The Origin of the World According to Revelation and Science (Abridged, Paperback, Abridged edition)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. OBJECTS AND NATURE OF A REVELATION OF ORIGINS ?Contimied. " What if earth Be but a shadow of heaven, and things therein Each to the other like; more than on earth is thought." Milton. (3) Character of the Biblical Cosmogony, and general View? of Nature which it Contains or to which it Leads.?Much of what appertains to the character of the revelation of origins has been anticipated, under previous heads. We have only to read the Song of Creation, as given in the last chapter, to- understand its power and influence as a beginning of religious doctrine. The revelation was written for plain men in the infancy of the world. Imagine Chaldean or Hebrew shepherd listening to these majestic lines from the lips of some ancient patriarch, and receiving them as truly the words of God. What a grand opening to him of both the seen and unseen worlds! Henceforth he has no superstitious dread of the stars above, or of the lightning and thunder, or of the dark woods and flowing waters beneath They are all the works of the one Creator, the same Creator who is his own Maker, in whose image and shadow he is made. He can look up now to the heavens or around upon the earth, and see in all the handiwork of God, and can worship God through all. He can see that the power that caresfor the birds and the flowers of the field cares for him. He is no longer the slave and sport of unknown and dreadful forces; they are God's workmanship and under his control? nay, God has given him a mission to subdue and rule over them. So these noble words raise him to a new manhood, and emancipate him from the torture of endless fears, and open to him vast new fields of thought and inquiry, which may enrich him with boundless treasures of new religious and intellectual wealth. Imagine still farth...