands at fault. But here, if reason will deign to forego its pride, and implore the aid of a superior light, the Hebrew prophet will lift up the dark veil from the primeval scene. In revealing the disobedience of Adam, the atrocious guilt of Cain, and the pestilence of sin, almost universally spread among their progeny, he shows, alas! too clearly, how justice outraged, and mercy spurned, inevitably called forth the final lustration of the deluge. This conclusion no philosopher can reasonably gainsay, who considers man as a responsible agent, and this earth, with all its apparatus of organic life, as mainly subservient to his moral and intellectual

We have so far endeavoured to furnish our readers with a detail of the valuable and important principles developed in this most interesting volume. We confess, that we have been not only delighted, but instructed, by the views which it unfolds. It