THE DRY LAND AND THE FIRST PLANTS.
“And God said, Let the waters
under the heavens be gathered into one place,
and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
And God called the dry land earth, and the gathering
of waters called he seas; and God saw that it
was good.
“And God said, Let the earth
bring forth the springing herb, the herb bearing
seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit, after
its kind, whose seed is in it on the earth: and
it was so. And the earth brought forth the
tender herb, the herb yielding seed, and the
tree bearing fruit whose seed is in it, after
its kind; and God saw that it was good.” Genesis
i., 10, 11.
These are events sufficiently simple
and intelligible in their general character.
Geology shows us that the emergence of the dry land
must have resulted from the elevation of parts of
the bed of the ancient universal ocean, and that the
agent employed in such changes is the bending and
crumpling of the outer crust of the earth, caused by
lateral pressure, and operating either in a slow and
regular manner or by sudden paroxysms. It farther
informs us that the existing continents consist of
stratified or bedded masses, more or less inclined,
fissured and irregularly elevated, and usually supported
by crystalline rocks which have been produced among
them, or forced up beneath or through them by internal
agencies, and which truly constitute the pillars and
foundations of the earth. These elevations, it
is true, were successive, and belong to different periods;
but the appearance of the first dry land is that intended
here.
The elevation of the dry land is more
frequently referred to in Scripture than any other
cosmological fact; and while all have been misapprehended,
the statements on this subject have been even more
unjustly dealt with than others. In the text,
the word “earth” (aretz) is,
by divine sanction, narrowed in meaning to the dry
land; but while some expositors are quite willing to
restrict it to this, or even a more limited sense,
in the first and second verses of this chapter, almost
the only verses in the Bible where the terms of the
narrative make such a restriction inadmissible, they
are equally ready to understand it as meaning the
whole globe in places where the explanatory clause
in the verse now under consideration teaches us that
we should understand the land only, as distinguished
from the sea. I may quote some of these passages,
and note the views they give; always bearing in mind
that, after the intimation here given, we must understand
the term “earth” as applying only to
the continents or dry land, unless where
the context otherwise fixes the meaning. We may
first turn to Psalm civ.:
“Thou laidst the foundations of
the earth,
That it should never be removed;
Thou coveredst it with the deep as with
a garment;
The waters stood above the mountains;
At thy rebuke they fled;
At the sound of thy thunder they hasted
away;
Mountains ascended, valleys descended
To the place thou hast appointed for them:
Thou hast appointed them bounds that they
may not pass,
That they return not again to cover the
earth.”
The position of these verses in this
“the hymn of creation” leaves no doubt
that they refer to the events we are now considering.
I have given above the literal reading of the line
that refers to the elevation of mountains and subsidence
of valleys; admitting, however, that the grammatical
construction gives an air of probability to the rendering
in our version, “they go up by the mountains,
they go down by the valleys,” which, on the
other hand, is rendered very improbable by the sense.
In whichever sense we understand this line, the picture
presented to us by the Psalmist includes the elevation
of the mountains and continents, the subsidence of
the waters into their depressed basins, and the firm
establishment of the dry land on its rocky foundations,
the whole accompanied by a feature not noticed in
Genesis the voice of God’s thunder or,
in other words, electrical and volcanic explosions.
The following quotations refer to the same subject:
“Before the mountains were settled,
Before the hills was I (the Wisdom of
God) brought forth;
While as yet he had not made the earth,
Nor the plains, nor the higher parts of
the habitable world.
When he gave the sea his decree
That the waters should not pass his limits,
When he determined the foundations of
the earth.”
Proverbs viii., 25.
“Thou hast established the earth,
and it endureth,
According to thy decrees they continue
this day,
For all are thy servants.”
Psalm cxix., 90.
“Who shaketh the earth out of its
place,
And its pillars tremble.”
Job ix., 6.
“Where wast thou when I founded
the earth?
Declare, if thou hast knowledge.
Who hath fixed the proportion thereof,
if thou knowest?
Who stretched the line upon it?
Upon what are its foundations settled?
Or who laid its corner-stone,
When the morning stars sang together,
And all the sons of God shouted for joy?
Who shut up the sea with doors
In its bursting forth as from the womb?
