espect should we follow old times? Now here there is this
obvious maxim--what God has given us from heaven cannot be improved,
what man discovers for himself does admit of improvement; we follow old
times then _so far_ as God has spoken in them, but in those respects in
which God has not spoken in them, we are not bound to follow them. Now
what is the knowledge which God has not thought fit to reveal to us?
_knowledge connected merely with this present world_. All this we have
been left to acquire for ourselves. Whatever may have been told to
Adam in paradise, or to Noah, about which we know nothing, still at
least since that time no divinely authenticated directions (it would
appear) have been given to the world at large, on subjects relating
merely to this our temporal state of being. How we may till our lands
and increase our crops; how we may build our houses, and buy and sell
and get gain; how we may cross the sea in ships; how we may make "fine
linen for the merchant," or, like Tubal-Cain, be artificers in brass
and iron: as to these objects of this world, necessary indeed for the
time, not everlastingly important, God has given us no clear
instruction. He has not set His sanction here upon any rules of art,
and told us what is best. They have been found out by man (as far as
we know), and improved by man, and the first essays, as might be
expected, were the rudest and least successful. Here then we have no
need to follow the old ways. Besides, in many of these arts and
pursuits, there is really neither right nor wrong at all; but the good
varies with times and places. Each country has its own way, which is
best for itself, and bad for others.

Again, God has given us no authority in questions of science. The
heavens above, and the earth under our feet, are full of wonders, and
have within them their own vast history. But the knowledge of the
secrets they contain, the tale of their past revolutions, is not given
us from Divine revelation; but left to man to attain by himself. And
here again, since discovery is difficult, the old knowledge is
generally less sure and complete than the modern knowledge. If we wish
to boast about little matters, _we_ know more about the motions of the
heavenly bodies than Abraham, whose seed was in number as the stars; we
can measure the earth, and fathom the sea, and weigh the air, more
accurately than Moses, the inspired historian of the creation; and we
can discuss th