Oriental Wealth
DR. JOHN KITTO.—The inhabitants of the Hauran, beyond Jordan, in or near which was the very country of Job, still estimate the wealth of a person by the number of his oxen, sheep, etc.—Pict. Bib., In loco.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM, LL. D., F. R. S.—The rich country of Gilead, Ammon and Moab was pre-eminently the land of sheep pasture, as it is to this day.... I have sat under the tent of a Beni Sakk'r sheikh, who pastures his sheep in the ancient plains of Moab, and boasts of counting 30,000 in his flocks.
—Nat. Hist. of Bib., p. 134.
ARISTOTLE.—Now some men in upper Asia possess as many as three thousand camels.—Hist. Animal, ix., 37, § 5
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM.—We have seen in the north of Palestine herds of several hundred she-asses kept together for breeding.—Nat. Hist. of Bib., p. 41.
Divine Hedge
REV. JOSEPH ROBERTS.-In the East, it is said of a man who cannot be injured, " Why attempt to hurt him? is there not a hedge about him? " " Yes, yes; the Modeliar has become his hedge. "Orient. Illust., p. 254
Job's Calamities
Job 1:14,1514And there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them: 15And the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (Job 1:14‑15).—And there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses were feeding beside them: and the Sabeans fell upon them, and took them away; yea, and they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
DR. W. M. THOMSON.—And, by the way, this Jaulan was Job's country. His flocks and herds roamed over these same wild " walks," and were exposed to the very same dangers that now task the courage of these Arab shepherds. In these inaccessible ravines were the lion's den, the tiger's lair, and pits for bears and wolves; and across these vast plateaus the flying bands of Sabean robbers roved in search of plunder. The country, the people, the manners and customs, temain unchanged from remote antiquity. Job was a great emir of the Hauran; and if he were there now, he might find the same kind of enemies to plunder and kill, and even natural phenomena very similar to the great fire that burnt up the sheep, and the mighty wind from the wilderness that overturned the houses of his children. Destructive fires often sweep over the desert, and angry hurricanes hurl to the ground the habitations of man.—The Land and the Book, II., 16.
Job 1:1616While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (Job 1:16).—While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep, and the servants, and consumed them; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
DR. HENRY J. VAN-LENNEP.—Danger sometimes comes from another source: when one of those sudden storms of rain arises which characterize the autumnal season in Western Asia, the helpless flock of sheep, frightened by the voice of thunder, huddle together under the nearest tree, and are not infrequently killed by the lightning. We have repeatedly known a large number of them to be thus destroyed; and the shepherd has himself sometimes met the same fate.—Bible Lands, p. 184.
Job 1:1717While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have carried them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee. (Job 1:17).—While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have carried them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword; and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.
XENOPHON.—CYRUS asked Tigranes which were the mountains from whence the Chaldeans made their incursions to plunder the country. Tigranes showed them to him. Cyrus looking around, observed a great part of the Armenian territory to be desert and uncultivated by reason of the war. One of the Chaldeans said to Cyrus that there were some of the Chaldeans who lived by plunder, and who neither knew how to apply themselves to work nor were able to do it.— Cyropœdia, lib. iii., c. 2.
REV. J. ROBERTS.—To "shave the head " in token of distress or grief, is a custom in all parts of the East at this day. A son on the death of his father, or a woman on the decease of her husband, has the head shaved in token of sorrow.-Orient. Ill., p. 118.
Job 1:2121And said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord. (Job 1:21).—The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord. EPICTETUS.—Why do I wish to retain what is granted only for a time? He who gave, takes away: why then do I resist?—Epictet., 1. iv., c. I.
IDEM.—Receive back again the things which thou hast given me, and assign them to whatever place thou wilt; for they were all thine, and thou gavest them me.—Ibid., c. 10.
IDEM.—Never say of anything, " I have lost it," but "I have restored it." " Is your child dead? It is restored. Is your wife dead? She is restored. Is your estate taken away? Well, and is not that likewise restored?"—Enchir., c. II.
Job's Wife
HOMER.—From God's own hand descend our joys and woes, These he decrees, and he but suffers those.—Odyss., 1. xiv., v. 444.
PYTHAGORAS.—Whatever misfortunes may afflict you by the will of the gods, bear your fate patiently, and submit without anger.—Aur. Car., v. 18.
Job's Friends
Job 22:1111Or darkness, that thou canst not see; and abundance of waters cover thee. (Job 22:11)—Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that was come upon him... they came to mourn with him, and to comfort him.
ARISTOTLE.—The presence of friends is agreeable both in prosperity and adversity; for those who are in pain feel lightened when their friends grieve with them.—Eth., 1. ix., c. II.
REV. JOSEPH ROBERTS.—In the East, those who go to sympathize with the afflicted, are often silent for hours together. As there were seven days for mourning in the Scriptures, so is it here; and the seventh day is always the most sorrowful. The chief mourner, during the whole of these days, will never speak, except when it is absolutely necessary: when a visitor comes in, he simply looks up, and then bows down his head.—Oriental Illustrations, p. 256.
Job Cursing the Day of His Birth
OVID.—Behold my birth-day comes round at its appointed time; but to no purpose, for of what use was it to me to be born? Why didst thou come, cruelly bringing with thee an additional year of misery to the exile? If thou hadst any care of me, in that place where first I was born an infant, thou wouldst have tried to be my last day as well as my first.—Trist., lib. iii., Eleg. 13.
PLUTARCH.—The Athenians having invented a foolish story about a quarrel between Neptune and Minerva, joined with it another fable, as if to correct the inconsistency of it. For they blotted out of the calendar the second day of the third Attic month, on which this quarrel took place. Why should not we, if we have any difference with our kinsfolks, condemn that day to oblivion, and reckon it among the inauspicious days never to be mentioned?—De. Frat. Am., c. 18.
HOMER.—
Would heaven, ere all these dreadful deeds were done,
The day that showed me to the golden sun
Had seen my death! Why did not whirlwinds bear
The fatal infant to the fowls of air?
—Iliad, VI., 345.
HERODOTUS. —Death is the most delightful refuge of the unfortunate.— Herodt., 1. vii., 46.
SOPHOCLES. —To those who die, there is no more toil.—Track., v. 1175.
EURIPIDES. —The tearless dead forget their troubles.—Troad., v. 602.
PLINY.—So numerous are the evils of life that death is given to man as his. chief good.—Hist. Nat., l. ii., c. 5.
HORACE.—But death the unhappy wretch receives, And from the toils of life relieves.—Hor., 1. ii., c. 18.
Evil Passions
Joh. 5: 2.—For wrath killeth the foolish man, and envy slayeth the silly one.
THOMAS WATSON, M. D.—Very many diseases have a mental origin: and perhaps there is no cause of corporeal disease more clearly made out, or more certainly effective, than protracted anxiety and distress of mind.—Our passions and emotions also, nay, even some of our better impulses, when strained or perverted, tend to our physical destruction.—Principles and Practice of Physic, p. 59.
GEORGE MOOR E, M. D.—Our passions are the grand conservators as well as disturbers of the healthy action of our bodies. Indeed, they often act with no less power than the most heroic medicines, and are as rapid, and sometimes as fatal in their operation, as prussic acid, or any other deadly poison.—Power of the Soul over the Body, p. 224.
Heir of Trouble
HOMER. —
But all, what is there of inferior birth
That breathes or creeps upon the dust of earth;
What wretched creature, of what wretched kind,
Than man more weak, calamitous and blind?
A miserable race.—
Iliad, lib. xvii., v. 446.
MENANDER.—Thou art a man—reason enough for being miserable.—Stob., 98.
ANACREON.—What avails heart-rending care, Since mortal man is sorrow's heir.—Carmen, 41.
God's Works
REV. ALBERT BARNES.—HOW soon does man get to the extent of his faculties; and what vast oceans of knowledge lie now unexplored, as in the time of Newton? —On what points, outside of the small circle of the mathematical demonstrations, is Science certain? What is light? What is matter? What is galvanism? What is gravitation? What is attraction? What is heat? What is life? How many are the original elements of matter? In what proportions do they combine? and by what power are they held in combination? How many are the Worlds that roll above us? What is the duration of our globe? When and how was it formed and molded? And what exact changes has it undergone? Is there any one of these and numberless kindred points on which the views of scientific men are settled and certain? Is there any one on which there are not many and shadowy opinions?—Evidences of Christianity in the Nineteenth Century, p. 88, 89.
GOLDWIN SMITH.—The sum of Physical Science-compared with the comprehensible universe and with conceivable time, not to speak of infinity and eternity, it is the observation of a mere point, the experience of an instant.—Lectures on the Study of History, p. 86.
HERBERT SPENCER.—After no matter how great a progress in the colligation of facts, and the establishment of generalizations ever wider and wider-after the merging of limited and derivative truth's) in truths that are larger and deeper, has been carried on no matter how far; the fundamental truth remains as much beyond reach as ever. The explanation of that which is explicable, does but bring out into greater clearness the inexplicableness of that which remains behind.