When I made the cloud its garment,
And swathed it in thick darkness,
I measured out for it my limit,
And fixed its bars and doors;
And said, Thus far shalt thou come, but
no farther,
And here shall thy proud waves be stayed.”
Job xxxviii., 4.
In these passages the foundation of
the earth at first, as well as the shaking of its
pillars by the earthquake, are connected with what
we usually call natural law the decree
of the Almighty the unchanging arrangements
of an unchangeable Creator, whose “hands formed
the dry land." This is the ultimate cause not
only of the elevation of the land, but of all other
natural things and processes. The naturalist
does not require to be informed that the details, in
so far as they are referred to in the above passages,
are perfectly in accordance with what we know of the
nature and support of continental masses. Geological
observation and mathematical calculation have in our
day combined their powers to give clear views of the
manner in which the fractured strata of the earth
are wedged and arched together, and supported by internal
igneous masses upheaved from beneath, and subsequently
cooled and hardened. A general view of these facts
which we have learned from scientific inquiry, the
Hebrews gleaned with nearly as much precision from
the short account of the elevation of the land in
Genesis, and from the later comments of their inspired
poets. From the same source our own great poet,
Milton, learned these cosmical facts, before the rise
of geology, and expressed them in unexceptionable
terms:
“The
mountains huge appear
Emergent, and their broad bare backs upheave
Into the clouds, their tops ascend the
sky.
So high as heaved the tumid hills, so
low
Down sunk a hollow bottom, broad and deep,
Capacious bed of waters.”
In further illustration of the opinions
of the Scripture writers respecting the nature of
the earth, and the disturbances to which it is liable,
I quote the following passages. The first is from
the magnificent description of Jéhovah descending
to succor his people amid the terrors of the earthquake,
the volcano, and the thunder-storm, in Psalm xviii.:
“Then shook and trembled the earth,
The foundations of the hills moved and
were shaken,
Because he was angry.
Smoke went up from his nostrils,
Fire from his mouth devoured,
Coals were kindled by it.
Then were seen the channels of the waters,
And the foundations of the world were
discovered,
At thy rebuke O Jéhovah
At the blast of the breath of thy nostrils.”
In another place in the Psalms we
find volcanic action thus tersely sketched:
“He looketh on the earth and it
trembleth,
He toucheth the hills and they smoke.”
Psalm civ., 32.
Perhaps the most remarkable discourse
on this subject in the whole Bible is that in Job
xxviii., in which mining operations are introduced
as an illustration of the difficulty of obtaining true
wisdom. This passage is interesting both from
its extreme antiquity, and the advancement in knowledge
and practical skill which it indicates. It presents,
however, many difficulties; and its details have almost
entirely lost their true significance in our common
English version:
“Surely there is a vein for silver,
And a place for the gold which men refine;
Iron is taken from the earth,
And copper is molten from the ore.
To the end of darkness and to all extremes
man searcheth,
For the stones of darkness and the shadow
of death.
He opens a passage [shaft] from where
men dwell,
Unsupported by the foot, they hang down
and swing to and fro.
The earth out of it cometh
bread;
And beneath, it is overturned as by fire.
Its stones are the place of sapphires,
And it hath lumps of gold.
The path (thereto) the bird of prey hath
not known,
The vulture’s eye hath not seen
it.
The wild beasts’ whelps have not
trodden it,
The lion hath not passed over it.
Man layeth his hand on the hard rock,
He turneth up the mountains from their
roots,
He cutteth channels [adits] in
the rocks,
His eye seeth every precious thing.
He restraineth the streams from trickling,
And bringeth the hidden thing to light.
But where shall wisdom be found,
And where is the place of understanding?”
This passage, incidentally introduced,
gives us a glimpse of the knowledge of the interior
of the earth and its products, as it existed in an
age probably anterior to that of Moses. It brings
before us the repositories of the valuable metals
and gems the mining operations, apparently
of some magnitude and difficulty, undertaken in extracting
them and the wonderful structure of the
earth itself, green and productive at the surface,
rich in precious metals beneath, and deeper still
the abode of intense subterranean fires. The only
thing wanting to give completeness to the picture
is some mention of the fossil remains buried in the
earth; and, as the main thought is the eager and successful
search for useful minerals, this can hardly be regarded
as a defect. The application of all this is finer
than almost any thing else in didactic poetry.
