Windham County Democrat. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1836-1853, 1852-07-07
Footprints Of the Creator.

| The North British Review, Tor February,
1850, contains an article entitled Footprints Of
the Creator, by Hugh Miller, being review of
geological work, and of which we find the fol-
lowing notice in the Washington Globe
The article, Footprints, is a review of Mr. Mil
ler's last geological work, to which he chose to
give that name and it is an appropriate one, as
! he has mingled with his scientific researches and
calculations, great deal of theological disquisi-
ton, making altogether work of surprising in
tercst Some of the assumptions and some of the
annunciations, are very startling, and though adj
vanced but as hypothesis, carry the appear
ance of probability and Of legitimate deduction
which it is not very difficult to regard establish
ed truths. 1t is curious, but nevertheless true
that the physical history of creation is most salts
factorily and most unerringly read in the rocks
that are dug from the bowels of the earth, and
which serve as an everlasting record of the begin
ming, progress, development, perfection deterora-
ton and decay of the old animated world. How
long the earliest of these records have existed, is
a matter of loose conjecture but it may be millions
| of years ; for Mr. Miller is of the opinion-for
which he can assign strong geological reasons
that certain fish, the perichthys, and the animals
contemporary with it existed five or six thousand
years ago, and there is nothing to prove that it
may not have existed millions of years. The Or
der in which animals were brought into existence
seems to be thisfrst fishes, then, reptiles, then
birds, then mamerous quadrupeds, and last, man.
But the original fishes, reptiles, birds and quadru-
peds, probably all extinct and become extingush-
ed, or so modified as to be adapted to another state
of things, as their successors were introduced upon
the scene. And it is reasonable to suppose, then.
as one class disappeared, upon the appearance of
another or before, the earth was no longer adapt
ed to its organization and habits, or that the in
compabties Of their natures was such as to rem
der coeXistence impossible or at least unnatural
and inconvenient. 1t is presumable, therefore,
that the extinction and total disappearance of GER
tain orders or genera Of animals, is so far from be-
ing in any degree accidental that it has taken
place in consequence of fixed and imuable laws
that 20 on towards fulfllment unerringly and in
evitably, although the term of their cycle may be
millions and millions of years. And this leads to
some curious speculaons, naturally.
Man was the last animal created, that is the
homo SdpienS of the naturalist, which includes wo-
men; so says the Bible, and so says geology
There are no traces of him to be found until long
after the other orders Of animals had been Great
ed-had lived out their prcordained terms of ex-
stence, and had disappeared, making room for
others better adapted to the progressive and i'm
proving condition of the globe we inhabt consc-
quently, the term of six days. mentioned in Gen
esis, has very different meaning from the one
given by some who suppose each day to have been
twenty-tour hours, as we measure time. Instead
of this, each period reckoned as day, may have
been thousands or hundreds of thousand of years;
for with the Almighty Architect and Creator, mil
lions of years are no more than a moment or less.
This opinion is neither atheistical or heterodox
nor irreveren for it has been entertained by very
pous and enlightened men. Mr. Miller is not on
y religious but enthusiastically So and he has as
we have shown assigned periods for the duration
of animal existence which are an hundred times
longer, at least, than would be allowable were the
Mosaic account to be insisted on in what was long
regarded us the literal Interpretation.
Surprising the external and visible world to be
constantly changing and in a perpetual state OF
/ transition and of progressive adapedness for SUI
perior and intelligent eXstences- this seems
to be the case, for geological discoveries 90 to
prove that everything is progressive and nothing
retrogressive--the we do not know but that at
some future and Incidentally remote period, man
himself may disappear from the earth. and give
way to a more perfect and yet more intellectual
being. 1t is Mr. Miller who specuIates; we oursel-
YES could not venture on such bold and startling
views. and them he says, passing on to the re-
Uedled record, we learn that the dynasty Of man
in the mixed state and character is not the fina
one, but that there is to be yet another recreation
known theologically as the resurrection, which
shall be connected in itsphysical components by
bonds of mysterious paternity with the dynasty
which now reigns and be bound to it mentally by
the chain of identity, conscious and actual bu
which, in all that constitutes superiority, shall be
vastly its superior, as the dynasty of responsible
man is superior even to the lowest of the prelim
mary dynasties.' (.
1t will naturally be asked-how does Mr. Miller
who is strong believer in revelation, possibly re
concile all this to the Sacred Volume? This he
, does very ngeniously and we think very plausi
| bly,. Revelation he thinks is intended for maj
precisely as he is and has no reference to anteri
or or posterior existences. 1t is his law and hi
rule of conduct, and will be applied TO no othe
dynasty. With him it began with him it will
end and with the resurrection closes the who'll
account in the material world This is, briefly
about the substance of what he says, and says i
in beautiful and glowing language.
, There is in physiology, most remarkable fac
so remarkable that we must glance at it, 1t
this: We have said that the order in which tn
). animal dynasies made their appearance on tn
earth, seems to be follows first fishes then REP
tiles, then birds, and lastly man. Now the brai
of the human foetus is developed thus-it first as
sumes the appearance of the brain of the fish, the
: of reptile, then of bird, then of quadrupeC
t and finally of human BRAIN Is this accidental
e or is there some mysterious connection betwee
h man and the preliminary and pre-existent dyna:
+ ties, thus making all the animals that have pre-
S ceded him, in some sort his prototype? We ca
J., ask the question: but cannot give an answer, nc
: hazard even conjecture; and SO we leave tn
subject.