Alike in the, external and the internal worlds, the man of science sees himself in the midst of perpetual changes of which he can discover neither the beginning nor the end. In all directions his investigations eventually bring him face to face with an insoluble enigma; and he evermore clearly perceives it to be an insoluble enigma.—First Principles, I., 3, § 21.
PROF. JOHN TYNDALL, LL. D., F. R. S.—If you ask me whether Science has solved, or is likely to solve, the problem of this universe, I must shake my head in doubt. We have been talking of matter and force; but whence came matter, and whence came force? Who made all these starry orbs? -Science makes no attempt to answer. As far as I can see, there is no quality in the human intellect which is fit to be applied to the solution of the problem. The phenomena of matter and force lie within our intellectual range, and as far as they reach we will at all hazards push our inquiries. But behind, and above, and around all, the real mysteries of this universe remain unsolved: and here the true philosopher will bow his head in humility, and admit that all he can do in this direction is no more than what is within the compass of an ordinary child.—Lecture to Working Men, at Dundee, 1867.
PROF. J. R. COOKE.—From the whole surface of the globe water is constantly evaporating into the aqueous atmosphere which surrounds it. The heated air from the tropics, heavily charged with moisture, is continually moving towards the colder regions, both of the north and of the south; and as the current thus becomes, chilled, the vapor is slowly condensed, and the water showered down in fertilizing rains on the land. Thus it is that those beautiful provisions, which we see in the rain, all depend on the presence of the air, and result from a careful adjustment of the properties of aqueous vapor to the exact density of our atmosphere. "Hath the rain a father? " Science, by discovering these evidences of skilful adaptation, has most conclusively answered this question, and the answer is the same now as in the days of Job. " Behold, God is great.. He maketh small the drops of water: they pour down rain according to the vapor thereof." —Religion and Chemistry, p. 131.
Poisoned Arrows
WM. ALDIS WRIGHT, M. A.—Here reference seems to be made to the custom of anointing arrows with the venom of a snake, a practice the origin of which is of very remote antiquity, (as appears from Homer and others.) The Soanes, a Caucasian race mentioned by Strabo, were especially skilled in the art. Pliny mentions a tribe of Arab pirates who infested the Red Sea, and were armed with poisoned arrows like the Malays of the coast of Borneo. For this purpose the berries of the yew-tree were employed. The Gauls used a poisonous herb; and the Scythians dipped their arrow points in vipers' venom mixed with human blood. These were so deadly that a slight scratch inflicted by them was fatal.-Smith's Dict. of the Bible, p. 2561.
Deceitful Friends
REV. W. M. THOMSON, D. D.—The phenomena of streams in this country aptly illustrate the character of false friends. In winter, when there is no need of them, they are full, and strong, and loud in their bustling professions and promises; but in the heat of summer, when they are wanted, they disappoint your hope. You think your fields will be irrigated, and yourself and your flocks refreshed by them, when lo! they deal deceitfully and pass away. Nearly all the streams of this country, "what time they wax warm," thus, vanish, go to nothing, and perish. Such were Job's friends. There is another illustration equally pertinent. You meet a clear, sparkling brook, and, so long as you follow it among the cool mountains, it holds cheerful converse with yet by its merry gambols over the rocks; but, as soon as you reach the plain, "where it is hot," it begins to dwindle, grow sad and discouraged, and finally fails altogether. Those which suggested the comparison of Job probably flower down from the high lands of Gilead and Bashan, and came to nothing in the neighboring desert; for it is added that " the troops of Teman looked, the companies of Sheba waited for them, and were confounded because they had hoped." It was in those high mountains only that Job would become familiar with the winter phenomena, where the streams are "blackish by reason of ice; " for not only are Lebanon and Hermon covered with snow in winter and the brooks there frozen, but the same is true also of the higher parts of tilt Hauran, and of the mountains to the south of it, where Job is supposed to have resided.—The Land and the Book, Vol. II., p. 231.
Watching the Shadow
REV. J. ROBERTS.—The people in the East measure time by the length of their shadow. Hence, if you ask a man what time it is, he immediately goes into the sunshine, stands erect, then locking where his shadow terminates, he measures the length with his feet, and tells you the time with tolerable exactness. Thus they 'earnestly desire the shadow, which indicates the time for leaving their work. A person wishing to leave his toil, often cries out, '` How long my shadow is coming." When asked, “Why did you not come sooner? " his answer is, " Because I waited for my shadow."—Orient. Illust., p. 261.
The Dead Return Not
Job 7:1010He shall return no more to his house, neither shall his place know him any more. (Job 7:10).—He shall return no more to his house; neither shall his place know him any more. EGYPTIAN PAPYRUS.—NO man comes from thence who tells of their sayings, who tells of their affairs, who encourages our hearts. Ye go to the place whence they return not.—Festal Dirge; See Records of the Past, Vol. IV., p.
ASSYRIAN INSCRIPTIONS.—To the house men enter—but cannot depart from: to the road men go—but cannot return.—Legend of Ishtar; See Records of the Past, Vol. I., p. 143.
Man's Frailty and Corruption
ANACREON.—
Ah, with what unwearied pace
The ceaseless wheel of life runs on!
Just like the chariot's rapid race,
How swift the course, how quickly run!
Yet thus, alas, our moments fly,
Thus pass our fleeting years away;
And soon shall we neglected lie,
A little dust, a lump of clay.
—Carmen, 4.
PLUTARCH.—All our life is but a moment of time.—De Lib. Ed., c. 17.
IDEM.—The whole course of man's life is as nothing.—De Ser. Num. vind., c. 9.
ÆSCHYLUS.—
Were all the mighty streams that wind
Their mazy progress to the main,
To cleanse this odious spot, in one combined,
The streams combined would flow in vain.
—Choeph., v. 7 G.
God Unsearchable
PHILEMON.—Believe in God and worship; but do not investigate, for you will then have nothing but investigation for your pains.—Philem. apud Stob.
CICERO. —If you should ask me what God is, or what his character and nature are, I should follow the example of Simonides, who, when Hiero, the tyrant, proposed the same question to him, desired a day to consider it. When he required his answer the next day, Simonides begged two days more; and as he kept constantly desiring double the number which he had required before, instead of giving his answer, Hiero with surprise asked him his meaning in doing so. ''Because," says he, "the longer I meditate on it the more obscure it appears to me."—De Nat. Deor., lib. i., cap. 22.
PROF. CHARLES HODGE, D. D., LL. D.—As the human mind is finite, and conceives by defining the limits of its thought, and as God is known to us to be infinite, it is evident that the human mind can never be capable of conceiving God adequately as he is, or of defining his being.—Syst. of Theol.
BISHOP R. WATSON, D. D., F. R. S.—What think you of an uncaused cause of everything? of a Being who has no relation to time, not being older to-day than he was yesterday, nor younger to-day than he will be to-morrow? who has no relation to space, not being a part here, and a part there, or a whole anywhere? What think you of an omniscient Being who cannot know the future actions of a man? Or, if his omniscience enables him to know them, what think you of the contingency of human actions? And if human actions are not contingent, what think you of the morality of actions, of the distinction between vice and virtue, crime and innocence, sin and duty? What think you of the infinite goodness of a Being who existed through eternity without any emanation of his goodness manifested in the creation of sensitive beings? Or, if you contend that there has been an eternal creation, what think you of an effect coeval with its cause, of matter not posterior to its Maker? What think you of the existence of evil, moral and natural, in the work of an Infinite Being, powerful, wise and good? What think you of the gift of freedom of will, when the abuse of freedom becomes the cause of general misery? I could propose to your consideration a great many other questions of a similar tendency.—Reply to Thomas Paine, Letter X.
Job 12:7-50.—But ask now the beasts, and they shall teach thee; and the fowls of the air, and they shall tell thee: or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee; and the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee. Who knoweth not in all these that the hand of the Lord hath wrought this? in whose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind.
DR. JOHN MASON Goon, F. R. S., F. R. S. L.—Everything in nature—the beasts of the field, the fowls of heaven, every inhabitant of the earth and sea, and everything that befalls them, are the work of his hands; and everything feels and acknowledges Him to be the universal Creator and Controller. This is the common doctrine of all nature.—Note, In loco.
DR. WILLIAM B. CARPENTER, M. A. S.—God is the efficient cause alike for the simplest and most minute, and of the most complicated and most majestic phenomena of the universe.— General and Comparative Physiology, p. 1080.
PROF. WILLIAM WHEWELL, F. R. S.—The agency of the Divine Being pervades every portion of the universe, producing all action and passion, all permanence and change.—IVth Bridg. Treat., p. 185.
SIR JOHN HERSCHEL. —We would no way be understood to deny the constant exercise of God's direct power in maintaining the system of nature, or the ultimate emanation, of every energy which material agents exert, from his immediate will, acting in conformity with his own laws.—Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy, p. 37.
