THE STORY OF THE EARTH.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1761, 8 February 1888, Page 3

THE STORY OF THE EARTH.

THE PREPARATION OF THE EARTH FOB ORGANIC LIFJfi. (By A. Ireland) Part 11. After the vapours condensed and fell upon the earih'e surface, thr-y would not remain idle or inactive, fur opon this agency, viz ,that of water, depended marly all the work of preparing the earth for Itt organlo life. The tarfaoa of the earth would only consist of igneous or volcanic recks, ev.ry landscape would present a roggtd angular appearance. There was no toil of any aort, no sand or grit, all was a solid compact maw, end as such could never support life, either vejetable or animal, A vast amount of work had yet ! to ho done hy the waters of the earth before it would be fit for tha support of life. For » loog period there wouid bo continuous and inoestant rain all over the j earth, most likely luting for some j thousands of yean, the water which fell upon the lowest parts remaining where It fell, bnt that on all the elevations forming torrents, wbloh would raib into the lower parts. These torrents would have tbelr source on the mouuUio topi dowa whose aides they would rush with ever inoreating velocity and volume. By their continual action they would undermine every obstruction, detach fragments and carry them down the stream, whloh together with the erosive action of the water would tear out channels and wear away the rook. These portions or fragments of rook, besides helping the water In its work of denadiDg, would be ground into sand and powder and so be carried to tbo forming oceans, and there beootne thfl first sedimentary rooks from which the first soil was formed During the time of this deluge of waters tnere would be very little evaporathn. Of ooarae, all the raiu which now falls is brought up from the ocean by evaporation, the amount that is evaporated and taioed opon the earth is a constant thing, the rainfall and evaporation beiig tqaal to acd depending on each other, but m this case the atmosphere contained the whole off the supply. The ooostant rain would render the atraoephere too moist to produes much evaporation, eothat the length of time whloh I assign to this constant rain was net the result of a oyole between evaporation and rain as at present, but from the enormous supply that h«d to be given out before an tquilibrium was produced which resulted m the present cvsle. The rapid progress that this state of things would produce m altering the free of the earth oan bprdly be imagined The whole earth would resou-'d with raging waters ; cataracts, rapids, and torrents, would fill the air with deafening ! thunder*. There would be no rainless tracts of the earth as at present, all and every part would be su^jtoted to the same deluge. Riven wcu'd abound, whi b j Would iwel' to great sza and power (f current. The earth would be a soene of bn»y activity. The whole matter ihna brought down from the mountains by the sotioo of rivers when carried into the oceans, owing to the comparative rest would settle down to the bottom. A constant sopply being brought wou'd accumulate, and the super incumbent weight of water, acting by pressure and chemloal change, would convert the mars Into stone, thus forming the first stratified rooks of the earth's formation, and the permanent record of the first geological age. But these first strata of rock would contain no fO3sl!s either animal or vtgeUble, as neither animil nor vegetab'e life, was jet m existence. The internal vigor of the earth wou'd be quite active yet, and sometimes the sea bottom or portions of it would be elevated above the surface of the surroundlsg waters. This would become dry land of quite a different nature from the other pans, inasmuch as this would be sedimentary rook, wbi'e all the other would be igr eoas rocks and thus the first step m the preparation was made. There would be rocks and ingredients i f rocks which, not only would be broken and carried away by the water, but they woqld be soluble alio, such as the different ■alts, Hoe etc which are contained m the ocean. As the atmosphere was freed j from the vast amount at vapocr that was bald m it, the l : gbt of the tun would begin to penetrate and 1 ght up the earth, although the ion would not be visible until it had needy reached thfl state of its present eqnihbriora. In the scripture acooont, we find there was light before the appeararoe of the san and moon, which sould only have heen the case andfr the conditions just mentioned. This fee* Is more tl an a coincidence, and if this theory be not trne, how is it that th* re»a\t tallies so well with the revealed versirn? I muat now mention another great factor m the breaking up rf the rooks viz frost, which would now begin to work with effect. While the atm' sphere eontaced so muob v»p- nr, it acted as a b >rt of euehloß, cbeck'ng too much radiation and also preventing the bold of space penetrating to soy great extent. Sc that In the earlier state* there would be l.tle or no frost, bnt more and more m the later stages. The frrquent rain would fill all hollows and crevices m the rocks with water, which, or becoming frrz>n would expand with a force irresistible. In tbl» manner Isnre portions, as well as ■nail, would become detached by the expansive force of Ice-formation. I will sotr digress from the story for a short time to consider a matter that gues a long w*y towards proving the truth of this tbeory (which is the only one yet given that oan ccconnt for tbe phenomenia described m the Scriptures) v'z •hat there wat ligbt and darkness alternating before the sun beoame v slble. This according to whatmty be oalied the orthodox doctrine of the interpretation of the Scripture story, would be a direct impossibility ; fur bow could light or night and day be before the sun was created. But according to the story as given here, it not only explains tbe fact, but it Is the only thing wbioh ©ou'd happen under the circumstances 1 have already shown la it a wonder m this age of education when man uses his reason, and blind faith m our teachers is no mere, that many h«ve refuted to believe the old orthodox story ! of creation v ; z , thit the wr>o'e onlverse was created out of nothing m six days of 24 hours, at • period ot time less than six thousand years ago. Nature Mti up her voice and proclaims the falsity of such • notion. She oper s her living pages and unfolds to as a story that cannot lie. Bhs presents to onr wondering eat?, a long catalogue of events the story of which has been preserved m her enduring reoords and wbioh tells us the true story of the earth. The heavens proclaim it f «lee acd every living star denies It. They tell of a story m which agea mnet have elapsed, the length of which Wd oannot even imagine. An Ignorant person might believe th=»t the heavens were oreatep six thousand years ago, because he has no knowledge of what the fctayens arc, but an astronomer who knews something of the stars, of their magnitude, of their distance m space, oould pot bellpye it. He knows that m some pises, ta thst of planetary nebulas for Instance, tbe light must have been travelting fpr far more than six thousand years to reach us: A good' story 1* told by - Hugh Miller of a clergyman of the Church of England irbo was defending the orthcdox dootrlna of the »ge of the earth At the time of tbe* story, the dlecß'slon between the clergy and geologists was at its height. The olargymaa trUd to prove that the oreatlon took place only six thousand years ago-r—by this.— While tha French were m Egypt an oficar of an enquiring turn of mind made observations as to the amount of deport* tbe Nile Uld down at every | pty^tfof > p»Tl D g fouod thii hs next

