Robert Merry's museum, Volumes III-IV (1842)

by Various

Nor is this the only marvel that is revealed by the discoveries of modern geology. Whole tribes of birds and insects, whole races of trees and plants, have existed, and nothing is left of their story save the traces to be found in the soil, or the images depicted in the layers of slate. They all existed before man was created, and thousands of years have rolled over the secret, no one suspecting the wonderful truth. Nor does the train of curiosities end here. It appears that the climates of the earth must have been different in those ancient and mysterious days from what they are at present: for in England, ferns, now small plants, grew to the size of trees, and vegetables flourished there of races similar to those which now grow only in the hot regions of the tropics.

As before stated, the northern shores of Siberia, in Asia, at present as cold and desolate as Lapland, and affording sustenance only to the reindeer that feeds on lichens, was once inhabited by thousands and tens of thousands of elephants, and other creatures, which now only dwell in the regions of perpetual summer.

The inferences drawn from all these facts, which are now placed beyond dispute, are not only interesting, but they come upon us like a new revelation. They seem to assure us that this world in which we dwell has existed for millions of years; that at a period, ages upon ages since, there was a state of things totally distinct from the present. Europe was then, probably, a collection of islands. Where England now is, the iguanodon then dwelt, and was, probably, one of the lords of the soil.

This creature was from seventy to a hundred feet long. He dwelt along the rivers and lakes, and had for his companions other animals of strange and uncouth forms. Along the borders of the rivers the ferns grew to the height of trees, and the land was shaded with trees, shrubs, and plants, resembling the gorgeous vegetation of Central America and Central Africa.

This was one age of the world—one of the days in which the process of creation was going on. How long this earth remained in this condition, we cannot say, but probably many thousands of years. After a time, a change came over it. The country of the iguanodon sunk beneath the waters, and after a period, the land arose again, and another age began. Now new races of animals and vegetables appeared.

The waters teemed with nautili, and many species of shell and other fishes, at present extinct; the tropical forests had disappeared, and others took their places. Instead of the iguanodon, and the hideous reptiles that occupied the water and the land before, new races were seen. Along the rivers and marshes were now the hippopotamus, tapir, and rhinoceros; upon the land were browsing herds of deer of enormous size, and groups of elephants and mastodons, of colossal magnitude.

This era also passed away; these mighty animals became entombed in the earth; the vegetable world was changed; swine, horses and oxen were now seen upon the land, and man, the head of creation, spread over the earth, and assumed dominion over the animal tribes.

Such are the mighty results to which the researches of modern geology seem to lead us. They teach us that the six days, spoken of in the book of Genesis, during which the world was created, were probably not six days of twenty-four hours, but six periods of time, each of them containing thousands of years. They teach us also that God works by certain laws, and that even in the mighty process of creation, there is a plan, by which he advances in his work from one step to another, and always by a progress of improvement.

So far, indeed, is geology from furnishing evidence against the truth of the Bible, that it offers the most wonderful confirmation of it. No traces of the bones of man are found among these remains of former ages, and thus we have the most satisfactory and unexpected evidence that the account given of his creation in the book of Genesis is true. It appears, also, that the present races of animals must have been created at the same time he was, for their bones do not appear among the ancient relics of which we have been speaking.