The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1884-10-15

may ask 1900 years. a. or any other given
number greater or less "2-Richmond Presby-
| terrain.
Certainly. we said so. Now what ?-Interior.
| Then this: there is an intimate connection be
tween the theory of the evolution of man and
the theory OF the antiquity of man, and we can
not recall a scientist who believes in one who
does not believe in the other
| Moreover: as stated by us last week and as
mentioned elsewhere this week, anthropolo
gists are declaring that the remains of man
have been found in the tertiary geological beds,
and asking millions of years for the antiquity
of our race. The Interior says they can have it
that 1t contradicts nothing said in the Bible to
admit that man originated in the Miocene period
This Is what. Central Presbyterian.
And therefore we must try to force out of the
Scriptures a statement which the Central itself
admits that they do not. either expressly or by
implication, make. There is no sense, nor any
honesty, in that kind of "apologetics" We
would like to know. first what writer of any
authority gives the hypothetical Miocene"
period an antiquity of millions of years."
The lacustrine, or lake-dwelling mammals
which are attributed to it, were in existence in
the time of Herodotus, and exist now. A lake
dweller of the time of Herodotus might have
fallen from his hut and been drowned, and his
|
older, tertiary stratas. If scientific smstterer
should point to them and say they were millions
of years old, the only reply we would make
would be that he was scientific" ass
Interior.
The Interior has made a mess Of it
now. In the first place, it stands con-
fessed to giving the anthropologists as
much time as they ask, that is to say,
1T admits on full consideration that man
may have been on the earth since the
miocene epoch, which, according to ge-
ologists, was some millions of years
ago. And yet the Interior asserted
that it did not sympathise with Prof
Woodrow's views
But the funny part is TO come The
Interior does not hesitate to pour it's
contempt on "a scientific smatterer"
and ga scientific ass" and yet in the
above paragraph it mixes up the semi
civilised Lake Dwellers of the Polished
Stone Age, whose canoes, stone axes,
bridle-bits, bronze swords, and chariot
wheels, have been found in the Swiss
Lakes, with the long extinct fauna of
the Miocene beds OF the tertiary age
of the biologists (the Hypothetical
Miocene," as the Interior puts it) 4!
This is about as if man should con
found the epoch of julius Caesar with
one of the eras Of fossil botany, or the
Cape of Good Hope with the dog-star
Sirius.
The "lacustrine mammals" to which
the Interior refers were the sheep, the
goat, the pig, the dog, the red deer,
wild boar, etc.,-that is to say, they in
cluded a number of our familiar do
mesticated animals, and are entirely
us regards both the wild and the do
mesticated animals, almost identical
with the fauna Of modern Europe. No
body $50 far as we know assigns 20 tie
lake-dwellers an antiquity of more than
few thousand years-say six, at the
outside. Herodotus describes one of
these settlements as existing in his day
a. Salonica, in Eastern Macedonia
they are delineated on Trajans Column
in Rome and in some of those brought
to light in Switzerland we believe Ro
man coins have been found. In fact
among the remains found in one of
these settlements in the Lake of Pala-
dru in France, was Carlovingian coin
of the eighth century.
What all this has to do with the
Miocene" epoch we cannot conceive.
Between the Lake Dwelers and the
Miocene epoch lies the whole of the
Quaternary Period of Geology Gnclud-
ing the Terrace, Champlain, and Gla-
cial epochs), and all of the Pliocene
epoch (the Upper Tertiary.
We are not aware that any one of the
lake-dwellers of the time of Herodotus"
ever "fell from his hut" into one of
these Miocene beds, and if the Interior
has heard of any such case it ought to
communicate the facts at once to the
Anthropological Institute of Great Bri-
tain or Paris.
The Scientific ass" who whispered
this suggestion into the ear of the IN
terror has led it into a grievous confu-
sion of things that have no more con-
nection than the modern bicycle and
tho Ctha ldooau Gapoa;a