New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1858-02-19

DR.. Boynton delivered his sixth and last lecture to
the school children and their parents and friends yes
terday afternoon, at Armory Hail. and last night he
delivered the eighth and last lecture of his regular
course to the public The audience at the latter
lecture was very large, filling the whole hail.
This lecture was of absorbing interest. It was
a review and summing up of the matters treated of
In the seven preceding lectures and as it wound up
with comparison of the disclosures of geology with
the assertions of the Mosaic record aud reconca-
ton of the supposed dsagreements of the two it was
listened to by all with the prooundest attention. and
much appauded by those who did not wish to have
their faith in the inspired volume shaken by the ire
sistible light of science.
The lecturer, by comparison of the different tvpes
Of the animal creation described in his previous lee
lures unfolded the grand system of creation in as
clear and condensed manner as we should Judge it
possible for any human being to do within the com.
pass of a two hours speech He took the present
perfected forms of the animal creation, including
man, and traced them back by the anaogies of their
structure and development through the extinct races
90 the tertiary creaceous sanrian and carbonerous
ages OF the world to the inconceiYably remote ne
riod-t ten thousand times ten million years ago, . as
he expressed it. when animal life first made its APP
pearanoe in the radata celular structures of the
ocean.
In the radiata. the vital or living principle was
found to exist in cells, each cell composed Of smaller
cells, and each smaller cell still subdiyided. until
the origin was placed beyond the reach of human
perception. The cell barely discernble with the
microscope, might be as gigantic, compared with
the cells Of its decreasing subdivision as the elephant
is when compared with the cell at the last limit of
vision. Creation wss therefore a mystery, which
science could never hope TO PROBE That the animal
creation proceeded by degrees from the vegetable
creation was manifest by the existence of creatures
partaking of the qualities of both but the definite
beginning Of animal life could never be ascertainetl.
Science might disclose the principles and laws Of
creation and the history of their action but it could
never penetrate the sublime mystery of creation
ITSELF That proceeded from and belonged exclusively
to Deity.
Having shown that man was the utimatnm of a
system of creation which could be traced back
through harmonious scale to the radiata the lee.
turer arrayed the facts Of geology aud the statements
of the Bible regarding the creation in lucid and
foreible comparison, which constituted the most in
terestng part of his lecture. Neither man nor any
OF the animals Of the present age were shown by ge-
oiogy to have existed in any former age. though
fSPN9 VI sASiu ages
the creatures Of this age were to be looked upon as
an entirely new creation.
The very first verse in the Bible says. in the
beginning God created the heaven and the earth .
but trsen thai beginning was writing inspired or
unlnspired, had ever ventured to state The third
verse Of the second chapter OF Genesis says, And
God blessed the seventh day. and sanetided II be.
cause that in it he had rested from all his work
which he had created and made The term created
the lecturer explained referring to the countless
ages through which creation unfoded itself as proven
By geology the term made as referring to the com.
pletion OF the creation in man and the other animals
of the alluyal present age And to show that the
English translation Of the Hebrew record could not
always be depended upon the lecturer explained that
the word ADAM as proper noun, or name of an indi
yidual, had existence in the original record The
record contained the word, as the general name Of
man, or the human species but King James trans
lators had converted it into proper noun and made
it the name Of an individual This, we take it, was
to show that the sublimities of the Mosaic record
were liable to be obscured and made contradictory
aud uncertain by the errors or faults Of translation
The sum Of this part Of the lecture was that tn.
Bible aud geology fully eorroborate and sustain eael
other.
me lecturer next proceeded TO prove that man i
the perfection Of the animal creation because he il
endowed with faculties Of infinite capacity The mn
sican, the painter, the architect may achieve grand
triumph o. intellect yet be has the power, or the