And mad’st it pregnant.”
The Holy Spirit, by his vital influence, infused that efficient power into the great mass of matter, which was necessary for the assumption of different forms, and the discharge of the assigned functions of selecting and arranging the materials out of which the world is formed. By brooding over the mingled earth and water, says Dr. Owen, “he communicated a prolific virtue; and inlaid them with the seeds of animal life; and therefore the earth and the water brought forth all sorts of creatures in abundance, according to the seeds and principles communicated to them by the cherishing motion of the Spirit of God.”
As several of the ancients have described the elementary principles of all things to be a gloomy chaos, consisting of darkness and water, we may easily infer from what source they derived this notion. Aristotle observes, the theologists and natural philosophers agreed, that all things were produced, as the former said, “out of night;” or, as the latter, “out of a confused mixture.” Whatever knowledge the inhabitants of Chaldea had of the creation of the world, they ascribe to the teaching of an amphibious monster denominated Oannes. He taught his auditors, that there was a time when all things were darkness and water, in the midst of which various monsters of horrible forms received life and light. Over this chaotic mass presided the demon Omoroca, a mythological personification of the ocean. At length arrived the destined hour of the creation. The monster Omoroca fell subdued beneath the victorious arm of Belus; the animals which composed her empire were annihilated; and the world was formed out of her substance. Oannes, however, taught, that this physiological description was to be taken merely in an allegorical sense, and that the whole fable alluded to the aqueous origin of the universe. Matter having been thus created, Belus divided the darkness from the light, separated the earth from the heavens, disposed the world in order, and called the starry host into existence.
According to the Phœnician system, the principle of the universe was a dark air, and a turbulent evening chaos; an opinion not very dissimilar to that given by Moses. Sanchoniathon afterward ascribes to material operation the origin of that which may be denominated the will or desire of God, when in his great wisdom he thought fit to create the world out of nothing. From this personification of Divine love, a chaotic mixture was produced, and within it were comprehended the rudiments of all things.
The cosmogony of the ancient Egyptians, though more obscure, is given by Diodorus Siculus. “Damascius having inquired about what was the first principle in the world, gives this as an ancient Egyptian doctrine. The Egyptians have chosen to celebrate the first cause as unspeakable. They accordingly style it darkness unknown and mention it with a three-fold acclamation. Again. In this manner the Egyptians styled the first principle an inconceivable darkness; night and darkness past all imagination.” This is perfectly consonant to passages from the same author, quoted by Dr. Cudworth. “There is one origin of all things, celebrated by the name of unknown (incomprehensible) darkness.” Again. “They hold, that the first beginning or cause of things was darkness beyond all conception; an unknown darkness.”
Hesiod mentions, “A chaos as first existing. Next was produced the spacious earth, the seat of the immortals; Tartarus hid within the recesses of the ample globe; and divine love, the most beautiful of the deities. From chaos sprung Erebus, and black night; and from the union of night and Erebus were born ether and the day.”[26] Zeno, of Cittium, the founder of the Stoics, said, Hesiod meant by the chaos, “Water, out of which all things were formed, which by concretion became firm earth.”
In the work of Aristophanes, we meet with a similar passage. “Chaos, and night, and black Erebus, and wide Tartarus, first existed; at that time, there was neither earth, air, nor heaven. But in the bosom of Erebus, black-winged night produced an aërial egg; from which, in due season, beautiful Love, decked with golden wings, was born. Out of dark chaos, in the midst of wide-spreading Tartarus, he begot our race, and called us forth into the light.”[27]
It is unnecessary to multiply quotations to prove, that the ancients were not only acquainted with the cosmogony of Moses, but received it as true; to which they added their own coloring.
[It is now generally agreed by cosmogonists, commentators, biblical critics, and natural philosophers, that the substance of the earth certainly, and probably the materials of the Solar System, was first created in a chaotic state, and subsequently arranged in order. This opinion is very ancient and almost universal, found in all nations. Ovid, an ancient heathen poet, has well described this chaos:
Ante mare et terras, et, quod teget omnia, Cœlum,
Unus erat toto naturæ vultus in orbe,
Quem dixére Chaos; rudis indigestaque moles,
Nec quicquam nisi pondus iners; congestaque eodem.
Non bene junctarum discordia semina rerum.
Before the seas, and this terrestrial ball,
And heaven’s high canopy that covers all:
One was the face of nature if a face:
Rather a rude and indigested mass:
A lifeless lump, unfashioned and unframed,
Of jarring seeds, and justly Chaos named.—Dryden.
Notwithstanding the general prevalence of this opinion, and the high authorities which support it, the reader must not imagine it is absolutely universal. Some eminent men have suggested, that the earth, and matter generally, was created in a solid state at first. This is the view taken by Mr. Ure, of the Andersonian University. He supposes the earth was created a solid ball, or spheroid, regular on its surface, without hills and vallies, and immersed in a crust of ice, which completely and uniformly surrounded it: that it was a cold lifeless lump; heat not yet having pervaded it. The first, and all quickening operation of heat he supposes to be indicated by these words of Moses: “And the Spirit of God moved on the face of the waters.” He supposes, all the matter of our earth is in the same relative position, in which it was when it first existed at the command of God; except such cases in which some subsequent force has disarranged it. These cases he supposes to have been many, and to have operated to the upheaving the mountains, and hollowing out the beds of the sea, &c. He says of the earth: “The central mass composed, most probably, of the metallic bases of the earths and alkalies, as volcanic phenomena seem to attest, would fuse, when first the calorific energy was made to actuate the body of the earth, and the exterior parts would oxydize into the crust of mineral strata, and the outermost coat of all, the fixed ice, would melt into the moveable waters.” New Syst. of Geol. B. 1. chap. 1. p. 7.