Man can explore depths of the earth inaccessible to
all other creatures, and extract thence treasures of
inestimable value; yet, after thus exhausting all the
natural riches of the earth, he too often lacks that
highest wisdom which alone can fit him for the true
ends of his spiritual being. How true is all
this, even in our own wonder-working days! A poet
of to-day could scarcely say more of subterranean
wonders, or say it more truthfully and beautifully;
nor could he arrive at a conclusion more pregnant
with the highest philosophy than the closing words:
“The fear of the Lord, that is wisdom;
And to depart from evil is understanding.”
The emergence of the dry land is followed
by a repetition of the approval of the Creator.
“God saw that it was good.” To our
view that primeval dry land would scarcely have seemed
good. It was a world of bare, rocky peaks, and
verdureless valleys here active volcanoes,
with their heaps of scoriae and scarcely cooled
lava currents there vast mudflats, recently
upheaved from the bottom of the waters nowhere
even a blade of grass or a clinging lichen. Yet
it was good in the view of its Maker, who could see
it in relation to the uses for which he had made it,
and as a fit preparatory step to the new wonders he
was soon to introduce. Then too, as we are informed
in Job xxxviii., “The morning stars sang together,
and all the sons of God shouted for joy.”
We also, when we think of the beautiful variety of
the terrestrial surface, the character and composition
of its soils, the variety of climate and exposure
resulting from its degrees of elevation, the arrangements
for the continuance of springs and streams, and many
other beneficial provisions connected with the merely
mechanical arrangements of the dry land, may well join
in the tribute of praise to the All-wise Creator.
There is, however, a farther thought suggested by
the approval of the great Artificer. In this
wondrous progress of creation, it seems as if every
thing at first was in its best estate. No succeeding
state could parallel the unbroken symmetry of the
earth in the fluid and vaporous condition of the “deep.”
Before the elevation of the land, the atmospheric currents
and the deposition of moisture must have been surpassingly
regular. The first dry land may have presented
crags and peaks and ravines and volcanic cones in
a more marvellous and perfect manner than any succeeding
continents even as the dry and barren moon
now, in this respect, far surpasses the earths.
In the progress of organic life, geology gives similar
indications, in the variety and magnitude of many
animal types on their first introduction; so that this
may very possibly be a law of creation.
During the emergence of the first
dry land, large quantities of detrital matter must
have been deposited in the waters, and in part elevated
into land. All of these beds would, probably,
be destitute of organic remains; but if such beds
were formed and still remain, they are probably unknown
to us, for the oldest formations that we know those
of the Eozoic age contain traces of such
remains. It has, indeed, been suggested that
these most ancient organisms are, as it were, overlooked
in the history of creation, or regarded as equivalent
to those shapeless monsters and animals of the darkness
that are referred to in the older Turanian versions
of this story of creation. I doubt very much,
however, if this is a fair interpretation of our ancient
record; but we shall be in a better position to discuss
it when we come to the actual introduction of animals.
Modern analogy would induce us to
believe that the land was not elevated suddenly; but
either by a series of small paroxysms, as in the case
of Chili, or by a gradual and imperceptible movement,
as in the case of Sweden two of the most
remarkable modern instances of elevation of land accompanied,
however, in the case of the last by local subsidence.
In either of these ways the seas and rivers would
have time to smooth the more rugged inequalities, to
widen the ravines into valleys, and to spread out
sediment in the lower grounds; thus fitting the surface
for the habitation of plants and animals. We
must not suppose, however, that the dry land had any
close resemblance to that now existing in its form
or distribution. Geology amply proves that since
the first appearance of dry land, its contour has
frequently been changed, and probably also its position.
Hence nearly all our present land consists of rocks
which have been formed under the waters, long after
the period now under consideration, and have been
subsequently hardened and elevated; and since all the
existing high mountain ranges are of a comparatively
late age, it is probable that this primeval dry land
was low, as well as, in the earlier part of the period
at least, of comparatively small extent. It is,
however, by no means certain that there may not have
been a greater expanse of land toward the close of
this period than that which afterwards existed in
those older periods of animal life to which the earliest
fossiliferous rocks of the geologist carry us back;
since, as already hinted, it seems to be a rule in
creation that each new object shall be highly developed
of its kind at its first appearance, and since there
have been in geological time many great subsidences
as well as elevations. Neither must we forget
that the oldest land has been subjected throughout
geological time to wearing and degrading agencies,
and that from its waste the later formations have been
mainly derived.
