Primeval Tradition. 277 15. At the beginning of the month, at the rising of the night, 16. his horns are breaking through to shine on the heaven. 17. On the seventh day to a circle he begins to swell, 18. and stretches towards the dawn further. 19. When the god Shamas (the sun) in the horizon of heaven, in the east, Now read from the Bible, Gen i. 14-19, "God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven, to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years: And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth; and it was so. And God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth, And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day." It seems hardly credible that the determined resolve to be rid of miracles, inspiration, prophecy, everything supernatural, should lead any man to regard Moses as having obtained his theology and cosmology from a jumble of serpent worship, devil worship, and Babylonian myth; yet, "some have gone so far as to argue that the Mosaic account was derived from it. Others, who reject this notion, suggest that a certain ‘old Chaldee tradition' was 'the basis of them both.' If we drop out the word 'Chaldee' from the statement, it may be regarded as fairly expressing the truth. The Babylonian legend embodies a primeval tradition, common to all mankind, of which an inspired author has given us the true ground-work in the first and second chapters of Genesis." 1 There are a few persons who say-"Theologians retain the Genesis account to prop up the theory of the Fall and of Satan's personality-retain it against reason; and if the book of any other religion gave an account of a speaking serpent, and of woman formed from the side of man, the whole would be counted an absurdity." Doubtless, but these marvels are certainly true in their spiritual meaning, really live in moral and physical events now operating; and are written in a manner so as to be understood by children, yet with depths for profoundest minds; are related in a Book which holds and will hold the world in awe; are connected with a scheme wonderfully comprehensive and mysterious; indeed, are the only accepted narrative which sufficiently explains the sin, the misery, the past and future of mankind. Take away the ancient narrative, deny the recorded events, refuse the essential meaning, and assert that there is no record of the earthly being so acted upon in primeval man that, as with men now a days, higher powers received damage, and what then? You are without any explanation of that in man which leads to devil-worship, and of those almost universal traditions which relate of sin entering by means of an evil principle. Nor do you get rid of marvels; the gradual growth of the universal mind of humanity, as asserted by some philosophers; and the redemption and sanctification affirmed with better authority by Christians; are nobler works, more lustrous in beauty and goodness, greater marvels, than any old wonder. The most practical men that the world has ever seen do consequently maintain that the knowledge of those old mysterious transactions were handed down to Moses through a tradition which had become the almost exclusive possession of the few who retained their faith in the primitive religion. The same being confirmed and probably enlarged to him by new revelation. In full confidence we retain our faith, revere the narratives, the ceremonies, the symbols in which it is embodied; and our confidence is further warranted because the verity and reality of both narratives are seen in the spiritual building 1 "The Five Great Monarchies," vol. i. p. 182 : George Rawlinson, M.A. Confirmation of both Accounts. 279 which Scripture erects. The creation of heaven and earth is the fact on which rests the declaration that we shall see a new heaven and a new earth (Rev. xxi. 1). The beginning of all things is treated as the beginning of manifestation concerning the mystery of the Divine nature (Jno. i. 1). The Spirit brooding over the waters and bringing forth life. prefigures the continual operation of God in our souls (Jno. iii. 5). The springing up of light is an analogue of the glory and the light which we hope to see by in the city of God (Rev. xxi. 23). The birth of land from the sea (Gen. i. 9) reminds us of all things being made new, and of there being no more troublous things like the sea (Rev. xxi. 1). The springing up of plants (Gen. i. 11) is a figure of the tree with food for all nations (Rev. xxii. 2). The sun and the moon and the stars shining with light, as of the star that led the wise (Mat. ii. 2), are a witness of mystery not yet fully known (Rev. xii. 1; xxi. 23). The Sabbath rest is symbol of the rest that remaineth (Heb. iv. 9, 10). The first narrative is full of spiritual reality and instruction, extending from the fact that God did frame the worlds (Heb. xi. 3), until it arrives at the startling statement that this frame encloses a spectacle of such vast import that angels are instructed by it (Eph. iii. 10). The reality underlying the second narrative manifests itself not only in the symbolistic and allegorising exegesis of patristic theology, but especially in Holy Scripture, and in souls of spiritual understanding. Who will forego the hope which is set forth in the fact of paradise? (Lu. xxiii. 