Perhaps Mr. Ure’s view might be improved, and made to approximate much nearer the common opinion, possibly identified with it, by supposing the mass of matter composing our earth, was confusedly mixed,—and of course chaotic—but was in a frozen, hard, inactive state: that the quickening energy, which softened and fused it, was simultaneous with its revolution on its axis. The consequence then would be precisely what we find it to be; viz: an enlargement of the equatorial diameter, and a flattening of the poles. This I conceive to be the true theory in this case.
Mr. Ure confirms his view by a quotation from Sir Isaac Newton; Optics, Book 3. towards the conclusion. “It seems probable to me that God in the beginning formed matter in solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, movable particles, of such sizes and figures, and with such other properties, and in such proportions to space, as most conduced to the end for which he formed them. All material things seem to have been composed of the hard and solid particles above mentioned, variously associated in the first creation by the counsels of an intelligent agent. For it became him who created them to set them in order; and if he did so, it is unphilosophical to seek for any other origin of this world, or to pretend that it might rise out of chaos by the mere laws of Nature; though being once formed, it may continue by those laws for many ages.”
I have given this quotation precisely as I found it in Mr. Ure’s New System of Geology, B. 1. chap. 1. p. 10. Considering the well founded reputation of Newton, it adds very much to the probability of the above theory: yet it seems to me to be at variance with the commonly received impression of Newton’s opinion on this subject. I have not his work at hand to examine it.
The Encyclopedia Britannica, Article Earth, seems to favor this view. It says, “The common notion of the earth’s being originally a chaos, seems neither to have a foundation in reason, nor in the Mosaic account of the creation.”
The reader will here perceive high authorities on both sides, and all claiming to agree with Moses. The weight of evidence seems to be in favor of a chaotic creation, which does not necessarily imply that the mass was created in a soft state. But the configuration, and internal structure of the earth abundantly prove it was in a soft, or compressible state when it was assuming its present form and structure. This condition was the effect of the quickening energy of the Spirit of God. The difference between the equatorial and polar diameters of the earth, which is now well established, and is about twenty-seven miles, can scarcely be accounted for, without supposing the substance of the earth, at least to a great depth, to have been partially or wholly fluid; in which case, by turning round rapidly on its own axis, it would assume the shape it is known to possess. It may, indeed, be said, the Almighty could give it any shape and qualities he pleased, and we cannot well object to it.
As it regards the interior, or central parts of our planet, our author has said nothing, and possibly he would give this very good reason for his silence—we can know nothing certainly. Still, however, we may subjoin the conjectures of some eminent philosophers.
Some suppose the central parts of our globe to be cavernous or hollow. The principal argument for this theory is the transmission of sound and motion through vast extents of country, in case of volcanoes and earthquakes. It is supposed this could not be done so perfectly and extensively, unless we suppose some aëriform, or gaseous body within the earth, by means of which it might be transmitted: which would be to suppose it cavernous or hollow.
Dr. Halley supposes the earth is a hollow sphere, in which there is inclosed a central magnetic globe, and by the motions of this globe the variations of the magnetic needle are produced.
Our own ingenious, but unfortunate countryman, Symms, supposed the earth to be hollow, and inhabited within, and its interior accessible to us. He argues, there is no necessity, for the purposes of gravitation, or for any other purposes, to suppose the earth solid to the centre: And it is inconsistent with the divine beneficence to suppose such an amount of matter as this globe would be, if solid, should have been created to afford so small a portion, scarcely one-fourth, fit for the actual habitation of man, for whom principally it was created. He, therefore, supported, that the interior of the earth was an immense cavern blessed with changes of season, succession of day and night, cold and heat, and inhabited by human beings, and other animals. He supposed the poles of the earth were hollow, and this hollow entrance gradually verged round towards the equator; and ships have, without knowing it, been within the verge, from whence they found no difficulty of returning.
Others have supposed the central parts of our globe are solid. This is the common supposition, and is principally supported by these two arguments:—As the attraction of gravitation depends on the quantity of matter, as well as the distance; unless we suppose the earth a solid body it will not be able to exert a sufficient attractive influence on the moon to keep her in her orbit. Again: it is ascertained by actual experiment, that the mean density of the earth is about five times that of water: from which it is infered it is solid, and must increase in density from the surface to the centre, in order to give this high mean proportion over the bodies at its surface.
The increasing density of the earth, from the surface to the centre is owing to compression in part, and partly to the supposed fact, that the heavier substances are placed nearer the centre. Thus we find the different strata of rocks indicate the same. Granite is the heaviest and lowest rock in situ.
Some have supposed that iron, probably nearly in a metallic state, constitutes the nucleus of our earth. This idea seems to have been suggested to account for the influence of the earth on a magnetic needle.
But the most splendid, and very probable conjecture is founded on the experiments of Berzelius, and Sir H. Davy, on the earths, which experiments prove them to have metallic bases universally: hence all our earths are metallic oxides. From these circumstances it is conjectured, that the nucleus of our globe is constituted of the metals in a pure, or nearly pure state, which are the bases of our earths, alkalis, and alkaline earths.
It would almost seem a legitimate conjecture to suppose the substances of our globe were, at first, metals and gases: that the oxygen, combining with the metals formed earths, and alkalis; and the gases combining among themselves formed air, water, &c. This would be a chemical process, and necessarily fuse and soften the earth, and introduce the process of cooling, which would proceed from the surface towards the centre. Hence some eminent philosophers have conjectured that there is a great degree of heat in the interior of the earth yet: probably the central parts are in a state of igneous fusion. Some recent researches of Cordier tend to establish this opinion. The amount of evidence in favor of this conjecture is increasing annually, and probably will prevail. See the additional paper on volcanos in this volume.]