It would be wrong, however, to omit
to state that, though we may know at present no remains
of the first dry land, we are not ignorant of its
general distribution; for the present continents show,
in the arrangement of their formations and mountain
chains, evidence that they are parts of a plan sketched
out from the beginning. It has often been remarked
by physical geographers that the great lines of coast
and mountain ranges are generally in directions approaching
to northeast and southwest, or northwest and southeast,
and that where they run in other directions, as in
the case of the south of Europe and Asia, they are
much broken by salient and re-entering angles, formed
by lines having these directions. Professor R.
Owen, of Tennessee, and Professor Pierce, of Harvard
College, were, I believe, the first to point out that
these lines are in reality parts of great circles
tangent to the polar circles, and the latter to suggest
a theory of their origin, based on the action of solar
heat and the seasons on a cooling earth. This
has been more fully stated by Mr. W. Lowthian Green
in his curious book, “Vestiges of the Molten
Globe." It would appear that the great circles
in question are in reality at right angles to the
line of direction of the attraction of the sun and
moon at the period of either solstice, and when they
happen to be in conjunction or opposition at these
periods; and that such circles would be the lines
on which the thin crust of a cooling globe would be
most likely to be ruptured by its internal tidal-wave.
Whatever the cause of the phenomenon, it is evident
that in the formation of its surface inequalities
the earth has cracked so to speak along
two series of great circles tangent to the polar circles;
and that these, with certain subordinate lines of fracture
running north and south and east and west, have determined
the forms of the continents from their origin.
M. Elie de Beaumont, and after him
most other geologists, have attributed the elevation
of the continents and the upheaval and plication of
mountain chains to the secular refrigeration of the
earth, causing its outer shell to become too capacious
for its contracting interior mass, and thus to break
or bend, and to settle toward the centre. This
view would well accord with the terms in which the
elevation of the land is mentioned throughout the Bible,
and especially with the general progress of the work
as we have gleaned it from the Mosaic narrative; since
from the period of the desolate void and aeriform
deep to that now before us secular refrigeration must
have been steadily in progress. Let us also observe
here that the earliest fractures of the crust would
determine the first coast lines, and the first slopes
along which sedimentary matter would descend from
the land and be deposited in the sea. They would
also modify the direction of the ocean currents.
Thus the deposition of new formations would be directed
by these old lines, as would also to some extent the
course of all subsequent fractures and plications.
Thus it happens that the lines of outcrop of the oldest
rocks first raised out of the waters already marked
out the forms of the continents, and that the later
formations appear rather as fillings-up and extensions
of the skeleton established by the first dry land.
Farther, the lines of plication first established
along the borders of the continents formed resisting
walls along which, in the continued contraction of
the earth, pressure was exerted from the ocean bed,
widening and elevating these lines of upheaval, and
still farther fixing the general forms of the continents,
and giving variety to their surfaces. In the progress
of geological time there have also been successive
depressions and re-elevations of the continental plateaus,
subjecting them alternately to the wearing and disintegrating
action of the atmosphere and its waters, and to the
influence of waves and ocean currents, and especially
to that of the deep-seated polar currents which have
throughout geological ages been loading the submerged
areas of the earth’s surface with the products
of the waste caused by frost and ice in the polar
regions. These causes again have been progressively
increasing the oblateness of the earth’s figure,
and, along with the slackening of its rotation, preparing
the way for those periodical collapses in the equatorial
and temperate regions which form the boundaries of
some of our most important geological periods.
Throughout all these changes the great general plan
of the continents, first sketched out when the “foundations
of the earth” were laid, before Eozoic time,
was being elaborated.
The same creative period that witnessed
the first appearance of dry land saw it also clothed
with vegetation; and it is quite likely that this
is intended to teach that no time was lost in clothing
the earth with plants that the first emerging
portions received their vegetable tenants as they
became fitted for them and that each additional
region, as it rose above the surface of the waters,
in like manner received the species of plants for
which it was adapted. What was the nature of
this earliest vegetation? The sacred writer specifies
three descriptions of plants as included in it; and,
by considering the terms which he uses, some information
on this subject may be gained.