proceeded to fiud out bow many feet of the deposit (xiated, and by this means calculator how long a time the JNile had run its onree. The result of hie oiiKolatiotis gave within a few hundred yeais of the supposed age of the earth, which discrepancy might easily be explained, the clergyman maintained, by a variation m the amount of deposit at any time. Having given and nsed this case himself, he ooald not rtfuee to allow bis opponents to use it also. They asked him if be had ascertained on what formation this deposit reitud. No, he had act! But, answered tbe geulogiss, he have, and fiud it lies upon a very thick limestone formation, riob m fossils, which shows that it had taken ages m its forma* tlon. The limestone rests upon several other formations each taking agea m their formation. Now, if the Nile formation took nearly six thousand years to form, how iong did each of the other formations take? No answer.

Tbe power of aqueous vapour for obsoaring the »uns rays depends greatly upon its condition ; on a dear day when the sun is visible there may be as mnofa v*pour Id the atmosphere as on a cloudy day when everything is dark and gloomy, oat nader the one oonduton it is almost, ■perfectly transparent, m tbe other it is iv a ondition to prevtnt light pass m i through it. We find that from tbe firat t j the evening of tbe thud day, there was enough light peoetrating the atmosphere to make a distiuguisbaole diff«r*noe betwsen day and night. And on the fourth morninp the sun, moon, and stars were visible. The difficulty is to aooount for the source of ibii light, if the sun *ere not created until the fourth day. From the first to tne third day is taHun op ex* olasively la bringing light upon the earth and bringing the ttatets to their present ooidittou. These things would not tske place like a flash of lightning, at a word of oomm*nd, as it woa.d have to be according to the orthodox interpretation, bat uomewhst m the order and manner laid down m this p*per. Ido not attempt an *pprux!Uiaiiou to the duration of these perioJn : from the first until the end vf the third mast tuve been almost an eternity of years. The n*xt division of the " Story of the Earth " will treat of tta organic life."