43). From the ground, out of which we were formed, we shall again arise, re-formed, other than this body, of a higher stuff: our personal identity residing within the inner man, not the earthly outside (1 Cor. xv. 24-44). In material substance we are like all flesh, yet all flesh is not the same flesh, even as the stars are not all suns (1 Cor. xv. 39, 40). The rivers of paradise all flow into one river of life. The tree of death by the tremendous death on Calvary, has become a veritable Tree of Knowledge; and now we have access unto the Tree of Life with twelve manner of fruits. Not once, but a hundred times, are the actual facts, in their reality and their doctrinal truth, recorded in the Pentateuch, the Psalms, the Prophets, the Gospels. All these fruitful interpretations would be unfruitful, and no interpretation, did they not grow out of the real actual germ-God made the world and all things that are therein. The whole becomes more wonderful when compared with Auguste Comte's famous but erroneous law of scientific progress. Every science, he says, passes to perfection by three stages the theological, the metaphysical, the positive. Biblical science is the very reverse of this, and founded on the most positive and simple statements which it is possible to make. The whole race of man, and afterwards Israel in particular, were dealt with in the directest, most real, and positive manner. Those were the true days of sacred positivism. He who doubts may compare the simplicity and reality of Genesis with the myths, poems, and rhapsodies of all other nations. From that positive was a transition into the metaphysical: the prophets are witnesses. Then appeared Jesus who, with perfect truth, established the world's theological school. His piety rested on true wisdom, and that wisdom was based on positive fact. The knowledge of it is like a view in a glass-yet not a view in a glass; it brightens and elevates the human mind into a likeness of the Divine Mind. Man's duty high and lifted up above the mists of human error, has the body of heaven in its clearness. Faith ascends to God-Creator, Redeemer, Sanctifier. Our will, if we are not unbelieving and rebellious, is becoming conformed to His Will; our thoughts are being fashioned by His Mind. When perfect in Christ, we shall be one with God, and He one with us (John xiii. 21-23). "Oh, my friend, That thy faith were as mine; that thou could'st see The strifes and tumults of this troubled world, With the strong eye that sees the promised day STUDY XVI. THE PRE-ADAMITE WORLD. 46 Christian, try to solve the problems Which life's mystery surround. Why God made thee? Why He loves thee? Where thou art, and whither bound?" The Three Bibles (Unpublished). THE account of creation, if a true account, is proved by that truthfulness to be Divinely inspired. Early unscientific thought could not, of itself, know or invent those deeply hidden facts of which accurate science has but lately obtained possession; and however clear the mind's eye of early contemplative genius, it could not, without Divine aid, see how the world was framed. A revelation of the fact that God did create the world is vastly important, and establishes the kingdom of God in the universe of matter, as the history and salvation of man establish it in the world of spirits. The revelation was made probably to the first man; and handed down to Moses through a tradition which had become the almost exclusive possession of the few who, amidst polytheistic systems, retained their faith in the ancient and pure theism of a more primitive religion. To Moses it was, doubtless, confirmed and probably enlarged by new revelation. It is not a picture of the Divine action drawn by an ancient geologist, though there is agreement with the discoveries of geological science, both as regards the antiquity of the earth, and as to the process of its formation; nor was it depicted by man's imagination trying, in its own way, to account for nature's origin and phenomena. Imagination was used, but only as the faculty through which God made a revelation of Himself. There was knowledge, but not scientifically obtained as is our modern conception of the universe. "It is the production of a writer who seems to possess an acquain |