Deshe, translated “grass”
in our version, is derived from a verb signifying
to spring up or bud forth; the same verb, indeed, used
in this verse to denote “bringing forth,”
literally causing to spring up. Its radical meaning
is, therefore, vegetation in the act of sprouting
or springing forth; or, as connected with this, young
and delicate herbage. Thus, in Job xxxviii.,
“To satisfy the desolate and waste ground, and
to cause the bud of the young herbage to spring
forth.” Here the reference is, no doubt,
to the bulbous and tuberous rooted plants of the desert
plains, which, fading away in the summer drought,
burst forth with magical rapidity on the setting-in
of rain. The following passages are similar:
Psalm xxiii., “He maketh me to lie down in green
pastures” (literally, young or tender herbage);
Deuteronomy xxiii., “Small rain upon the tender
herb;” Isaiah xxxvii., “Grass
on the house-tops.” The word is also used
for herbage such as can be eaten by cattle or cut
down for fodder, though even in these cases the idea
of young and tender herbage is evidently included;
“Fat as a heifer at grass” (Jer.
xiv.) that is, feeding on young succulent
grass, not that which is dry and parched. “Cut
down as the grass, or wither as the green herb,”
like the soft, tender grass, soon cut down and quickly
withering. With respect to the use of the word
in this place, I may remark: 1. It is not
here correctly translated by the word “grass;”
for grass bears seed, and is, consequently, a member
of the second class of plants mentioned. Even
if we set aside all idea of inspiration, it is obviously
impossible that any one living among a pastoral or
agricultural people could have been ignorant of this
fac. It can scarcely be a general term, including
all plants when in a young or tender state. The
idea of their springing up is included in the verb,
and this was but a very temporary condition.
Besides, this word does not appear to be employed
for the young state of shrubs or tree. We
thus appear to be shut up to the conclusion that deshe
here means those plants, mostly small and herbaceous,
which bear no proper seeds; in other words, the
Cryptogamia as fungi, mosses, lichens, ferns,
etc. The remaining words are translated
with sufficient accuracy in our version. They
denote seed-bearing or phoenogamous herbs and trees.
The special mention of the fructification of plants
is probably intended not only for distinction, but
also to indicate the new power of organic reproduction
now first introduced on the surface of our planet,
and to mark its difference from the creative act itself.
That this new and wondrous phenomenon should be so
stated is thus in strict scientific propriety, and
it is precisely the point that would be seized by an
intelligent spectator of the visions of creation, who
had previously witnessed only the accretion and disintegration
of mineral substances, and to whom this marvellous
power of organic reproduction would be in every respect
a new creation.
The arrangement of plants in the three
great classes of cryptogams, seed-bearing herbs, and
fruit-bearing trees differs in one important point viz.,
the separation of herbaceous plants from trees from
modern botanical classification. It is, however,
sufficiently natural for the purposes of a general
description like this, and perhaps gives more precise
ideas of the meaning intended than any other arrangement
equally concise and popular. It is also probable
that the object of the writer was not so much a natural-history
classification as an account of the order of
creation, and that he wishes to affirm that the introduction
of these three classes of plants on the earth corresponded
with the order here stated. This view renders
it unnecessary to vindicate the accuracy of the arrangement
on botanical grounds, since the historical order was
evidently better suited to the purpose in view, and
in so far as the earlier appearance of cryptogamous
plants is concerned, it is in strict accordance with
geological fact.
A very important truth is contained
in the expression “after its kind” that
is, after its species; for the Hebrew “min,”
used here, has strictly this sense, and, like the
Greek idea and the Latin species, conveys
the notion of form as well as that of kind. It
is used to denote species of animals, in Leviticus
i., 14, and in Deuteronomy xiv., 15. We are taught
by this statement that plants were created each kind
by itself; and that creation was not a sort of slump-work
to be perfected by the operation of a law of development,
as fancied by some modern speculators. In this
assertion of the distinctness of species, and the
production of each as a distinct part of the creative
plan, revelation tallies perfectly with the conclusions
of natural science, which lead us to believe that each
species, as observed by us, is permanently reproductive,
variable within narrow limits, and incapable of permanent
intermixture with other species; and though hypotheses
of modification by descent, and of the production
of new species by such modification, may be formed,
they are not in accordance with experience, and are
still among the unproved speculations which haunt
the outskirts of true science. We shall be better
prepared, however, to weigh the relations of such
hypotheses to our revelation of origins when we shall
have reached the period of the introduction of animal
life.