SIR ISAAC NEWTON.—The various portions of the world, organic and inorganic, can be the effect of nothing else than the wisdom and skill of a powerful ever-living Agent, who being in all places, is more able by his will to move the bodies within his boundless uniform sensorium, and thereby to form and reform the parts of the universe, than we are by our will to move the parts of our own body.-Optics, in fine.
Man's Mortality
Job 14:7-107For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease. 8Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof die in the ground; 9Yet through the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant. 10But man dieth, and wasteth away: yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he? (Job 14:7‑10).—For there is hope of a tree if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease. Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof die in the ground; yet through the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant. But man dieth and wasteth away; yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he?
PLUTARCH.—Pericles wishing to restrain his soldiers from an attack which seemed to him too hazardous, endeavored to bring them to reason by observing that trees when lopped will soon grow again, but when men are cut off, the loss cannot be repaired.—Pericles, c. 33.
MOSCHUS.—
Though fade crisp Anise and Parsley's green
And vivid Mallows, from the garden scene,
The balmy breath of spring their life renews,
And bids them flourish in their former hues:
But we, the great, the valiant, and the wise,
When once the seal of death bath closed our eyes,
Lost in the hollow tomb, obscure and deep,
Slumber, to wake no more, one long unbroken sleep.
—IDYL., iii., v. 106.
Human Depravity
XENOPHON— cannot see any mortal alive who goeth through life without committing some offense.—Hist. Grœc., 1. vi., c. 3.
PLATO —I am led to wonder whether there are any men really good; and if there are, what can be the manner of producing good men?—Meno., c. 37.
PLATO.—Socrates And is not he who does ill miserable?
Alcibiades. Yes, very.—Alcib, i., c: 29.
ISOCRATES.—Never imagine that you can conceal a bad action, for though you hide it from others, your conscience will remind you of it.—Orat., i.
REV. W. M. THOMSON, D. D.—The olive is the most prodigal of all fruit-bearing trees in flowers. It literally bends under the load of them. But then not one in a hundred comes to maturity. The tree casts them off by millions, as if they were of no more value than flakes of snow, which they closely resemble. So it will be with those who put their trust in vanity. Cast off, they melt away, and no one takes the trouble to ask after such empty useless things.—The Land' and the Book, i., 72.
The Counsel of One at Ease
TERENCE.—
How readily do men at ease prescribe
To those who're sick at heart! distressed like me,
You would not talk thus.
—Andr., Act II., sc. 1.
Inscriptions in Rock and Lead
DR. JOHN KITTO.—All our existing information points to stone, as the substance on which the art of writing was first employed; and men continued to engrave important documents on stone in times long subsequent to that in which writing was made subservient to the intercourse of life and the service of literature. Ancient inscriptions on the surface of perpendicular rocks are still found in different parts of Asia, many of them of such early date, that the knowledge of the characters in which they were written is lost.—Pict. Bib., Vol. I., p. 272.
M. GOGUET.—There was nothing in all antiquity more famous than the columns erected by Osiris, Bacchus, Sesostris, and Hercules, to perpetuate the remembrance of their respective expeditions. Still more renowned were the pillars or tables of stone on which Thoth, the Egyptian Hermes, is said to have written his theology and the history of the first ages. In Crete there existed very ancient columns, charged with inscriptions detailing the ceremonies practiced in the sacrifices of the Corybantes. In the time of Demosthenes (B. C. 350) there still existed at Athens a law of Theseus inscribed on a stone pillar.— Origine des Lois, Vol. I., p. 204.
IBN MOKRI.—The inhabitants of southern Arabia were accustomed, in' the remotest ages, to inscribe laws and wise sayings on tables and pillars of stone: And, " more durable than what is engraven on stone," became at length a common proverb among them.—Burder's Oriental Literature, Vol. I., p. 198.
W. ALDIS WRIGHT, M. A.—Job seems to allude to the ancient practice of carving inscriptions upon stone, and pouring molten lead into the cavities of the letters, to Tender them legible, and at the same time preserve them from the action of the air. Frequent references to the use of leaden tablets for inscriptions are found in ancient writers. Pausanias saw Hesiod's “Works and Days” graven on lead, but almost illegible with age. Public proclamations, according to Pliny, were written on lead; and the name of Germanicus was carved on leaden tablets. Eutychius relates that the history of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus was engraved on lead by the Cadi.—Smith's Dict. of Bible, p. 1619.
Man Cannot Profit God
PLATO.—Tell me what advantage the gods derive from the gifts which they receive from us? The advantage arising from what they give is clear to every one; for we have no good at all which they do not impart. But how are they benefited by what they receive from us?—Euthyph., c. 18.
Height of the Stars
DR. JOHN HENRY KURTZ.—The human mind is filled with wonder in contemplating the grand scale on which magnitude, motion, and distance are displayed even in the planetary heavens. Jupiter lies at the distance of 495,000,000 miles, Saturn at 906,000,000 miles, Uranus 1822,000,000 miles, and Neptune at 3000,000,000 miles... But mounting up to higher spheres... Struve chose for observation the brilliant star Vega, and found its distance to be no less than 75,000,000,000,000 of miles. Bessel calculated the star 61 Cygni to lie at the distance of 56, 000,000,000,000 of miles. And Peters has estimated the distance of the Pole star to be more than 280,000,000,000,000 of miles—a distance which light cannot traverse in less than forty-three years. And Midler has computed that it would require 2,934 years for light to pass from the nearest point in the Milky Way to the earth, and from its most distant point no less than 3,836 years!—The Bible and Astronomy, chap. v., § 2, 6.
House-Breaking
ARISTOPHANES. —Some wall-digger has crept into the house. —Plut., v. 204.
MENANDER.—You dig through your neighbor's walls. —Apud. Eurip.
STRABO.—Autolycus, who lived on Parnassus, was in the habit of digging through the houses of his neighbors, which is the common practice of every house-breaker.—Strab., 1. ix., c. 5.
The Earth's Position
DR. WILLIAM FRASER.—Sir Isaac Newton could not have more succinctly stated the position of the earth, nor could any of our meteorologists give fitter outline of our cloud system than this and similar descriptions given in this book. —Blending Lights, p. 80.
Treasures of the Earth
Job 28:1-121Surely there is a vein for the silver, and a place for gold where they fine it. 2Iron is taken out of the earth, and brass is molten out of the stone. 3He setteth an end to darkness, and searcheth out all perfection: the stones of darkness, and the shadow of death. 4The flood breaketh out from the inhabitant; even the waters forgotten of the foot: they are dried up, they are gone away from men. 5As for the earth, out of it cometh bread: and under it is turned up as it were fire. 6The stones of it are the place of sapphires: and it hath dust of gold. 7There is a path which no fowl knoweth, and which the vulture's eye hath not seen: 8The lion's whelps have not trodden it, nor the fierce lion passed by it. 9He putteth forth his hand upon the rock; he overturneth the mountains by the roots. 10He cutteth out rivers among the rocks; and his eye seeth every precious thing. 11He bindeth the floods from overflowing; and the thing that is hid bringeth he forth to light. 12But where shall wisdom be found? and where is the place of understanding? (Job 28:1‑12).—Surely there is a vein for the silver, and a place for gold where they fine it. Iron is taken out of the earth, and brass is molten out of the stone. He setteth, etc.
PRINCIPAL J. W. DAWSON, LL. D., F. R. S., etc.—This passage brings before is the repositories of the valuable metals and gems, and the wonderful structure of the earth itself; green and productive at the surface, rich in precious minerals beneath, and deeper still the abode of intense subterranean fires... How true is all this! A poet of to-day could scarcely say more of subterranean wonders or say it more truthfully and beautifully; nor could he arrive at a conclusion most pregnant with the highest philosophy than the closing words:
The fear of the Lord, that is wisdom;
And to depart from evil is understanding.
—Nature and the Bible, p. 103
The Wind and Rain and Lightning
Job 28:24-2624For he looketh to the ends of the earth, and seeth under the whole heaven; 25To make the weight for the winds; and he weigheth the waters by measure. 26When he made a decree for the rain, and a way for the lightning of the thunder: (Job 28:24‑26).—For he looked' to the ends of the earth, and seeth under the whole heaven; to make the weight for the winds; and he weigheth the waters by measure. When he made a decree for the rain, and a way for the lightning of the thunder; then did he see it, and declare it; he prepared it, and searched it out.
THE COMPILER. —In these verses, modern investigations are, to a remarkable degree, anticipated by the pen of Inspiration. Here are clearly recognized the grand principles upon which are built our whole science of Meteorology: 1. The pressure of the "wind" or atmosphere. 2. The "weight and measure" of water. 3. The "decree," or law, according to which rain is formed and distributed. 4. The “way" followed by the currents of the lightning of thunder.
The weight for the winds.—People, in general, are not aware, because they are not conscious, of any weight resting upon them from the atmosphere, yet reliable experiments prove that at the sea-level it presses with a force equal to 41.3/5 pounds on every square inch, or 2,100 pounds on every square foot, or more than 29,060,000 of tons on every square mile; or, on the whole surface of the earth, with a weight equal to that of a solid globe of lead 60 miles in diameter. —See my work entitled Work Days of God, p. 208.
