a miracle equally grand, they were enabled to glide unhurt down the wet and slippery faces of the rocks?
"One fact more I have to mention in this range of argument. There are trees of the most astonishing magnificence, as to form and size, which grow, the one species in Africa, the other in the southern part of North America. There are also methods of ascertaining the age of trees of the class to which they belong, with satisfaction generally, but with full evidence after they have passed the early stages of their growth. Individuals of these species now existing, are proved, by those methods, to have begun to grow at an epoch long before the date of the deluge; if we even adopt the largest chronology that learned men have proposed. Had those trees been covered with water for three-quarters of a year, they must have been destroyed. The most certain conditions of vegetable nature, for the class (the most perfect land plants) to which they belong, put such a result out of doubt. Here, then, we are met by another independent proof that the deluge did not extend to those regions of the earth."
"Such are the objections which present themselves against the interpretation which, with grief I acknowledge, is generally admitted, in relation to the scriptural narrative of the deluge. It is a painful position in which I stand. I seem to be taking the part of an enemy, adducing materials for skepticism, and doing nothing to remove them. But this situation for me is inseparable from the plan of these lectures—the only plan that appeared practicable. The apparent discrepancies between the facts of science and the words of scripture, must be understood before we can make any attempt at their removal."
The reader who is unacquainted with the book from which these quotations are taken, would probably be gratified to know what theory the author substitutes in the place of the one which he so thoroughly demolishes. To this just and natural inquiry, I will briefly answer, that he sup-
