Now, looking at the structure and composition of the earth’s crust, especially its fossiliferous rocks, I am driven to one of three conclusions, each of them involving difficulty, I acknowledge, but the one that involves the least is, of course, the most preferable. Either I must admit—
1. That the fossils in these rocks were all deposited in order and in succession, without injury, through a crust of rocks ten miles in thickness, during twelve months’ violent diluvial action:
2. Or that they were all deposited there during the 15,000 or 16,000 years that had elapsed since the creation of man prior to the Deluge; that is, supposing the creation of man and the creation of the earth to have been synchronous. Or, lastly, which theory I accept—
3. That the date of the earth’s physical being is unknown to us, and that the fossiliferous rocks were deposited in decades of ages before the creation of man.
For, on the other hand, let us suppose the flood to have been universal, in the strict and literal sense of the term; then let me suggest some of the consequences and difficulties of such a theory.
1. One consequence would be that some remains of man or of his works would have been found; but nothing of this kind has occurred. Even Armenia has been geologically examined, and no human remains have been found; and surely man’s bones would last as long as the shells of a trilobite or terebratula?
2. And, secondly, the organic remains, the fossils themselves, would have been found confusedly heaped together; whereas, the remains in the crust of the earth are as carefully arranged as the contents of a well-ordered cabinet. We know always to a certainty what fossils will be found in any rock before we examine that rock.
3. Besides which, some, at least, of the organic remains found ought to correspond with existing beings and species: yet the contrary is the case, except only a few fossils found near the surface of the earth, in that portion of the earth’s crust occupied by the tertiary system.
Nor is this all. Consider the vast difficulties the universal flood theory has to contend with, all of which are removed by the theory we have adopted.
1. There is the quantity of water required. If all over the earth the water rose twenty-two feet six inches above the tops of the highest mountains, the quantity of water required would be eight times the whole quantity of water now existing. Where all this could have come from first and gone to afterwards, are prodigious stumbling-blocks. Of course we can resort to miracle; but this is not the way to get rid of difficulty in a manly and honest spirit.