He weigheth the waters by measure.-Water, in its natural state, is 800 times heavier than atmosphere.—Ibid., p. 222.
He made a decree for the rain.—Exact and beautiful, indeed, is the "decree," or law, according to which rain is formed and distributed over the face of the earth. That such a weighty element as water should rise and float in thin air, but for our experience, would appear to us as unlikely and impossible as that the gravel at the bottom of a lake should rise and swim on its surface. Yet God contrived a method, “yea, He searched it out and prepared it," by which this is effected with infinite ease every day. In what way, then, does water climb into the firmament, and float at the rarefied altitudes of three or four miles, and even six miles, where cloudlets are sometimes seen? The atmosphere is so constituted as to be capable of absorbing moisture and retaining it in an invisible state; the warmer the air, the greater is its capacity for this. The air in a room measuring sixty feet each way, and at a temperature of 68° Fhr., is capable of taking up and holding no less than 25.2 pounds of water. Now, by the action of heat, water is converted into steam or vapor; and in this state, it occupies a space 1,600 times greater than in its liquid state, and is, therefore, much lighter than the atmosphere: consequently it readily floats and ascends into its higher regions. In this way vast quantities of water, in the form of invisible vapor, are continually ascending from sea and land, and even from the regions of perpetual ice and snow. This vapor having reached the higher and cooler altitudes of the firmament, gradually condenses into visible clouds, which are sometimes thousands of feet in thickness, and tens of thousands of acres in extent, and suspend in their dark folds immense quantities of water, ever ready to return to the earth from whence it arose.— Ibid., p. 223.
And now let us look at the working of the divine “decree " in releasing and bringing down this water from the clouds. As water is converted into vapor by heat, so by the loss of heat vapor is reconverted into water. Hence, when a cloud of vapor, either by entering a chillier stratum of air, or by coming in contact with colder currents, loses any portion of its former heat, a corresponding proportion of its aqueous contents is condensed into what may be called water-dust. And these dust-like particles, by coming into contact, unite; and these again, in a similar manner, coalesce with others still, till visible globules or drops are forMed. And all this process is conducted with the exactness of “weight” and " measure." A cloud, for example, floats in a current of air of 80° temperature; if that current loses 9° of its heat, the cloud must cast overboard, in the form of a shower, one-quarter of its load; and if it loses 21° of its heat, then it must part with one-half its tonnage. Thus as the heat gradually decreases, the condensation of the vapor gradually increases, forming, as just stated, the drops and the showers which refresh and renew the face of the earth. —Ibid., p. 224.
And he made a way for the lightning of the thunder.-The subtle and mysterious element of Electricity may be generated and collected by artificial means; for example, by rubbing a revolving plate of glass with a piece of silk. After a manner similar to this Nature herself is constantly carrying on the same process on a grand scAle. The currents of air are ever generating electricity as they sweep or rub over the surface of the globe; and the fluid thus evolved passes partly into the earth and partly into the atmosphere. When very dry, the portion passing into the air may accumulate in excess. And it is pleasing to contemplate the "way" provided, the provisions made to prevent danger and destruction from an undue accumulation of electricity in the atmosphere. The Creator has so constituted every tree, every bush, and every blade of grass, as to be a conductor of electricity from the atmosphere into the earth. A leaf pointed with nature's exquisite workmanship is three times as effectual as the finest needle; and a single living twig far more efficient than the metallic points of the best constructed rod. What then must be the agency of an extended forest in disarming the thunder-storm of its power for destruction? The raindrops and the snow-flakes also have been made good conductors; so that during the storms a bridge for the lightning is thrown across from the clouds to the earth. Hence we see with what care Providence has guarded us by making "a way" for this destructive element to pass harmlessly into the bowels of the globe under our feet.—It occasionally occurs, however, that electricity is developed more rapidly than it can be dissipated through all these channels; the atmosphere becomes surcharged with it; but even this excess is a specific arrangement to turn it another " way" to accomplish important ends. Fierce flashes now dart from cloud to cloud, or from cloud to the ground below; and it is when the volleys of these bursting clouds cleave the firmament, and the thunders of the discharge are pealing their dreadful notes above our heads, that the chemical combinations of the noxious exhalations arising from decaying animal and vegetable substances are effected, and the elements, fitted for the purposes of animal health and vegetable growth, are formed and brought to the ground in the heavy rains which usually attend these storms. It is by these convulsions that the atmosphere regains its balance, and renews its salubrity. Thus Science unites with Revelation in teaching us, that our Father in heaven is no less loving and kind in launching forth the " winged bolt," than in sending down the gentle sunbeam.—Such are some of the "ways" which the Great God " has made for the lightning of the thunder."—Bid., p. 239.
Job in His Prosperity
REV. JOSEPH ROBERTS.—These are figurative expressions, constantly employed in the East, to denote great prosperity. “The man is so rich, he washes himself with ney; “i. e., “clarified butter." “O the charitable man! milk and honey accompany his feet."—Oriental Illustrations, p. 293.
PLINY. —We have known the very soles even of their feet to be sprinkled with perfumes. —Hist. Nat., 1. xiii., c. 4.
PLAUTUS.—In the houses of the nobles are balsam-shoemakers, or makers of unguents for the feet. —Aulul., Act III., sc. to.
REV. JOSEPH ROBERTS.—What a graphic scene is this! When a man of rank passes a crowd, the young people and children conceal themselves behind their seniors, and the aged always arise from their seats. See the respectable man in a court of justice, who is listening to the address of the judge: his hand is placed on his mouth. Oriental Illustrations, p. 293.
REV. JOSEPH ROBERTS.—The man who bestows great charities is said to be “the eyes of the blind," and " the feet of the cripples." “True, my lord, I am blind; but you are my eyes." “O king, are you not my staff! "—Oriental Illustrations, 294.
PLUTARCH. —Soon after Cyrus expired, an officer, who was called "the king's eye," passed that way. —Artax., c. 52.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM, LL. D., F. R. S.—" The former rain " rarely failed; but " the latter rain " was more uncertain, and has ever been looked for with anxiety by the inhabitants of the country, for on its copiousness depend the hopes of the harvest, since it falls at the time when the corn is just pushing into ear, and without it the crop is either deficient or fails altogether: "They waited for me as for the rain; and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain." —Nat. Hist. of the Bible, p.
Job's Uprightness
EPICTETUS.—If you chance to be placed in some superior station, will you presently set up yourself for a tyrant? Will you not remember what you are, and over whom you bear rule? That they are by nature your relations, your brothers; that they are the offspring of God?—Epict., 1. i., c. 13.
HESIOD.—
The man of sin is he confessed,
Who spurns the suppliant and who wrongs he guest.
—Op. et Dies, V. 325.
DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.—We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
PROF. CHARLES ROLLIN, M. R. A. I.—The most ancient and general idolatry in the world was that wherein the sun and moon were the objects of divine worship. In all ages mankind have been sensibly convinced of the necessity of an intercourse between God and man: and adoration supposes God to be both attentive to man's desires and capable of fulfilling them. But the distance of the sun and the moon is an obstacle to this intercourse. Therefore foolish men endeavored to remedy this inconvenience, by laying their hands upon their mouths, and then lifting them up to those false gods, in order to testify that they would be glad to unite themselves to them, but that they could not. This was that impious custom so prevalent throughout all the East, from which Job esteemed himself happy to have been preserved.— Ancient History, Vol. I., p. 160. (Harper's Ed.)
PLINY.—When paying adoration we kiss the right hand.—Hist. Nat., 1. 28, c. 5.
LUCIAN.—A poor man perhaps comes off for a hand-kiss to the god.—De Sacrif., c. 12.
IDEM.—Seeing him put his hand to his mouth, I concluded that he was praying.—Demosth., Encom., c. 49.
The Reasoning Soul of Man
ST. GEORGE MIVART, F. R. S.—The soul of man was created in a very different way from his body—not by any pre-existing means, external to God himself-but by the direct action of the Almighty, symbolized by the term "breathing:" the very form adopted by Christ, when conferring the supernatural powers and graces of the Christian Dispensation. Genesis of Species, p. 300.
M. LOUIS FIGUIER.—Intelligence and speech, these are really the attributes which constitute man; these are the qualities which make him the most complete being in creation, and the most privileged of God's creatures.—L' Homme Primitif, p. 30.
