s been held that the word earth may
denote only a particular region, temporarily obscured and reduced to
ruin, and about to be fitted up, by the operations of the six days,
for the residence of man; and that consequently the narrative of the
six days refers not to the original arrangement of the surface,
relations, and inhabitants of our planet, but to the retrieval from
ruin and repeopling of a limited territory, supposed to have been in
Central Asia, and which had been submerged and its atmosphere obscured
by aqueous or volcanic vapors. The chief support of this view is the
fact, previously noticed, that the word earth is very frequently used
in the signification of region, district, country; to which may be
added the supposed necessity for harmonizing the Scriptures with
geological discovery, and at the same time viewing the days of
creation as literal solar days.

Can we, however, after finding that in verse 1st the term earth must
mean the whole world, suddenly restrict it in verse 2d to a limited
region. Is it possible that the writer who in verse 10th for the first
time intimates a limitation of the meaning of this word, by the solemn
announcement, "And God called the _dry land_ earth," should in a
previous place use it in a much more limited sense without any hint of
such restriction. The case stands thus: A writer uses the word earth
in the most general sense; in the next sentence he is supposed,
without any intimation of his intention, to use the same word to
denote a region or country, and by so doing entirely to change the
meaning of his whole discourse from that which would otherwise have
attached to it. Yet the same writer when, a few sentences farther on,
it becomes necessary for him to use the word earth to denote the dry
land as distinguished from the seas, formally and with an assertion of
divine authority, intimates the change of meaning. Is not this
supposition contrary not only to sound principles of interpretation,
but also to common-sense; and would it not tend to render worthless
the testimony of a writer to whose diction such inaccuracy must be
ascribed. It is in truth to me surprising beyond measure that such a
view could ever have obtained currency; and I fear it is to be
attributed to a determination, at all hazards and with any amount of
violence to the written record, to make geology and religion coincide.
Must we then throw aside this simple and convenient method of
reconciliation, sancti