Some additional facts contained in
the recapitulation of the creative work in Chapter
II. may very properly be considered here, as they seem
to refer to the climatal conditions of the earth during
the growth of the most ancient vegetation, and before
the final adjustment of the astronomical relations
of the earth on the fourth day. “And every
shrub of the land before it was on the earth, and every
herb of the land before it sprung up. For the
Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and
there was not a man to till the ground; but a mist
ascended from the earth and watered the whole surface
of the ground.” This has been supposed
to be a description of the state of the earth during
the whole period anterior to the fall of man.
There is, however, no Scripture evidence of this;
and geology informs us that rain fell as at present
far back in the Palaeozoic period, countless ages
before the creation of man or the existing animals.
Although, however, such a condition of the earth as
that stated in these verses has not been known in
any geological period, yet it is not inconceivable,
but in reality corresponds with the other conditions
of nature likely to have prevailed on the third day,
as described in Genesis. The land of this period,
we may suppose, was not very extensive nor very elevated.
Hence the temperature would be uniform and the air
moist. The luminous and calorific matter connected
with the sun still occupied a large space, and therefore
diffused heat and light more uniformly than at present.
The internal heat of the earth may still have produced
an effect in warming the oceanic waters. The
combined operation of these causes, of which we, perhaps,
have some traces as late as the Carboniferous period,
might well produce a state of things in which the
earth was watered, not by showers of rain, but by
the gentle and continued precipitation of finely divided
moisture, in the manner now observed in those climates
in which vegetation is nourished for a considerable
part of the year by nocturnal mists and copious dews.
The atmosphere, in short, as yet partook in some slight
degree of the same moist and misty character which
prevailed before the “establishment of the clouds
above” the airy firmament of the
second day. The introduction of these explanatory
particulars by the sacred historian furnishes an additional
argument for the theory of long periods. That
vegetation should exist for two or three natural days
without rain or the irrigation which is given in culture,
was, as already stated, a circumstance altogether
unworthy of notice; but the growth during a long period
of a varied and highly organized flora, without this
advantage, and by the aid of a special natural provision
afterward discontinued, was in all respects so remarkable
and so highly illustrative of the expedients of the
divine wisdom that it deserved a prominent place.
It is evident that the words of the
inspired writer include plants belonging to all the
great subdivisions of the vegetable kingdom. This
earliest vegetation was not rude or incomplete, or
restricted to the lower forms of life. It was
not even, like that of the coal period, solely or
mainly cryptogamous or gymnospermous. It included
trees bearing fruit, as well as lichens and mosses,
and it received the same stamp of approbation bestowed
on other portions of the work “it
was good.” We have a good right to assume
that its excellence had reference not only to its
own period, but to subsequent conditions of the earth.
Vegetation is the great assimilating power, the converter
of inorganic into organic matter suitable for the sustenance
of animals. In like manner the lower tribes of
plants prepare the way for the higher. We should
therefore have expected a priori that vegetation
would have clothed the earth before the creation of
animals, and a sufficient time before it to allow soils
to be accumulated, and surplus stores of organic matter
to be prepared in advance: this consideration
alone would also induce us to assign a considerable
duration to the third day. After the elevation
of land, and the draining off from it of the saline
matter with which it would be saturated, a process
often very tedious, especially in low tracts of ground,
the soil would still consist only of mineral matter,
and must have been for a long period occupied by plants
suited to this condition of things, in order that
sufficient organic matter might be accumulated for
the growth of a more varied vegetation; a consideration
which perhaps illustrates the order of the plants in
the narrative.
It may be objected to the above views
that, however accordant with chemical and physiological
probabilities, they do not harmonize with the facts
of geology; since the earliest fossiliferous formations
contain almost exclusively the remains of animals,
which must therefore have preceded, or at least been
coeval with, the earliest forms of terrestrial vegetation.
This objection is founded on well-ascertained facts,
but facts which may have no connection with the third
day of creation when regarded as a long period.
