Wisconsin tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1847-1854, 1849-05-18
fHGtggeggaMp.
from the North American Review.l
TIE SUPREME POWER.
iBY EDWARD EVERETT.


II has been as beautifully as truly said, tina
"the undevout astronomer is mad The
same remark might with equal force and Justice
be applied II the undevout geologist Of al
the absurditses ever started, none more extrav-
agant can be named than that the grand and
far-reaching researches and discoveries of ge-
ology are h9stile to the spirit of religion
They seem 10 US, on the very contrary, to lead
the inquirer step by step, into the more i'm
mediate presence of that tremendous Power.
which could; alone produce, and can alone ac-
count for tie primitive commissions of the
globe, of which the proofs are craven in eter-
nal charactefs, on the side of its bare and
cloud-pierciEg mountains, or are wrought into
the very substance Of the strata that compose
its surface, and which are also day by day
and hour byshour at work to feed the fire of
the volcGno,sto pear forth its molten tides, or
to compeund the selubrious elements of the
mineral .ountains, which spring in thousand
valleys. la. gazing at the starry heavens, all
glorious as they age, we sink under the awe
of their magnitude, the very mystery of their
secret ard reciprocal influence, the bewilder-
ing conceptions oftheir distances. Sense and
sciences are at war.
The sparkling gem that glitters on the brow
of night,ts converted by science into a mighty
orb-the source Of light and heat, the centre
of attraction, the sun of a system like our
own. The beautiful planet which fingers in
the western sky when the sun has gone
down, OF heFalds abe approach of morning
whose nald and lovely beams seem to shed a
spirit of aranquilisy, not unmixed with sad
ness, nor far removed from devotion, into the
heart of .him who, wanders forth in solitude
to behold it's, 5 the contemplation of sci
ence, a oloud-wr.pped sphere; world of
rugged mountains and stormy deeps. We
study, we reason, we calculate. We climb
the giddy sc-iffold of induction up to the very
stars. We borrow the wings of the bodest
analysis and flee to the uppermost parts of
creation, and twinkle in the vault of night,
the well instructed mind sees opening before
1t In mental visions, the stupendous mechan-
ism OF the heavens. Its planets swell into
worlds. Its crowded. stars recede, expand,
become central SUNS, and we hear the rush of
the mighty oibs taat circle round them.
The bands of Orion are loosed, and the
sparkling rays which cross each other on his
belt, are resolved INTO floods of light stream
ing from system to system, across Him
liable pathway o. the outer heavens. The
conclusions which we reach are oppress-
lively grSnd and sublime; the imagination
sinks under theIn; the truth is too vast, too
remote ttom the premises from which it is
:
back to TIE earth, and signs to worship again,
with the. innocence of child or Chaldean
shepherd, the quiet and beautiful stars. as he
sees theEa IN the I implicitly of sense. But in
the provincesof geology, there are some SUBJ
Jects In ~hlch nv senses seem, as 1t were,
led up inso tie laboratory of divine power
Let masa FIX his Eyes upon one of the mar
BILE colurssxns in ths Capitol at Washington
He sees Ihele cyndition of the earth's sur
face, wh3n the PEBBLES of every size and form
and material, which compose this singular
species q stone. were held suspended in the
medium sa which, they are now imbedded in
to solid, sustrous, and variegated mass before
his eye, sn tiae yesy substance of which he
beholds "a rGcord.of the commissions of the
globe. :
Let hI.n go and;stand upon the sides OF the
crater ofSN esuviuS. in the ordinary state of it's
eruPtions. ard contemplate the glazy stream
OF molteIkrocks, That oozes quietly at his feet,
encaslng*:the surace of the mountain as it
cools VITA mostt black and stygian crust, or
lighting Up It's sid.ss at night with streaks of
iurid fire. Iet hip consider the volcanic is
land, which .arost few years since in the
neighboIhooa of Malta, spouting flames, from
the dept. OF the sea; or accompany one of
our own nafigatsrs from Nantucket to the
Antarctic Oohan. who, finding the centre of
small islsnd. to which he was in the habit of
resortngs sunk IN the interval of two of his
voyages: sailed through an opening in its
sides where the ocean had found its way, and
moored has s:lip IN the smouldering crater of
a recently exainguished volcano.
UT hnally,: let nam survey the striking phe-
nomenon which oar author has described, and
which has LED Us to this train of remark, a
mineral tountain Of salubrious qualities, of a
temperature greatly above that of the surface
OF the eaEth N the region where it is found,
compounded with numerous ingredients in a
constant proportion, and known to have been
flowing fFom.its secret springs. as at the pres
ent day, at least Tor eight hundred years, I'M
changed: unexhausted. The religious of the
elder wotld So an early stage of civilization,
place genius OF G divinity by the side of ev-
cry spriI.g which gushed from the rocks, or
flowed ttom the bosom of the earth. Surely
1t woul& be- no weakness for thoughtful
man, WHIP SHOULD resort for the renovations of
wasted, tra.me, to one of those salubrious
mineral t9un:ains, If he drank in their healing
waters as Gift from the outstretched. though
lnvlslble:hat.d, OF an everywhere present and
benignaI..t Pswer.