REV. JOSEPH P. THOMSON, D. D., LL. D.—Man has been defined as " an Intelligence served by organs; " and his reasoning intelligence is a characteristic that separates him from the brute creation by a chasm that they can never cross. Whence then came this intelligence? What shall we say of this MIND of man? its power of reasoning, which grasps the facts of the external world, and the truths of the inner world of consciousness, and weaves them into consecutive chains of ideas, and builds up fabrics of thought that will stand though the physical universe shall fall? What shall we say of this mind that, from a few arbitrary characters and a few articulate sounds, constructs a language that expresses thought, that stirs emotion, that kindles passions or allays them—language that makes the printed page glow with the fire and beauty of poetry, that makes the air pulsate with the throbs of eloquence? this mind that from a few arbitrary figures, that you may count upon your fingers, constructs the abstract science of mathematics, by which it weighs the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance; by which it measures the velocity of light, and the distances and magnitudes of the stars? this mind of man that with unfaltering confidence, determines by mathematical law that the equilibrium of our solar system demands the existence of another planet yet unseen, then points the telescope and finds it where it ought to be? this 'mind that takes the wings of the morning and out-travels light; that flies backward to the beginning and forward to the unknown; that counts all time and space its home, and dares look forth upon the Infinite? From a few letters of the alphabet Homer made a poem whose rhythm still beats upon the shores of Time, while the sea washes a desolate beach Where Troy once stood; Plato gave shape to thoughts that live, while Athens is falling to decay; the creations of mind survive, though temples and pyramids perish; and though the heavens should pass away, and the stars be seen no more, the System of mathematical order and beauty, that Newton formed from a few abstract lines and numbers, would remain for the admiring contemplation of the mind, overarching it with a firmament of its own. This mind of man, with its powers of reason, imagination, memory, will,—with its hopes and fears, joys and loves,—this mind that knows itself, and that dominates all matter and all life without itself, can it be less than the immediate offspring of God? or any other than the inspiration of the Almighty?—Man in Genesis and Geology, p. 68-70.
Dreams
Job 33:15-1815In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed; 16Then he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction, 17That he may withdraw man from his purpose, and hide pride from man. 18He keepeth back his soul from the pit, and his life from perishing by the sword. (Job 33:15‑18)—In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed; then he openeth; the, ears of men, and sealeth their instruction, that he may withdraw man from his purpose, and hide pride from man. He-keepeth back his soul from the pit, and his life from perishing by the sword.
DR. ADAM CLARKE.—To decry all dreams, or visions of the night, because there are many vain dreams, would be nearly as much wisdom as to deny the Bible, because there are many foolish books.... Many warnings in this way have come from God: and the impression they made and the good effect produced were the proofs of their Divine origin. To deny this would be to call into doubt the testimony of the best, wisest, and holiest men in all ages of the church..... By taking the warning thus given, some have been prevented from perishing by the fit, some sudden accident; and others from the sword of the assassin, or nocturnal murderer. It would be easy to give examples, numerous examples in all these kinds.—Note, In loco.
DR. ABERCROMBIE.—A Scotch lady dreamed that a company of young people had made arrangements to go out sailing on the Frith of Forth, that her nephew had engaged to accompany them, and that they went out and were all drowned. Impressed by her dream, in the morning she sent for her nephew, and with great difficulty prevailed on him to give up the engagement. All the rest went out, and were all drowned just according to the dream. This occurrence, however it is to be accounted for, is authentic and reliable.—Intellectual Philosophy.
REV. HORACE BUSHNELL, D. D.—Captain Yount, of California, in a midwinter's night, had a dream, in which he saw what appeared to be a company of emigrants arrested by the snows of the mountains, and perishing rapidly by cold and hunger. He noted the very cast of the scenery, marked by a huge perpendicular front of white rock cliff; he saw the men cutting off what appeared to be tree-tops rising out of deep gulfs of snow; he distinguished the very features of the persons, and the look of their particular distress. He woke, profoundly impressed with the distinctness and apparent reality of his dream. At length he fell asleep and dreamed exactly the same dream again. In the morning he could not expel it from his mind. Falling in, shortly, with an old hunter comrade, he told him the story, and was only the more deeply impressed by his recognizing, without hesitation, the scenery of the dream. This comrade came over the Sierra by the Carson Valley Pass (in California), and declared that a spot in the Pass answered exactly to his description. By this the unsophisticated patriarch was decided. He immediately collected a company of men with mules and blankets, and all necessary provisions. The neighbors were laughing, meantime, at his credulity. “No matter," said he, " I am able to do this, and I will; for I verily believe that the fact is according to my dream." The men were sent into the mountains 150 miles distant, directly to the Carson Valley Pass; and there they found the company in exactly the condition of the dream, and brought in the remnant alive. A gentleman present, when the Captain told me, said: “You need not doubt this, for we Californians all know the facts, and the names of the families brought in, who look upon our venerable friend as a kind, of savior." Their names he gave, and the places where they resided; and I found, afterward, that the California people were ready everywhere to second his testimony.—The Natural and Supernatural.
PROF. THOMAS UPHAM.—Benjamin Franklin has made the remark, that the bearings and results of political events, which had caused him much trouble while awake, were not infrequently unfolded to him in dreaming.—Mental Philos., p. 108 (abridgment).
Man's Superiority
Job 25:11.—God teacheth us more than the beasts of the earth, and maketh us wiser than the fowls of heaven.
PROF. THOMAS HUXLEY.—A great gulf intervenes between the lowest man and the highest ape in intellectual power.—Man's Place in Nature, p. 120.
IDEM.—The immeasurable and practically infinite divergence of the Human from the Simian Stirps.—.Man' s Place in Nature, p. 122.
IDEM.—No one is more strongly convinced than I am of the vastness of the gulf between civilized man and the brutes.—Man's Place in Nature, p. 129
CHARLES DARWIN, M. A., F. R. S.—No doubt the difference in respect to man's mental power is enormous, even if we compare the mind of one of the lowest savages, who has no words to express any number higher than four, and who uses no abstract terms for the commonest objects or affections, with that of the most highly organized ape.—Descent of Man, Vol. I., p. 33.
Formation of Rain
THE COMPILER.—As water is converted into vapor by heat, so by the loss of heat vapor is reconverted into water. Hence when a cloud of vapor, either by entering a chillier stratum of air, or by coming in contact with colder currents, loses any portion of its former heat, a corresponding proportion of its aqueous contents is condensed into what may be called water dust. And these dust-like particles, by coming in contact, unite; and these again in a similar manner coalesce with others still, till visible globules or drops are forMed. And all this process is conducted with the exactness of number, weight and measure. A cloud, for example, floats in a current of air of 80° temperature; if that current loses 9° of its heat, the cloud must cast overboard, in the form of a shower, one-quarter of its load; and if it loses 21° of its heat, then it must part with one-half its tonnage. Thus, as the heat gradually decreases, the condensation of the vapor gradually increases, forming, as just stated, the drops and the showers, which refresh and renew the face of the earth.
And how admirable the way in which the clouds of vapor discharge their contents, viz., in soft and gentle showers. If, instead of this, they poured out their prodigious contents at once, in streams and floods, the consequences, frequently, would be destructive and lamentable in the extreme, as is evident from instances of this kind, which, at distant intervals, have taken place. Vegetation would be destroyed, crops would be beaten into the ground, the trees stripped of their leaves and fruits, the fields plowed into trenches, and the soil washed away, the streams suddenly swelled into impetuous and destructive torrents; so that presently every gathering or passing cloud would become, like an avalanche, an object of terror to all who beheld it. Viewed in contrast with all this, how beautiful, how beneficent is the existing arrangement! Instead of descending like this, in ruinous cascades, we see the water trickling down in gentle and fertilizing drops, as if the nether side of the clouds were finely perforated into a sieve, and these drops alighting upon the earth, without bruising a flower, or destroying a blade of grass. Softly the work begins, and softly it is carried on as the cloudy cisterns sail slowly over field and forest, hill and dale, leaving no district unvisited, no spot un-watered. Who that intelligently contemplates all this, but must be rapt into admiration and gratitude, in view of the designing wisdom and diffusive goodness of God, as seen in every passing shower! How true to Nature, and to Nature's God and Governor are the words of Scripture, " He maketh small the drops of water; they pour down rain according to the vapor thereof: which the cloud do drop and distil upon man abundantly.—"See Work Days of God, p. 225, 226.
Universal Agency of God
Job 37:2-242Hear attentively the noise of his voice, and the sound that goeth out of his mouth. 3He directeth it under the whole heaven, and his lightning unto the ends of the earth. 4After it a voice roareth: he thundereth with the voice of his excellency; and he will not stay them when his voice is heard. 5God thundereth marvellously with his voice; great things doeth he, which we cannot comprehend. 6For he saith to the snow, Be thou on the earth; likewise to the small rain, and to the great rain of his strength. 7He sealeth up the hand of every man; that all men may know his work. 8Then the beasts go into dens, and remain in their places. 9Out of the south cometh the whirlwind: and cold out of the north. 10By the breath of God frost is given: and the breadth of the waters is straitened. 11Also by watering he wearieth the thick cloud: he scattereth his bright cloud: 12And it is turned round about by his counsels: that they may do whatsoever he commandeth them upon the face of the world in the earth. 13He causeth it to come, whether for correction, or for his land, or for mercy. 14Hearken unto this, O Job: stand still, and consider the wondrous works of God. 15Dost thou know when God disposed them, and caused the light of his cloud to shine? 16Dost thou know the balancings of the clouds, the wondrous works of him which is perfect in knowledge? 17How thy garments are warm, when he quieteth the earth by the south wind? 18Hast thou with him spread out the sky, which is strong, and as a molten looking glass? 19Teach us what we shall say unto him; for we cannot order our speech by reason of darkness. 20Shall it be told him that I speak? if a man speak, surely he shall be swallowed up. 21And now men see not the bright light which is in the clouds: but the wind passeth, and cleanseth them. 22Fair weather cometh out of the north: with God is terrible majesty. 23Touching the Almighty, we cannot find him out: he is excellent in power, and in judgment, and in plenty of justice: he will not afflict. 24Men do therefore fear him: he respecteth not any that are wise of heart. (Job 37:2‑24).—Hear attentively the noise of his voice, and the sound that goeth out of his mouth. He directeth it under the whole heaven, and his lightning unto the ends of the earth: etc.