The oldest geological formations are of marine origin,
and contain remains of marine animals, with those
of plants supposed to be allied to the existing algae
or sea-weeds. Geology can not, however, assure
us either that no land plants existed contemporaneously
with these earliest animals, or that no land flora
preceded them. These oldest fossiliferous rocks
may mark the commencement of animal life, but they
testify nothing as to the existence or non-existence
of a previous period of vegetation alone. Farther,
the rocks which contain the oldest remains of life
exist as far as yet known in a condition so highly
metamorphic as almost to preclude the possibility of
their containing any distinguishable vegetable fossils;
yet they contain vast deposits of carbon in the form
of graphite, and if this, like more modern coaly matter,
was accumulated by vegetable growth, it must indicate
an exuberance of plants in these earliest geological
periods, but of plants as yet altogether unknown to
us. It is possible, therefore, that in these
Eozoic rocks we may have remnants of the formations
of the third Mosaic day; and if we should ever be so
fortunate as to find any portion of them containing
vegetable fossils, and these of species differing
from any hitherto known, either in a fossil state
or recent, and rising higher, in elevation and complexity
of type, than the flora of the succeeding Silurian
and Carboniferous eras, we may then suppose that we
have penetrated to the monuments of this third creative
aeon. The only other alternative by which these
verses can be reconciled with geology is that adopted
by the late Hugh Miller, who supposes that the plants
of the third day are those of the Carboniferous period;
but, besides the apparent anachronism involved in
this, we now know that the coal flora consisted mainly
of cryptogams allied to ferns and club-mosses, and
of gymnosperms allied to the pines and cycads, the
higher orders of plants being almost entirely wanting.
For these reasons we are shut up to the conclusion
that this flora of the third day must have its place
before the Palaeozoic period of geology.
To those who are familiar with the
vast lapse of time required by the geological history
of the earth, it may be startling to ascribe the whole
of it to three or four of the creative days. If,
however, it be admitted that these days were periods
of unknown duration, no reason remains for limiting
their length any farther than the facts of the case
require. If in the strata of the earth which are
accessible to us we can detect the evidence of its
existence for myriads of years, why may not its Creator
be able to carry our view back for myriads more.
It may be humbling to our pride of knowledge, but it
is not on any scientific ground improbable, that the
oldest animal remains known to geology belong to the
middle period of the earth’s history, and were
preceded by an enormous lapse of ages in which the
earth was being prepared for animal existence, but
of which no records remain, except those contained
in the inspired history.
It would be quite unphilosophical
for geology to affirm either that animal life must
always have existed, or that its earliest animals are
necessarily the earliest organic beings. To use,
with a slight modification, the words of an able thinker
on these subjects, “For ages the prejudice
prevailed that the historical period, or that which
is coeval with the life of man, exhausted the whole
history of the globe. Geologists removed that
prejudice,” but must not substitute “another
in its place, viz., that geological time is coeval
with the globe itself, or that organic life always
existed on its surface.”
A second doubt as to the existence
of this primitive flora may be based on the statement
that it included the highest forms of plants.
Had it consisted only of low and imperfect vegetables,
there might have been much less difficulty in admitting
its probability. Farther, we find that even in
the Carboniferous period scarcely any plants of the
higher orders flourished, and there was a preponderance
of the lower forms of the vegetable kingdom.
We have, however, in geological chronology, many illustrations
of the fact that the progress of improvement has not
been continuous or uninterrupted, and that the preservation
of the flora and fauna of many geological periods has
been very imperfect. Hence the occurrence in one
particular stratum or group of strata of few or low
representatives of animal and vegetable life affords
no proof that a better state of things may not have
existed previously. We also find, in the case
of animals, that each tribe attained to its highest
development at the time when, in the progress of creation,
it occupied the summit of the scale of life.
Analogy would thus lead us to believe that when plants
alone existed, they may have assumed nobler forms
than any now existing, or that tribes now represented
by few and humble species may at that time have been
so great in numbers and development as to fill all
the offices of our present complicated flora, as well
as, perhaps, some of those now occupied by animals.
We have this principle exemplified in the Carboniferous
flora, by the magnitude of its arborescent club-mosses,
and the vast variety of its gymnosperms. For this
reason we may anticipate that if any remains of this
early plant-creation should be disinterred, they will
prove to be among the most wonderful and interesting
geological relics ever discovered, and will enlarge
our views of the compass and capabilities of the vegetable
kingdom, and especially of its lower forms.
