very great elevations, we must here carefully ascertain if the nature of these islands be not volcanic, for in this case, these madrepores might rest on the ground originally at great depths under the sea, and have been thereafter elevated with the volcanic body itself, or any other rocky mass upheaved in the eruption.

CHAP. V.-PHENOMENA OF THE DELUGE.

It has been maintained by some ingenious writers, that the whole of the antediluvian earth now lies drowned under our actual seas; and that the whole of the present dry lands, formed the bed of the antediluvian ocean. I do not mean to offer an elaborate examination of this hypothesis. Dr. Buckland, has in my opinion advanced sufficient evidence, to prove that considerable portions at least of our existing grounds, were occupied by land animals before the Noachian flood, in his ingenious theory of the hyæna caves, to be described in a subsequent chapter. These seem to have been antediluvian dens of those carnivora, whose exuviæ buried in diluvial loam, along with the gnawed bones of the animals on whose carcases they preyed, still attest their ancient habits and resort. That they are not postdiluvian, appears from the osteology of the animals; as the bones differ specifically from those of their existing generic types.

The texts of Scripture which have been cited in proof of the total submersion of the antediluvian world, particularly by Mr. Penn in his comparative estimate of the Mineral and Mosaical Geologies, merit the deepest reverence; but they will admit, on his own principles of criticism, of a less restricted interpretation. That the ground of the antedilu

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vians was cursed on account of Adam's transgression we are expressly assured; and we also know that its destruction was denounced in the prophetic intimation of the deluge to Noah. "I will destroy both man and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; and behold I will destroy them with the earth." Moreover, this penal expiation of the curse due to sin, is declared by St. Peter to have been accomplished. "The world, which then was, being overflowed with water perished; but the heavens and the earth which are now, reserved by the same word, are kept in store, unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men."

It is indeed demonstrable on physical grounds, that such a transflux of the ocean, as Cuvier's conclusion implies, must have permanently submerged a great extent of the ancient lands, and upheaved a vast tract of submarine territory. But the general tenor of the Scripture style, will certainly not warrant the theologian to insist on the arithmetical interchange of land and water, by the deluge; nor is the philosopher entitled to build his system on the above expressions of sacred writ. Expositors of the Bible allow, and indeed every attentive reader of the authorised version, cannot fail to perceive, that language apparently absolute and unlimited, is according to the idiom of oriental writers, often susceptible of a relative and modified meaning. Thus, St. Paul says, "be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven." Ezekiel also in comparing the Assyrian

monarchy to a cedar of Lebanon, exclaims, " All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations."

But assuredly neither the apostle nor the prophet intended that the reader should understand in a strictly literal sense these passages, which merely described, in forcible words, the vast range over which the influence reached in either case. Scripture quotations to the same effect might be multiplied were it necessary; but these two will suffice to show that without some very definite limitation, many oriental phrases involve such modified meanings.

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

A universal deluge seems clearly proved by the utter extinction of the species of the primeval race of animals, a topic which we shall afterwards discuss at some detail. Were we not informed by Moses of the universal depravity of the progeny of Cain, as well as of the descendants of Seth whom they corrupted, a depravity to which modern crime affords parallels enow to render the history credible, we

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should find some difficulty in reconciling with the counsels of a Benignant Governor so tremendous a catastrophe, implicating not only the human race, but myriads of animals, in a common destruction. But we read that Divine justice outraged, and mercy spurned, at length required their victims. "And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord, that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at the heart."

Since geology leads us to conclude, that the earth peopled by Noah's contemporaries, perished at the deluge, complete harmony is maintained between Science, and a just interpretation of holy writ.

By a series of such subversions of the old land, and emersions of the new, within a short space of time, at an epocha of intense volcanic activity, (as exemplified in the great trap and porphyritic eruptions through the conchiferous strata,) we may explain many important phenomena of the ancient world, as well as its diluvial transition into the present, without hypothetical assumptions, or the violation of any moral or physical probability.

We shall first bestow a few thoughts on the primordial land. Consisting of primitive formations in the strictest sense of the geological word, it would prove in general a stubborn soil, prolific of every congenial weed, but ungracious to culture. Hence, after the fertile fields of Eden were forfeited and

Ceylon is described by Dr. Davy as one mass of primitive rock, to which the soil corresponds. Though almost universally teeming with vegetation in the interior, it is generally poor, and contains but a small

lost, the lands assigned to man might, from heat and dryness, (except in marshes overrun with ferns and equisetums,) readily favour the fulfilment of the penal denunciation, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread;" and may make us feel the force of the prophetic hope of a better earth, expressed by Lamech at the birth of Noah his son; "This same shall comfort us concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground which the Lord hath cursed." We shall afterwards see how well this prospect was realised, when the rich secondary strata were upheaved out of the waters at the diluvial metastasis.

A tradition of this malediction has been ever current among mankind; typified in the change from the golden to the iron age of agriculture. And probably we may likewise trace to the same origin, the singular idea of the innate malignity of matter, and of the necessary pollution of whatever is associated with it; a dogma of great importance in oriental mythology. The title justissima tellus, we must remember, was not applied by Virgil to lands contemporaneous with himself; but to the garden soil of his primeval paradise. The notion of the inhe rent malignity of matter could not be suggested by experience; that is, by any observed property earth or clay; for it is either plastic, yielding kindly

of

proportion of vegetable matter, seldom more than one or two per cent., proving that the luxuriant vegetation of the country, and particularly of the Kandian country, is more dependant on the high temperature of a tropical sun, and the abundance of water in a mountainous region, than on richness of soil, which is confirmed by the natural sterility of certain parts of the low country, that are subject to long continued droughts. Geol. Trans. vol. V. p. 312.