And so it is with all the natural changes which we witness around us, and with all which science shows us to have taken place on the globe, excepting some which geology discloses, and perhaps one which astronomy renders probable. Let us look at some of those changes which the argument under consideration regards as inconsistent with the world’s eternity.
Nearly all the changes in nature with which we are acquainted belong to three classes,—the mechanical, the chemical, and the organic. Astronomical changes are purely mechanical; and hence the ease with which they may be calculated by mathematics. The universal system of death, which reigns over all animals and plants, is the result of organic laws; and it is this which probably gives to man the strongest impression of the transient nature of sublunary things. But just consider the antagonist agencies to this universal destroyer. I refer to the equally universal system of reproduction, and to the law by which permanence of species is secured. The consequence is, that, while every individual animal and plant dies, the species survives. In the whole history of the animals and plants now existing on the globe, only eight or ten certain examples are on record in which a species has become extinct, and those are some large birds, such as the dinornis and dodo, once inhabitants of the Isle of Bourbon and New Zealand. Every one of the human family, every elephant, every ox, every lion, &c., die, but man, as a species, still lives; and so does the elephant, the ox, and the lion; and most obviously this is a law of nature. How easy, then, for the atheist to evade the force of your argument against the world’s eternity, drawn from the ravages of death! He has only to suppose the havoc of individuals by death always to have been repaired by the equivalent operation of reproduction, and that these two agencies have been balanced against each other from eternity; and how will you prove this impossible, except by the absurd metaphysical arguments already considered?
Atmospheric and aqueous changes often, and, indeed, generally, appear more chaotic and destitute of a controlling force than any others in nature. When the winds are let loose from their prison-house; when the heavens become dark, and the clouds, rent by the lightnings, pour down their contents, and the swollen torrents carry desolation down the mountain’s side and over the wide plain; when the ocean rolls in upon the land its giant waves; when the tornado sweeps all before it, in rich tropical regions; or when the sirocco sends its hot blast, loaded with sand, over the devoted surface,—in all these cases, how difficult for us to conceive that all this uproar among the elements is limited and controlled by laws as fixed and unalterable as those which regulate the heavenly bodies! Nevertheless, it must be so; and although the winds and the waters seem to be rioting at their pleasure, there are, in fact, at work antagonist agencies; which will confine their wild war to a narrow field, and soon bring them again into peaceful submission. For such has always been the case, and the limits of their irregularities are no wider now than six thousand years ago. In other words, the repressing agency has always been superior to the destroying force, when the latter has risen to a certain limit; and I doubt not but the profounder mathematics of angelic minds might as easily calculate the anomalies and perturbations of winds and waves as the formulas of La Place can determine those of the solar system. And if such constancy has existed for six thousand years in meteorological changes,—of all others in nature apparently the most irregular,—why, the atheist will ask, may not that constancy have been eternal? And with equal reason may he ask the same in respect to all changes resulting from mechanical, chemical, and organic laws, which we witness in nature, except those which come within the province of geology, and even concerning some of those; and what changes in the material world do not result, directly or remotely, from one or two, or all of these laws? Yet, in regard to all these changes, there is no inconsistency in supposing them to have gone on in an eternal series; and hence they furnish no proof of the non-eternity of the world.
In the seventh and last place, the recent origin of society, as shown by historical monuments, is regarded as evidence of the recent origin of the world. This argument was well understood as long ago as the days of Lucretius, who states it very clearly in the oft-quoted lines,—
“Si nulla fuit genitalis origo,
Terrarum et cœli, semperque eterna fuit,
Cur, supra bellum Thebanum et funera Trojæ,
Non alias alii quoque res cecinere pœtæ?”
This argument, though it has been met by a plausible reply, is certainly of great importance in its bearing upon the recent origin of the human race, which, as we shall shortly see, is a point of much interest. But it is obvious that it proves nothing respecting the origin of matter, since this might have had an eternal existence before man was placed upon it. We need not, therefore, be delayed by its discussion.
Such is a fair summary, as I believe, of the arguments usually adduced, aside from the Bible and geology, to prove the non-eternity of the world. I am not prepared to say that they amount to nothing; but I do believe that they perplex, rather than convince, and that some of them are mere metaphysical quibbles.
They do not produce that instantaneous conviction which most of the arguments of natural theology force upon the mind; and it is easy to see how a man of a sceptical turn should rise from their examination entirely unaffected, or affected unfavorably. Let us now, therefore, turn to geology, and inquire whether its archives will afford us any clearer light upon the subject.
And here we must confess, at the outset, that geology furnishes us no more evidence than the other sciences of the creation of the matter of the universe out of nothing. But it does furnish us with examples of such modifications of matter as could be effected only by a Deity. Suppose, then, we should be obliged to acknowledge to the atheist, that we yield to him the point of matter’s eternal existence, if he pleases, because we can find nowhere in nature decisive evidence of its creation, and then take our stand upon the arrangements and metamorphoses of matter. Or, rather, suppose we say to him, that we shall not contend with him as to the origin of matter, but challenge him to explain, if he can, without a Deity, its modifications, as taught by geology. If that science does disclose to us such changes on the globe as no power and wisdom but those of an infinite God could produce, then of what consequence is it, so far as religion is concerned, whether we can, or cannot, demonstrate the first creation of matter? I can conceive of no religious truth that would be unfavorably affected, though we should admit that this point cannot be settled. Let us, then, at least for the sake of argument, admit that it cannot be, and proceed to inquire whether, aside from this point, geology does not teach us all that is necessary to establish the most perfect system of Theism. I shall select four examples from that science, each of which is independent of the others in its bearing upon the subject, since in this way the argument will become cumulative; and if some are not satisfied with one example, the others may produce conviction.
In the first place, geology teaches that the time has been when the earth existed as a molten mass of matter, and, therefore, all the animals and plants now existing upon its surface, and all those buried in its rocky strata, must have had a beginning, or have been created. I should be sustained by many probabilities, were I to go farther, and maintain that the time was when the globe existed in a gaseous state—an opinion very widely adopted by able philosophers of the present day. But as this view is more hypothetical than my first position, which makes the earth a liquid mass, and as nothing would be gained to the argument by supposing it in a gaseous state, I shall not press that point. That it was once in a state of fusion is probable from the very great heat still remaining in its interior. But more direct proof of this results from the facts, now admitted by almost all geologists, that the unstratified rocks have all been melted, and that the stratified class have all, or nearly all, been the result of disintegration and abrasion of the unstratified masses. A striking confirmation of this opinion is the spheroidal figure of the earth,—a figure precisely such as the globe would have assumed in consequence of rotation, had it been in a fluid state. In fine, so many and so decisive are the facts which point to the original igneous fluidity of the globe, that no competent judge thinks of doubting that all the matter of which it is composed, certainly its crust, has some time or other been in that state. It is, however, the opinion of some geologists of distinction, that the whole of it was not in fusion at the same time, and that its different portions have passed successively through the furnace. But this view of the subject scarcely affects my argument, since at whatever period the fusion of any part took place, the destruction of organic life, if it existed, must have been the consequence. The essential thing is, to show that such was once the state of the earth that animals and plants could not have existed on it. For if such was the case, their creation must have been a subsequent operation; and if this did not require an infinite Being to accomplish it, no result in nature would demand his agency.