r requests, not in the belief that we can change his
great plans, or that any advantage could result from this if it were
possible, but that these plans may be made in his boundless wisdom and
love to meet our necessities. There is also in the Bible the farther
promise that, if we are truly the children of God, regulating our
conduct by his will and enlightened by his spirit, we shall know how
to pray for what is in accordance with his divine purpose, and how to
receive with gladness whatever he sees fit to give. While, therefore,
the Biblical doctrine as to natural law emancipates us from fears of
angry storm-demons, it draws us near to a heavenly Father, whose power
is above all the tempests of earth, and who, while ruling by law, has
regulated all things in conformity with the higher law of love. When
God had made the atmosphere, he saw that it was good, and the highest
significance is given to this by the consideration that God is love.
The position of the Bible is thus the true mean between superstitions
at once unhappy and debasing, and a materialistic infidelity that
would reduce the universe to a dead, remorseless machine, in which we
must struggle for a precarious existence till we are crushed between
its wheels.

CHAPTER VIII.

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 strat