Mr. Gladstone and Genesis | Page 7

A period of
vegetable life, anterior to animal life (v. 11, 12). 3. A period of animal
life, in the order of fishes (v. 20). 4. Another stage of animal life, in the
order of birds. 5. Another in the order of beasts (v. 24, 25). 6. Last of
all, man (v. 26, 27).
Mr. Gladstone then tries to find the proof of the occurrence of a similar
succession in sundry excellent works on geology.
I am really grieved to be obliged to say that this third (or is it fourth?)
modification of the foundation of the "plea for revelation" originally set
forth, satisfies me as little as any of its predecessors.
For, in the first place, I cannot accept the assertion that this order is to
be found in Genesis. With respect to No. 5, for example, I hold, as I
have already said, that "great sea monsters" includes the Cetacea, in
which case mammals (which is what, I suppose, Mr. Gladstone means
by "beasts") come in under head No. 3, and not under No. 5. Again,
"fowl" are said in Genesis to be created on the same day as fishes;
therefore I cannot accept an order which makes birds succeed fishes.
Once more, as it is quite certain that the term "fowl" includes the
bats,--for in Leviticus xi. 13-19 we read, "And these shall ye have in
abomination among the fowls ... the heron after its kind, and the
hoopoe, and the bat,"--it is obvious that bats are also said to have been
created at stage No. 3. And as bats are mammals, and their existence
obviously presupposes that of terrestrial "beasts," it is quite clear that
the latter could not have first appeared as No. 5. I need not repeat my
reasons for doubting whether man came "last of all."
As the latter half of Mr. Gladstone's sixfold order thus shows itself to
be wholly unauthorised by, and inconsistent with, the plain language of
the Pentateuch, I might decline to discuss the admissibility of its former
half.
But I will add one or two remarks on this point also. Does Mr.
Gladstone mean to say that in any of the works he has cited, or indeed
anywhere else, he can find scientific warranty for the assertion that
there was a period of land--by which I suppose he means dry land (for
submerged land must needs be as old as the separate existence of the
sea)--"anterior to all life?"
It may be so, or it may not be so; but where is the evidence which
would justify any one in making a positive assertion on the subject?

What competent palaeontologist will affirm, at this present moment,
that he knows anything about the period at which life originated, or will
assert more than the extreme probability that such origin was a long
way antecedent to any traces of life at present known? What physical
geologist will affirm that he knows when dry land began to exist, or
will say more than that it was probably very much earlier than any
extant direct evidence of terrestrial conditions indicates?
I think I know pretty well the answers which the authorities quoted by
Mr. Gladstone would give to these questions; but I leave it to them to
give them if they think fit.
If I ventured to speculate on the matter at all, I should say it is by no
means certain that sea is older than dry land, inasmuch as a solid
terrestrial surface may very well have existed before the earth was cool
enough to allow of the existence of fluid water. And, in this case, dry
land may have existed before the sea. As to the first appearance of life,
the whole argument of analogy, whatever it may be worth in such a
case, is in favour of the absence of living beings until long after the hot
water seas had constituted themselves; and of the subsequent
appearance of aquatic before terrestrial forms of life. But whether these
"protoplasts" would, if we could examine them, be reckoned among the
lowest microscopic algae, or fungi; or among those doubtful organisms
which lie in the debatable land between animals and plants, is, in my
judgment, a question on which a prudent biologist will reserve his
opinion.
I think that I have now disposed of those parts of Mr. Gladstone's
defence in which I seem to discover a design to rescue his solemn "plea
for revelation." But a great deal of the "Proem to Genesis" remains
which I would gladly pass over in silence, were such a course
consistent with the respect due to so distinguished a champion of the
"reconcilers."
I hope that my clients--the people of average opinions--have by this
time some confidence in me; for when I tell them that,