the Church from the miracles of the Gospel. Jesus went about doing good. He forgave sins, healed diseases, fed multitudes, cast out devils, gave sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, speech to the dumb, and restored the dead alive to their sorrowing relatives on the moment, without one failure, by a word speaking. Nature bowed to his voice, and acknowledged the bidding of her God: and by works, such as never man did, he enforced words, such as never man spoke. Nothing mean, capricious, or ludicrous, disturbs the majestic and godlike consistency of his life, his character, his doctrines, and his deeds. Like in nature were the miracles of his Apostles.

With government and priesthood and people arrayed to put them down, thousands and tens of thousands, seeing them with hostile eyes, left all the world holds most dear, to testify at the hazard of their lives, how firmly they believed in them. From the multitudes who crowded to behold, there went forth friends and enemies, martyrs, traitors, and apostates; but, in that loud hubbub of voices, not one rises in denial. Had there been fraud, a single apostate (and there were many) would have betrayed it. Was it magic, then, and the power of demons? When we can believe that the Gospel, devised in the councils of the godhead, and announced by the wonders of omnipotence, was the work of wicked men, or of wicked angels, then shall we believe that they made the sun and the stars also, and flung them aloft into the heavens.

Let any impartial man turn from the lives of Hilarion and Antony, written by the learned and accomplished and experienced Jerome and Athanasius, to the Gospels of the fisherman and publican of Galilee; and if he still doubts that the one is of earth, and the other of heaven, we despair of convincing him.

ART. VIII.—Explanations: A Sequel to Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation. By the Author of that work. London, 1845.

ALTHOUGH the ingenious author of the "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation" sent forth his work "to take its chance of instant oblivion, or of a long and active course of usefulness in the world," without "expecting that any word of praise which the work might elicit should ever be responded to by him, or that any word of censure should ever be parried or deprecated;" yet he has felt it necessary, under the name of Explanations, to reply to the attacks which have, from so many quarters, been levelled against his Theories. There is perhaps no previous example of any scientific work having called forth such a storm of opposition. The astronomer, the geologist, the naturalist, the physiologist, and the divine, have all launched against it the thunderbolts of their wrath. They have called in question its statements-challenged its reasonings-and marshalled against it an array of science, which would have shivered the strongest fabric of human wisdom.

Believing "that the general scope of his work has been in a great measure misapprehended," and that "so much has been excepted to, justly and unjustly, on particular points, that ordinary readers might be ready to suppose its whole indications disproved," the author has been "induced to take up the pen, for the purpose of endeavouring to make good what is deficient, and reasserting and confirming whatever has been unjustly challenged in his book." Without questioning the prudence of again involving himself in controversy or calculating the chance of his putting himself to rights with his readers-or estimating the value of such a triumph, even when achieved, we must express our regret, that his acknowledgments of just criticismhis supplements of deficiency-his reassertions and confirmations of what he thought unjustly challenged, do not exhibit that candour of expression, that accuracy of information, and that modesty of discussion, which are so desirable in controversy, and so becoming in an anonymous defender. We do not complain that he has treated his opponents with actual harshness or incivility, for we believe that he is an amiable and an estimable shade; but we lament that he has overlooked their moral influence, as well as their mental power, while he has formed a sin

gular over-estimate of the capacity of the arbiters to whom he appeals. In the lengthened controversy which he pursues with the most distinguished of his geological reviewers, the tone of his argument is that of an equal, if not a superior; and he forgets how different would have been the aspect of the debate had it been conducted in person on a public arena. He chides the decisions of Cuvier and Agassiz, with the same boldness and self-complacency. He gives battle to Whewell and Herschel— now claiming them as friends-now smiting them as foes; and he denounces the whole "scientific class," as he calls them, as incapable of pronouncing a judgment upon his book.

"After discussing," says he, "the whole arguments on both sides in so ample a manner, it may be hardly necessary to advert to the objection arising from the mere fact, that nearly all the scientific men are opposed to the theory of the Vestiges. As this objection, however, is one likely to be of some avail with many minds, it ought not entirely to be passed over. If I did not think there were reasons independent of judgment, for the scientific class coming so generally to this conclusion, I might feel the more embarrassed in presenting myself in direct opposition to so many men possessing talents and information. As the case really stands, the ability of this class to give at the present a true response upon such a subject, appears extremely challengeable. It is no discredit to them that they are almost without exception engaged each in his own little department of science, and able to give little or no attention to other parts of that vast field. From year to year, and from age to age, we see them at work, adding, no doubt, much to the known, and advancing many important interests, but at the same time doing little for the establishment of comprehensive views of nature. Experiments in however narrow a walk, facts of whatever minuteness, make reputations in scientific societies; all beyond is regarded with suspicion and distrust. The consequence is, that philosophy does nothing among us-does nothing to raise its votaries above the common ideas of their time. There can, therefore, be nothing more conclusive against our hypothesis in the disfavour of the scientific class, than in that of any other section of educated men. There is even less; for the position of scientific men, with regard to the rest of the public, is such, that they are rather eager to repudiate than to embrace general views, seeing how unpopular these usually For the very purpose of maintaining their own

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respect in the concessions they have to make, they naturally wish to find all possible objections to any such theory as that of progressive development, exaggerating every difficulty in its way, rejecting, wherever they can, the evidence in its favour, and extenuating what they cannot reject; in short, taking all the well recognized means which have been so often employed in KEEPING BACK ADVANCING TRUTHS."