A farther objection is the uselessness
of the existence of plants for a long period, without
any animals to subsist on or enjoy them, and even
without forming any accumulation of fossil fuel or
other products useful to man. The only direct
answer to this has already been given. The previous
existence of plants may have been, and probably was,
essential to the comfort and subsistence of the animals
afterwards introduced. Independently of this,
however, we have an analogous case in the geological
history of animals, which prevents this fact from
standing alone. Why was the earth tenanted so
long by the inferior races of animals, and why were
so much skill and contrivance expended on their structures,
and even on their external ornament, when there was
no intelligent mind on earth to appreciate their beauties.
Even in the present world we may as well ask why the
uninhabited islands of the ocean are found to be replete
with luxuriant vegetable life, why God causes it to
rain in the desert where human foot never treads, or
why he clothes with a marvellous exuberance of beautiful
animal and plant forms the depths of the sea.
We can but say that these things seemed and seem good
to the Creator, and may serve uses unknown to us;
and this is precisely what we must be content to say
respecting the plant-creation of the Eozoic period.
Some writers on this subject have
suggested that the cosmical use of this plant-creation
was the abstraction from the atmosphere of an excess
of carbonic acid unfavorable to the animal life subsequently
to be introduced. This use it may have served,
and when its effects had been gradually lost through
metamorphism and decay, that second great withdrawal
of carbon which took place in the Carboniferous period
may have been rendered necessary. The reasons
afforded by natural history for supposing that plants
preceded animals are thus stated by Professor Dana:
“The proof from science of the
existence of plants before animals is inferential,
and still may be deemed satisfactory. Distinct
fossils have not been found, all that ever existed
in the azoic rocks having been obliterated.
The arguments in the affirmative are as follows:
“1. The existence of limestone
rocks among the other beds, similar limestones in
later ages having been of organic origin; also the
occurrence of carbon in the shape of graphite, graphite
being, in known cases in rocks, a result of the alteration
of the carbon of plants.
“2. The fact that the cooling
earth would have been fitted for vegetable life for
a long age before animals could have existed; the
principle being exemplified everywhere that the earth
was occupied at each period with the highest kinds
of life the conditions allowed.
“3. The fact that vegetation
subserved an important purpose in the coal-period
in ridding the atmosphere of carbonic acid for the
subsequent introduction of land animals, suggests a
valid reason for believing that the same great purpose,
the true purpose of vegetation, was effected through
the ocean before the waters were fitted for
animal life.
“4. Vegetation being directly
or mediately the food of animals, it must have had
a previous existence. The latter part of the azoic
age in geology we therefore regard as the age when
the plant kingdom was instituted, the latter half
of the third day in Genesis. However short or
long the epoch, it was one of the great steps of progress.”
In concluding the examination of the
work of the third day, I must again remind the reader
that, on the theory of long creative periods, the
words under consideration must refer to the first introduction
of vegetation, in forms that have long since ceased
to exist. Geology informs us that in the period
of which it is cognizant the vegetation of the earth
has been several times renewed, and that no plants
of the older and middle geological periods now exist.
We may therefore rest assured that the vegetable species,
and probably also many of the generic and family forms
of the vegetation of the third day, have long since
perished, and been replaced by others suited to the
changed condition of the earth. It is indeed
probable that during the third and fourth days themselves
there might be many removals and renewals of the terrestrial
flora, so that perhaps every species created at the
commencement of the introduction of plants may have
been extinct before the close of the period.
Nevertheless it was marked by the introduction of
vegetation, which in one or another set of forms has
ever since clothed the earth.
At the commencement of the third day
the earth was still covered by the waters. As
time advanced islands and mountain-peaks arose from
the ocean, vomiting forth the molten and igneous materials
of the interior of the earth’s crust. Plains
and valleys were then spread around, rivers traced
out their beds, and the ocean was limited by coasts
and divided by far-stretching continents. At the
command of the Creator plants sprung from the soil the
earliest of organized structures at first
probably few and small, and fitted to contend against
the disadvantages of soils impregnated with saline
particles and destitute of organic matter; but as
the day advanced increasing in number, magnitude,
and elevation, until at length the earth was clothed
with a luxuriant and varied vegetation, worthy the
approval of the Creator, and the admiring song of
the angelic “sons of God.”