THE COMPILER.—The various meteoric phenomena so graphically described in this chapter—the spread of lightning, the roar of thunder, the fall of rain, the formation of snow, the breath of frost, the progress of whirlwinds, the balancing of the clouds, the cold of the North, and the heat of the South-these phenomena which human science regards as simply the workings of the "Laws of Nature," are here ascribed immediately to GOD HIMSELF; He is represented as the DOER of all that takes place under the whole heaven. And this is true-the scriptural representation is absolutely correct. The laws of nature do nothing, and can do nothing. Laws are not agents, but rules for agents. Power, all power resides in the Divine Law-Giver. His active omnipotence, each moment, floods all Nature. The whole order and activity of the universe are simply the effects of His infinite power and wisdom. See this subject amply illustrated in my work, entitled Present Conflict of Science with the Christian Religion, p.
PROF. WILLIAM WHEWELL, M. A., F. R. S.—Wherever the laws of material nature appear, we have a manifestation of the Intelligence by which they were established. But a law supposes an agent, and a power; for it is the mode according to which the agent proceeds, the order according to which the power acts. Without the presence of such an agent, of such a power, conscious of the relations on which the law depends, producing the effects which the law prescribes, the law can have no efficacy, no existence. Hence we infer that the Intelligence by which the law is ordained, the Power by which it is put in action, must be present at all times and in all places where the effects of the law occur; and thus the knowledge and the agency of the Divine Being pervade every portion of the universe, producing all action and passion, all permanence and change. The laws of nature are the laws which He, in his wisdom, prescribes to his own acts; his universal presence is the necessary condition of any course of events, his universal agency the only origin of any efficient force.—Astronomy and Physics, Book III., c. 8.
DR. WILLIAM B. CARPENTER, M. B. A.—All our science is but an investigation of the mode in which the Creator acts; its highest laws are but expressions of the mode in which He manifests his agency to us. He is the efficient cause alike for the simplest and most minute, and of the most complicated and most majestic phenomena of the universe.—General and Comparative Physiology, p. 1080.
Antiquity of the Earth, and Recency of Man
PRESIDENT JOHN HARRIS, D. D.—Turning to the inspired record to ascertain the origin of things as they now are, we learn, of our earth, that it assumed its present state a few thousand years ago, in consequence of a creative process, or of a series of creative acts concluding with the creation of man. Possessed of this fact respecting the date of man's introduction on the earth, we proceed to examine the globe itself. And here we find that the mere shell of the earth takes us back through an unknown series of ages, in which creation appears to have followed creation at the distance of vast intervals between. By means of these the geologist can demonstrate that the crust of the earth has a natural history. Let us descend with him, and traverse an ideal section of a portion of the earth's crust. Quitting the living surface of the green earth, and entering on our downward path, our first step may take us below the dust of Adam, and beyond the limits of recorded time. From the moment we leave the surface-soil, and touch even the nearest of the Tertiary beds, all traces of human remains disappear, so that let our grave be as shallow as it may in even the latest stratified bed, we have to make it in the dust of a departed world. Formation now follows formation, composed chiefly of sand, and clay, and lime, and presenting a thickness of more than a thousand feet each. As we descend through these, one of the most sublime fictions of mythology becomes sober truth, for at our every step an age flies past. We find ourselves on a road where the lapse of duration is marked—not by the succession of seasons and years,—but by the slow excavation, by water, of deep valleys in rock marble; by the return of a continent to the bosom of an ocean in which ages before it had been slowly formed; or by the departure of one world and the formation of another.
Advancing into the Secondary Rocks, we enter upon a new series of worlds.
Taking the chalk formation as tile first member of this series, we find a stratification upwards of a thousand feet thick. Who shall compute the tracts of time necessary for its slow sedimentary deposition! So vast was it, and so widely different were its physical conditions from those which followed, that scarcely a trace of animal species still living is to be found in it. Types of organic life, before unknown, arrest our attention, and prepare us for still more surprising forms. Descending into the-system next in order—the politic—with its many subdivisions, and its thickness of about half a mile, we recognize new proofs of the dateless antiquity of the earth. For, enormous as this bed is, it was obviously formed by the deposition from sea and river water. And so gradual and tranquil was the operation, that, in some places, the organic remains of the successive strata are arranged with a shelf-like regularity, reminding us of the well-ordered cabinet of the naturalist. Here, too, the last trace of animal species still living has vanished. Even this link is gone. We have reached a point when the earth was in the possession of the gigantic forms of Saurian Reptiles,—monsters more appalling than the poet's fancy ever feigned; and these are their catacombs. Descending through the later Red Sandstone, and saliferous marls of two thousand feet in thickness, and which exhibit, in their very variegated strata, a succession of numerous physical changes, our subterranean path brings us to the Carboniferous System, or coal formations. These coal strata, many thousands of feet thick, consist entirely of the spoils of successive ancient vegetable worlds. But in the rank jungles and luxuriant wildernesses which are here accumulated and compressed, we recognize no plant of any existing species. Nor is there a single convincing indication that these primeval forests ever echoed to the voice of birds. But between these strata, beds of limestone of enormous thickness are interposed; each proclaiming the prolonged existence and final extinction of a creation. For these limestone beds are not so much the charnel-houses of fossil organisms as the remains of the organisms themselves.
These mountain masses of stone which now surround us, extending for miles in length and breadth, were once sentient existences—testaceous and coraline,—living at the bottom of ancient seas and lakes. How countless the ages necessary for their accumulation; when the formation of only a few inches of the strata required the life and death of many generations. Here, the mind is not only carried back through immeasurable periods, but while standing amidst the petrified remains of this succession of primeval forests and extinct races of animals piled up into sepulchral mountains, we seem to be encompassed by the thickest shadow of the valley of death.
On quitting these stupendous monuments of death, we leave behind us the last vestige of land-plants, and pass down to the Old Red Sandstone. Here, too, we have passed below the last trace of reptile life. The speaking foot-prints impressed on the carboniferous strata are absent 'here. The geological character of this vast formation, again, tells of ages innumerable. For, though many a thousand feet in depth, it is obviously derived from the materials of more ancient rocks, fractured, decomposed, and slowly deposited in water. The gradual and quiet nature of the process, and therefore its immense duration, are evident from the numerous "platforms of death," which mark this formation, and crowded with organic structures which lived and died where they now are seen.
Immeasurably far behind us as we have already left the fair face of the extant creation, while traveling into the night of ancient time, we yet feel, as we stand on the threshold of the next, or Silurian System, and look down towards " the foundations of the earth," that we are not half way on our course. Here, on surveying the fossil structures, we are first struck with the total change in the petrified inhabitants of the sea, as compared with what we found in the mountain limestone; implying the lapse of long periods of time, during the formation of the intervening Old Red Sandstone which we have just left. But still more are we impressed with the lapse of duration, while descending the long succession of strata, of which this Primary fossiliferous formation is composed, when we think of their slow derivation from the more ancient rocks; of their oft repeated elevation and depression; of the long periods of repose, during which hundreds of animal species ran through the cycle of their generations, and became extinct; and of the continuance of this stratifying process, until these thin beds had acquired, by union, the immense thickness of a mile and a half. Net below this, we reach the Cambrian System, of almost equal thickness and formed by the same slow process. Here the gradual decrease of animal remains admonishes us that even the vast and dreary empire of death has its limits, and that we are now in its outskirts. But there is a solitude greater than that of the boundless desert, and a dreariness more impressive than that which reigns in a world entombed. On leaving the slate-rocks of the Cambrian and Cumbrian formations, we find that the worlds of organic remains are past, and that we have reached a region older than death, because older than life itself. Here, at least, if life ever existed, all trace of it is obliterated by the fusing power of the heat below. But we have not even yet reached a resting-place. Passing down through the beds of mica schist, many thousand feet in depth, to the great gneiss formation, we find that we have reached the limits of stratification itself. The granitic masses below, of a depth which man can never explore, are not only crystallized themselves, but the igneous power acting through them, has partially crystallized the rocks above. Not only life, but the conditions of life, are here at an end.
