We are then told that on the next day "God said, Let the waters bring
forth abundantly the moving creatures that hath life, and fowl that may
fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And God created
great whales and every living creature which the waters brought forth
abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind, and
God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and
multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the
earth."
Is it true that while the dry land was covered with grass, and herbs,
and trees bearing fruit, the ocean was absolutely devoid of life, and so
remained for millions of years?
If Moses meant twenty-four hours by the word day, then it would make but
little difference on which of the six days animals were made; but if
the word day was used to express millions of ages, during which life was
slowly evolved from monad up to man, then the account becomes infinitely
absurd, puerile and foolish. There is not a scientist of high standing
who will say that in his judgment the earth was covered with fruit
bearing trees before the moners, the ancestors it may be of the human
race, felt in Laurentian seas the first faint throb of life. Nor is
there one who will declare that there was a single spire of grass before
the sun had poured upon the world his flood of gold.
Why should men in the name of religion try to harmonize the
contradictions that exist between Nature and a book? Why should
philosophers be denounced for placing more reliance upon what they know
than upon what they have been told? If there is a God, it is reasonably
certain that he made the world, but it is by no means certain that
he is-the author of the bible. Why then should we not place greater
confidence in Nature than in a book? And even if this God made not only
the world but the book besides, it does not follow that the book is
the best part of Creation, and the only part that we will be eternally
punished for denying. It seems to me that it is quite as important to
know something of the solar system, something of the physical history
of this globe, as it is to know the adventures of Jonah or the diet of
Ezekiel. For my part, I would infinitely prefer to know all the results
of scientific investigation, than to be inspired as Moses was.
Supposing the bible to be true; why is it any worse or more wicked
for free-thinkers to deny it, than for priests to deny the doctrine of
Evolution, or the dynamic theory of heat? Why should we be damned for
laughing at Samson and his foxes, while others, holding the Nebular
Hypothesis in utter contempt, go straight to heaven? It seems to me
that a belief in the great truths of science are fully as essential to
salvation, as the creed of any church. We are taught that a man may
be perfectly acceptable to God even if he denies the rotundity of
the earth, the Copernican system, the three laws of Kepler, the
indestructibility of matter and the attraction of gravitation. And we
are also taught that a man may be right upon all these questions, and
yet, for failing to believe in the "scheme of salvation," be eternally
lost.