its rotation about the mass till the oscillations to which it was subjected produced a rupture, when the whole material of the ring gathered itself together in another globe of igneous vapor revolving around the first. In progress of time the principal mass, under the influence of inevitable refrigeration and acceleration of its motion, threw off another ring, which, on rupturing, became another revolving globe. From time to time the process was repeated; and a series of globes was thus left at varying distances from the centre of the system. These globes became the planets, and the residual mass is the sun. We come into existence, and gaze upon the series of planets, on one hand, and the sun upon the other, and think, because no perceptible change transpires in a generation or two, that all things are stable-that creation is completed-that. all things were made at first as we see them, and are destined so to remain. Vain thought! The movements of matter are even now in progress. The residual mass-the sun-is still cooling and shrinking, and may yet throw off other rings, the germs of other planets within the orbit of Mercury-if, indeed, Lescarbault be not correct in asserting the existence already of an intramercurial planet. But what of the detached globes of matter? The largest are the remoter, being formed of rings detached when the parent mass was largest. Each has continued to revolve in an orbit which marks the periphery of the parent mass at the time of the planet's separation. All continue to revolve in the same direction as the parent mass and the resultant sun. All revolve very nearly in the plane which must always have been the plane of the equator of the mass--the astronomical ecliptic. All continue, to revolve upon their own axes in the same direction as required by the motion of the parent mass. Can all these things be so by chance? Can these planetary movements thus corre spond, and the material constitution of all these bodies be identical, without leaving a profound conviction upon our minds that they have had a common origin and a common history? Such queries were raised by Leibnitz and Kant upon slenderer data than we possess. Does not the hypothesis of Laplace rise almost to a demonstration? But what, again, of our family of infant planets? Each sprang forth a globe of igneous vapor like their common mother. Each began to repeat the process of cooling, condensation, and accelerated rotation. In the cases of the larger, the cooling had not reached the point of liquefaction before the rotation had become sufficiently rapid to detach from one to six or seven rings, which, in turn, became satellites revolving about their planets. The larger planets have had time to detach the greater number of rings. Our earth threw off but one, and became too rigid to repeat the process. Mars, Venus, and Mercury-all smaller than the earth--attained the rigid condition before their acquired velocity had separated the periphery. Their nights are consequently unillumined by the presence of a moon. Saturn not only threw off seven rings which became satellites, but another also, which to this day hangs poised in a state of unstable equilibrium—as if the hand of Omnipotence had steadied it, and arrested it in its career, to hold it up to the gaze of intelligent creatures, to reveal to them the nature of events which transpired before their arrival upon the theatre of existence. And this ring is said to be a liquid--a discovery for which we are indebted to the analysis of an eminent American scholar, but one which lends still farther corroboration to our view of the genesis of worlds.* We have then, preserved as if by the care of Providence, * The only difficulty arises from the fact that the liquid ring is not selfluminous. But this difficulty is not insurmountable. It may be aqueous. existing exemplifications of all the main phenomena which have attended upon the evolutions of cosmical matter from the time when it first sprang from the hands of its Creator. The cloud-like comet; the "zodiacal light;" the solar-photosphere; the irresolvable nebulæ, may probably be regarded as examples of attenuated luminous matter such as our theory hypothecates. Every whirlpool shows how rotation is liable to be spontaneously generated. The Saturnian ring or rings illustrate an essential phase in this cosmical genesis; their liquid condition another. The body of the sun is a mass remaining in the incandescent state; while the planets have become opaque, because smaller masses of matter sooner reach the point of total refrigeration. The moon represents a state of refrigeration which the earth is destined to attain in the distant future. We may thus regard the visible universe as a vast museum in which Nature has preserved for our instruction specimens illustrative of every stage in the embryology of worlds. Will it be asked how such views accord with our theistic opinions? I reply, perfectly. It has become a kind of fashion in certain quarters to denounce all scientific doctrines to which the much-abused term "development" can be applied; but in this we may be too much influenced by "the fashion." Leading theologians-though indeed scarcely followers of the leaders in physical science-have heaped opprobrium on the "nebular hypothesis" as tending to atheism. The patronage of this hypothesis by the author of the "Vestiges of Creation" has thrown, a dark suspicion over it; but the cause of truth will be best promoted by allowing every scientific question to be decided on its merits. The scientific world as a whole will never abandon a position because denounced by the theological world-not even because it seems to be in conflict with sound the ological doctrine. Scientific evidence is of such a nature as always to command the respect and the assent of the bulk of reasoning men. If this hypothesis is sustained by scientific evidence, it is the duty of the Christian world to embrace it and convert it to their own uses. To do otherwise is to earn the contempt of those who are really on the side of truth. If it is not sustained by scientific evidence, it behooves the Christian world to overthrow it from scientific data. Such data ought not to be monopolized by secular learning. Science belongs peculiarly to Christianity, and Christianity is in duty bound to assert her claim. If she can use science to overthrow a false and dangerous position, she is derelict to neglect the opportunity; and all her denunciation will not atone for the error. But this hypothesis, whether it represent the true history of cosmical matter or not, has no tendency to remove the Deity from creation. This has been admitted by Whewell, Buchanan, and all others who have been crowded to a response. This objection is founded in short-sightedness and a failure to appreciate the case. The hypothesis simply assumes that the Creator has brought worlds into existence by the use of second causes, precisely as he brings a tree into existence. Does any one hesitate to admit that an oak has undergone a slow and regular “development"or that the delta of the Mississippi is undergoing "development"--or that the cone of Vesuvius is undergoing "development ?" If it appear to intellects of the loftiest and broadest grasp that the Creator has evolved the solar system according to a method, and by the use of natural laws, exactly as he evolves a tree from the germ in the seed, why do we charge atheism in the one case and not in the other? The only difference between the cases is that the one attributes to Deity a vaster scope of intelligence and power than the other--and in doing this it concedes to |