Now, looking from our ideal position, backwards and upwards to the ten miles height of stratifications from which we have descended, who but must feel that we have reached a point of immeasurable remoteness in terrestrial antiquity! Who but must exclaim, "How dreadful is this place!" And yet this, even this is not the beginning—that lies still far back in the dark abyss of unmarked and unmeasured departed time I (From such a standpoint as this, how unutterably impressive the demand of the Almighty, "Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare if thou halt understanding. Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened; or who laid the corner-stone thereof, when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?")—Pre-Adamite Earth, p. 66-71.
PROF. WILLIAM WHEWELL, M. A.—The scale of man's insignificance is of the same order in reference to time, as to space. There is nothing which at all goes beyond the magnitude which observation and reasoning suggest for geological periods, in supposing that the Tertiary strata occupied, in their deposition and elevation, a period as much greater than the period of human history, as the solar system is larger than the earth:—that the Secondary strata were as much longer than these in their formation as the nearest fixed star is more distant than the sun:—that the still earlier masses, call them Primary, or Protozoic, or what we will, did, in their production, extend through a period of time as vast, compared with the Secondary period, as the most distant nebula is remoter than the nearest star. If the earth, as the habitation of man, is a speck in the midst of infinite space, the earth, as the habitation of man, is also a speck at the end of an infinity of time. If we are as nothing in the surrounding universe, we are as nothing in the elapsed eternity; or rather, in the elapsed organic antiquity, during which the earth has existed and been the abode of life. "Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?"—Plurality of Worlds, p. 122.
THE COMPILER.—The globe of the earth is not the product of chance, but of power guided by unerring intelligence. It may be said with literal truth that its dimensions were laid out by scale, its materials weighed in a balance, and its distances measured by a line. Its oblate sphericity, its parallel zones, its great circles and its small, have been described according to the principles of strict geometry. The ratio of its polar to its equatorial diameter was so fixed as to ensure for it, what was an absolute necessity, namely, an axial rotation perfectly smooth and undeviating. Its mass and its magnitude were so estimated and determined as to adapt the force of its gravitation to the structure of the vegetation and to the strength of the living creatures that should occupy its surface. The angle of its axis with the plane of its orbit, and the speed of its rotation upon that axis, were so measured as to produce the pleasing alternation of day and night, and all the wonderful variations of the seasons. Its distance from the sun w so calculated, and the orbit it should pursue around him so described, that it should not be exposed to destructive cold on the one hand, nor to consuming heat on the other. These and a hundred other applications of the principles of mathematics, and of the laws of gravitation and motion, light and heat, were made in the construction' of our world, ages and eons untold, ere the first of human kind had been quickened into consciousness. So that the Almighty's demand of Job was a question based upon actual fact: “Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it? "—See Work Days of God, p. 408-410.
Bounds of the Sea
Job 38:9-119When I made the cloud the garment thereof, and thick darkness a swaddlingband for it, 10And brake up for it my decreed place, and set bars and doors, 11And said, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed? (Job 38:9‑11).—When I brake up for the sea my decreed place, and set bars and doors, and said, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further; and here shall thy proud waves be stayed?
PROF. ARNOLD GUYOT. —The forms, the arrangement, and the distribution, of the terrestrial masses on the surface of the globe, accidental in appearance, yet reveal a plan. The continents are made for human societies, as the body is made for the soul. The Supreme Intelligence and Goodness has arranged all for the great purpose of the education of man, and the realization of the plans of mercy for his sake.—Earth and Man, p. 34.
PROF. WILLIAM WHEWELL, M. A.—One of the quantities which enters into the constitution of the terrestrial system of things is the bulk of the waters of the ocean. The, sources which water the earth, both clouds, rains, and rivers, are mainly fed by the aqueous vapor raised from the sea; and therefore if the sea were much diminished, and the land increased, the mean quantity of moisture distributed upon the land must be diminished, and the character of climates, as to wet and dry, must be materially affected. Similar but opposite changes would result from the increase of the surface of the ocean. It appears, then, that the magnitude of the ocean is one of the conditions to which the structure of all organized beings which are dependent upon climate must be adapted.—Astronomy and General Physics, p. 38.
Light and Darkness
ROBERT HUNT.—Newton's theory of light was—that luminous particles dart from the surfaces of bodies in all directions—Huyghens, on the contrary, supposes light to be caused by the waves or vibrations of an elastic medium diffused through all space, which waves are propagated in every direction from the luminous body. In the one case, a luminous particle is supposed actually to come from the sun to the earth; in the other, the sun only occasions a disturbance of the ether, which extends with great rapidity, in the same manner as a wave spreads itself over the surface of a lake.... But what is light?.... We know much of the mysterious influences of this great agent, but we know nothing of the principle itself. The solar beam has been tortured through prismatic glasses and natural crystals. Every chemical agent has been tried upon it, every electrical force in the most excited state brought to bear upon its operations, with a view to the discovery of the most refined of ethereal agencies; but it has passed through every trial without revealing its secrets, and even the effects which it produces in its path are unexplained problems still, to tax the intellect of man.... Science, with her Ithuriel wand, has, however, shown that light is itself an effect of a yet more exalted cause, which we can only refer to the Source of every good and every perfect gift.—Poetry of Science, p. 94, 124, 125.
The Snow
CAPTAIN SCORESBY, R. N.—The extreme beauty and endless variety of the microscopic objects perceived in the animal and vegetable kingdoms, are perhaps fully equaled if not surpassed, in both particulars of beauty and variety, by the crystals of snow. The principal configurations are the stelliform and hexagonal; though almost every variety of shape of which the generating angle of 60° and 120° are susceptible, may, in the course of a few years' observation, be discovered. Some of the general varieties in the figures of the crystals may be referred to the temperature of the air; but the particular and endless modification of similar classes of crystals can only be referred to the will and pleasure of the First Great Cause, whose works, even the most minute and evanescent, and in regions the most remote from human observation, are altogether admirable.—In Pict. Bible.
Pleiades and Orion
HOMER.—The Pleiads, Hyads, with the northern team, And great Orion's more refulgent beam.— Iliad, lxviii., v. 486.
ARATUS. —
The Pleiads next are roll'd,
Like seven pure brilliants set in ring of gold;
Though each one small, their splendor all combine
To form one gem, and gloriously they shine..
Their number seven, though some men fondly say,
And poets feign, that one has pass'd away.
—Phenom., v. 254.
THOMAS DICK, LL. D.—The constellation of Orion forms one of the most striking and beautiful clusters of stars in the heavens, and is generally recognized even by common observers. It is distinguished by four brilliant stars in the form of an oblong, or parallelogram; and particularly by three bright stars in a straight line near the middle of the square or parallelogram, which are termed the Belt of Orion, and in the book of Job the "Bands of Orion." The line passing through these three stars points to the Pleiades. This cluster was described by the ancients as consisting of seven stars, but at present only six can be distinguished by the naked eye.—Sidereal Heavens, p. 18.
REV. HUGH MACMILLAN. —Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades? If we examine this text in the original, we find that the Chaldaic word translated in our version “Pleiades " is Chimah, meaning literally a Hinge, or Pivot. Now, strange to say, M. Mädler, of Dorpat, by a series of elaborate observations and most ingenious calculations, has found that Alcyone, the brightest star of the Pleiades, is the center of gravity to our vast Solar System—the luminous HINGE in the heavens round which our sun and his attendant planets are moving through space. The very complexity and isolation of the system of the Pleiades, exhibiting seven distinct orbs closely compressed to the naked eye, but nine or ten times, that number when seen through a telescope—forming a grand cluster, whose individuals are united to each other more closely than the general mass of stars—indicate the amazing attractive energy that must be concentrated in that spot. Vast as is the distance which separates our sun from this central group—a distance thirty-four millions of times greater than the distance between the sun and our earth—yet so tremendous is the force exerted by Alcyone, that it draws our system irresistibly around it at the rate of 422,000 miles a day, in an orbit which it will take many thousands of years to complete. With this new explanation, how remarkably striking and appropriate does the original word for Pleiades appear! What a lofty significance does the question of the Almighty receive from this interpretation! “Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades?" Canst thou arrest, or in any degree modify, that attractive influence which it exerts upon our sun and all its planetary worlds, whirling them round this pivot in an orbit of such inconceivable' dimensions, and with a velocity so utterly bewildering? Silence the most profound can be the only answer to such a question.—In accordance with this higher interpretation, the influence of the Pleiades may be called "sweet," as indicating the harmonious operation of those great laws by which our system revolves around them. In this vast and complex arrangement, not one wheel jars or creaks—not a single discordant sound disturbs the deep, solemn quietude of the midnight sky. Smoothly and silently each star performs its sublime revolutions; and all with a rhythm so perfect, that we might almost believe in the old poetic fable of “The Music of the Spheres."—Bible Teachings in Nature, p.