In support of these extraordinary opinions, our author calls upon the "reader to bring to his remembrance the impressions

which have been usually made upon him by the transactions of learned Societies, and the pursuits of individual men of science;" and as an "illustration of their deficiency in the life and soul of nature-seeking," he quotes from Sir John Herschel a passage on the uses of science, from which he concludes, not that Sir John is incapable of deciding on his Theory of Creation, but that the whole scientific class are disqualified, and that " it must be before another tribunal that the new philosophy is to be truly and righteously judged!"

The character of our author's genius, and the frailty of his judgment, are nowhere more conspicuous than in these unwise and ungenerous expressions. His estimate of scientific men shows how little he has associated with them; and his opinion of the transactions of learned Societies, and of the reputations which they embalm, proves that he has not understood, if he has perused them. In the mighty temple of science, there are not more venerable and sacred records than those which have been thus depreciated. They are the intellectual pyramids which preserve for distant ages those grand and ennobling truths, which have for nearly two hundred years illuminated Europeand those very truths, too, which have served the author as the materials of his speculation! As if he aimed at being the founder of a modern school, our author calls his philosophy new ;-an appellation not very inappropriate, as that indeed must be a new philosophy which refuses to have philosophers to judge it. If they be disqualified for the task, is it from the Royal Society of Literature-from the Antiquaries-from the political clubs-from the Agricultural Societies-or from a committee of Blue-stockings, that he is to summon the judges who are to preside at this grand inquest on the new philosophy? We presume that the author himself would not thus degrade his own speculations. The genius of such men has not been fostered among stars and planets. They have not trodden the pavement of the primitive world—nor pried into the mysteries of life-nor pondered over the functions and laws of organic and inorganic being. Our author's appeal is, therefore, to ordinary readers-to that class of the community who seek only poetry among stars, and romance among stones-and who, in our author's process of mental development, may yet ascend from the capacity of the monad to the wisdom of the crow. Their verdict has been given in the circulation of his work, and he will doubtless value and enjoy it; but in their applause, philosophers perceive his punishment, and rest with confidence in the belief, that every step which they make towards truth, will place itself in antagonism with the new philosophy.

In again directing the attention of our readers to the Vestiges

VOL. IV. NO. VIII.

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of the Natural History of Creation, we have no desire to renew the general discussion of the subject. If that be deemed necesit should be done by the eminent individual who can bring to it the highest geological knowledge, and to whom the author has, in a more special manner, thrown down the gauntlet. Our object is to consider the replies which the author of the Explanations has given to our animadversions-to place the views we entertain in a stronger and more popular light-and to examine the author's explanations in so far as they have an immediate bearing on the religious aspect of the question.

Notwithstanding the powerful objections, bearing the impress of demonstration, which have been urged against the nebular hypothesis, the author of the Explanations boldly reasserts it, and strives to sustain it by feeble and failing buttresses. He denies that it is the basis of his system of development; and, claiming it only as presumptive evidence in his favour, he is obviously prepared to support his own dogma of animal transmutations, even if the nebular and planetary hypotheses were exploded. He forgets, however, that every argument, like a weapon, has two edges, one of which must be directed against its bearer. If in the vast creations of the universe the appear ances of natural law, or of any special mode of creation, are disproved, are we not entitled to presume that the Almighty presided at every epoch of change, creating, or destroying, or modifying his works according to his will and pleasure evoking the world from its chaos-commanding light to be, when light was-summoning from the black earth its verdure-from the deep its moving creatures-man from the dust of Eden, and woman from near the heart of her help-mate. Let the nebular and planetary theories, therefore, be once overturned, as exhibitions of creation by law, and we render infinitely improbable the existence of such a law in the creation and development of animal life; and prepare the intelligent mind for the reception of those noble truths which Scripture and Reason so clearly reveal.

The author begins his defence by replying to our assertion, that after the discoveries made by Lord Rosse's telescope, it was "an unwarantable assumption that there are in the heavenly spaces any masses of matter different from solid bodies composing planetary systems.'

"The nebulæ," he 66 says, are said to be now shown as clusters of stars, rendered apparently nebulous only by the vast distance at which they are placed. There is often seen a greater vehemence and rashness

* See this Journal, vol. iii., p. 477. We might have added that the assumption was equally unwarrantable before any telescope whatever was applied to the hea

vens.