IDEM.—Or loose the bands of Orion? In the country of Job, Orion occupies a position near the zenith, and therefore is the more brilliant and striking in its appearance. Night after night it sheds down its rays with mystical splendor over the lonely solitudes through which the Euphrates flows, and where the tents of the patriarch of Uz once stood. Orion is not only the most striking and splendid constellation in the heavens; it is also one of the very few clusters that are visible in all parts of the habitable world. The equator passes through the middle of it; the glittering stars of its belt being strung, like diamonds, on its invisible line. The Bible reader of every clime and country can go out, in the appropriate season, and find in his own sky the very constellation, and direct his gaze to the very peculiarity in it, to which the Creator alluded in His mysterious converse with Job. The three bright stars which constitute the girdle or bands of Orion never change their form; they preserve the same relative position to each other, and to the rest of the constellation, from year to year, and age to age. They present precisely the same appearance to us which they did to Job. They afford to us one of the highest types of immutability in the midst of ceaseless changes. Mysterious triplet of stars! What answer could Job give to the question of the Almighty—" Canst thou loose the bands of Orion? “Can man, whose breath is in his nostrils, and who is crushed before the moth, unclasp that brilliant starry bracelet which God's own hand has fastened on the dusky arm of night? Can man separate these stars, or alter their relative positions in the smallest degree?—Bible Teachings in Nature, p. 13-16.
Ordinances of Nature
PROF. WILLIAM WHEWELL, M. A.—Man, in all his contrivances and combinations, only takes advantage of laws of nature which already exist; in his most exquisite, machines he simply applies to his use qualities which matter already possesses. Nor can he by any effort do more. He can establish no new law of nature which is not a result of the existing ones. He can invest matter with no new properties which are not modifications of its present attributes. He navigates the ocean by the assistance of the winds which he cannot raise or still. He cannot give the minutest portion of the atmosphere new relations, a new course of expansion, new laws of motion. He can set up the dominion of no new ordinance in the earth.— Astronomy and General Physics, p. 184.
The Wild Ass
XENOPHON.—They (the forces of Cyrus) then proceeded through Arabia; still keeping the Euphrates on their right hand; and, in five days, made, through a desert, a distance of, thirty-five parasangs. This country appeared to the eye a complete flat, and as smooth as the sea. It abounded in absinthium; and whatever herb or shrub grew there had an aromatic scent: but no trees whatever appeared. Of wild creatures, the most numerous were wild asses, with plenty of ostriches, besides bustards and roe-deer, which afforded sport to our horsemen. The wild ass, however, being swifter of foot than our horses, would, on gaining ground upon them, stand still and look around; and when their pursuers got nearly up to them, they would start off, and repeat the same trick; so that there remained to the hunters no other method of taking them, but by dividing themselves into dispersed parties which succeeded each other in the chase.—Anabasis, l. i. c. 5.
MORIER.—We gave chase to two wild asses, but which had so much the speed of our horses, that when they had got at some distance, they stood still and looked behind at us, snorting with their noses in the air, as if in contempt of our endeavors to catch them.—Journey Through Persia.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM, LL. D., F. R. S.—Though well known by name, the wild ass is rarely now found west of the Hauran. I have seen it in the deserts of North Africa, in small troops of four or five. They allowed us to approach near enough to make them out more clearly, when, snuffing up the wind, they dashed off at a speed which the best of our horses could not have approached. The Syrian wild ass in no way differs from the African in habits.—Natural Hist. of the Bible, p. 43
The Ostrich
DR. THOMAS DICK.—The parts of which the feathers of birds are composed, afford a beautiful variety of the most exquisite workmanship. There is scarcely a feather but contains a million of distinct parts, every one of them regularly shaped. In a small fiber of a goose quill, more than 1,200 downy branches or small leaves have been counted on each side, and each appeared divided into sixteen or eighteen small joints. A small part of the feather of a peacock, one-thirtieth of an inch in length, appears no less beautiful than the whole feather does to the naked eye, exhibiting a multitude of bright shining parts, reflecting first one color and then another in the most vivid manner.—Improvement of Society, Sec. VI.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM, LL. D., F. R. S.—The plumage of the male Ostrich is a brilliant contrast of black and white, the precious plumes of the wings and tail being spotless white.—Nat. Hist. of Bible, p. 239.
Job 39:1414Which leaveth her eggs in the earth, and warmeth them in dust, (Job 39:14).—Which leaveth her eggs in the earth, and warmeth them in the dust, and forgetteth that the foot may crush them, or that the wild beast may break them.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM, LL. D., F. R. S.—The ostrich is polygamous, and several hens deposit their eggs in one place: a hole scraped in the sand. The eggs are then covered over, and left during the heat of the day, but sat upon through the night, and until the sun has full power, the male also incubating. I never but once found an ostrich nest, and then the complement of eggs was not completed. Tracing the foot-prints we came to the spot where we had (from a distance) seen two birds standing, and which we identified by the sand being much trodden. Two Arabs dismounting, began to dig with their hands, and presently brought up four fine fresh eggs, from the depth of about a foot under the warm sand—Nat. Hist. of the Bible, p. 237.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM, LL. D., F. R. S.—Though I did not myself see the eggs scattered on the surface, yet all my Arab friends have assured me that it is the invariable habit of the bird so to place many of them, and that far more are laid than are ever incubated. It is from this habit most probably that the want of parental instinct is laid to the charge of the Ostrich; at the same time, when surprised by man with the young before they are able to run, the parent bird scuds off alone, and leaves its offspring to their fate. To do otherwise would be a self-sacrifice on the open desert. Nat. Hist. of Bible, p. 238.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM.—Stupidity is universally ascribed to the ostrich by the Arabs. In some respects this is accurate, for, when surprised, it will often take the very course that ensures its capture. The Arabs also consider it stupid, from the readiness with which it will swallow stones, nails, bullets, or any other hard and indigestible substance; and, in short, they give five particular proofs of its stupidity.—Nat. Hist. of Bible, p. 238.
XENOPHON.—None could take an ostrich; the horsemen who pursued them soon gave up the attempt; for they flew far away, making use both of their feet to run and of their wings when expanded, as a sail to waft them along.— Anab., 1. 1., c. 5.
DIODORUS SICULUS.—The ostrich of Arabia runs upon the ground as swiftly as if she flew in the air.—Diod. Sic., 1. ii., c. 4.
PROF. H. B. TRISTRAM.—The capture of the ostrich is the greatest feat of hunting to which the Arab sportsman aspires. I have myself, in the Sahara, measured its strides, and found them, when bounding at full speed, to be from twenty-two to twenty-eight feet.—Nat. Hist. of Bible, p. 236, 237.
The War Horse
Job 39:19-2519Hast thou given the horse strength? hast thou clothed his neck with thunder? 20Canst thou make him afraid as a grasshopper? the glory of his nostrils is terrible. 21He paweth in the valley, and rejoiceth in his strength: he goeth on to meet the armed men. 22He mocketh at fear, and is not affrighted; neither turneth he back from the sword. 23The quiver rattleth against him, the glittering spear and the shield. 24He swalloweth the ground with fierceness and rage: neither believeth he that it is the sound of the trumpet. 25He saith among the trumpets, Ha, ha; and he smelleth the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains, and the shouting. (Job 39:19‑25).—Hast thou given the horse strength? Hast thou clothed his neck with thunder?.... He goeth on to meet the armed men. He mocketh at fear, and is not affrighted; neither turneth he back from the sword. The quiver rattleth against him, the glittering spear and the shield, etc.
REV. THOMAS S. MILLINGTON, B. A.—The Arabians are now, as in the days of Job, passionately fond of their horses, whose beauties and merits they describe in most glowing and enthusiastic language. Nothing can equal the poetic force and beauty of that in the book of Job.—Test. of Heath. ,p. 271.
VIRGIL.—But at the clash of arms, his ear afar Drinks the deep sound and vibrates to the war: Flames from each nostril roll in gathered stream;
His quivering lips with restless motion gleam;
O'er his right shoulder floating full and fair,
Sweeps his thick mane and spreads his pomp of hair;
Swift works his double spine; and earth around
Rings to the solid hoof that wears the ground.
—Georg., lib. iii., v. 83.
The Eagle
ARISTOTLE.—Eagles build their nests in lofty places, especially among steep and precipitous rocks.— Hist. Anim., 1. ix., c. 32.
PLINY.—The melanætos, or black eagle, is an inhabitant of the mountains. Eagles build among rocks and trees.—Hist. Nat., X., 3. '
HOMER.—
The field exploring, with an eye
Keen as the eagle's, keenest-eyed of all
That wing the air, whom, though he soar aloft,
The lev'ret 'stapes not in thickest shades,
But down he swoops, and at a stroke she dies.
—Iliad, b. xvii., v. 674.
D. W. M. THOMSON. —The power of vision in the eagle is amazing, almost incredible. No sooner does a kid fall in the wilderness among the thick bushes, than some of these keen-sighted hunters after prey notice it from their pathway in mid-heaven, and, circling round and round, they pounce down upon and bear it away to their nest. This appears to be done purely by sight.—The Land and the Book, Vol. I., 257.