it SUNDAY, as too many too often do. I must assure you, To keep up the Right Names of Things in matters of Religion, has no little Tendency to keep up Right Thoughts of the Things themselves. Wise men have sometimes been justly apprehensive, of more mischief lurking in Bare Names, than is commonly apprehended by those that use them.* I remember an unhappy passage, of the Romish and Rhemish Annotators upon the New-Testament, say they, concerning the Protestants, While they say, Ministers, let us say, Priests; when they call it. A Communion-Table, let us call it, An Altar. Let us keep our old Words, and we shall keep our old Things. Truly, Sirs; you are much in the Right on't! But what will you say, when I tell you, That the Rhemish Annotators themselves, [on Rev. 1. 10.] condemn the Name of Sunday as Heathenish? I will not quote unto you the complaints even of no better a man than Polydore Virgil, about our keeping up the Planetary Names for the Days. I will only say, every Body knows, that the Pagans were they, who first called this Day, by the Name of Sunday; and that it was a stroke of their Idolatry to call it so, that is to say, t'was to Express the Dedication of the Day unto the Oldest and Brightest Idol in the World. If any of those Pagans, might now give their Balaamitick Advice, how to make People insensible of the Reverence due to, The LORDS DAY, they * Whatever propriety there may be in the application of this remark in the present instance, I cannot help observing that it were well if the justness of it as it respects human affairs generally were more commonly understood. In politics, not less than in religion, every reader of history knows there is "more mischief lurking in bare names than is ordinarily apprehended." It has not unfrequently happened that by the mere invention of an appellative, designed to excite the popu lar odium against a particular portion of the community, (a term perhaps so vague that nobody can define it, and for that reason the better fitted for its purpose,) a sagacious demagogue has duped the populace and overturned the government. would say, By all means keep up our Idolatrous Name for the Day, and never let it be call'd any other than, Sunday But, Sirs, if it be the LORDS DAY, let us not be shy of honestly calling it so! Surely, we are not ashamed of confessing our LORD, or of confessing that This Day belongs unto Him. We may before we are aware, Take the Lord's Name in Vain, by not allowing to the LORDS DAY, the Name which He has Himself challenged for it : The Third and the Fourth Commandments may be together violated, in our denying the Name of the LORD, unto the Day of the LORD. Have any of my Hearers, a secret Inclination to bring or keep the LORDS DAY under Contempt? Beloved, we are perswaded better things of you! But would not the Royal Person who is now placed at the Head of Three mighty Kingdoms, count it a contempt of Her Majesty, if People should now call Her nothing but, The Princess of Denmark? And I am the more free in making use of this comparison, because the Jews do very agreeably call the Sabbath-day, by that Name, The Queen of all the Days: And Ignatius puts upon the Lords-day too, that very Title. It is true, some of the Ancients, as both Justin Martyr and Tertullian, do sometimes, in their Apologies, call the Lords-day, by the Name of, Sunday; But there is this to be Apologised for them, That they directed their Apologies unto the Pagans, who would not have readily understood another Name. And now that you may not count me more Nice than Wise, I will quote you a few more of the Ancients, to whom, if you please, the matter shall be referr'd. First, The great Ambrose, has a Passage of this Import, The Day which is called The Lords day, in the Church, is called Sunday, by the men of the World. And then, the greater Austin, shows, that the Manichees rather than the Christians called, The Lords day by the Name of Sunday; but, says he, For our parts, we call it the Lords day, because on it, we reverence, not the Sun, but the Resurrection of the Lord. And elsewhere, he is very earnest, for that Heathen Name to be laid aside says he, Tis a manner of speaking, that becomes not a Christian Mouth. Add hereto, That Philastrius would have the use of THE CHURCH-YARD AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. 6 (Extracted from the Excursion,' by Wordsworth.) "To a mysteriously-consorted Pair This place is consecrate; to Death and Life, To Charity, and Love, that have provided, And evil, to the just and the unjust; Even as the multitude of kindred brooks And streams, whose murmurs fills this hollow vale, Their waters clear or sullied, all are lost And blest are they who sleep; and we that know, And gathering all within their tender shade, Of friends and kindred, whom the angry Sea Restores not to their prayer! Ah! who would think From the delights of charity cut off, To pity dead-the Oppressor and the Oppressed ; And slaves who will consent to be destroyed; Were of one species with the sheltered few, This file of Infants; some that never breathed That lovingly consigns the Babe to the arms These that in trembling hope are laid apart ; The thinking, thoughtless School-boy; the bold Youth Are opening round her; those of middle age, Cast down while confident in strength they stand, Keview of New Publications. Reliquiæ Diluviana; or Observations on the Organic Remains contained in Caves, Fissures, and Diluvial Gravel, and on other Geological Phenomena attesting the action of an Universal Deluge. By the Rev. WILLIAM BUCKLAND, B. D. F. R. S. F. L. S. Professor of Mineralogy and Geology in the University of Oxford, &c. 4 to pp. 303. 27 Plates. London, 1823. A marked feature in the character of the champions of revealed religion in modern times, has been the fearlessness with which they have entered the very citadel of infidelity, and wrested from their antagonists their best tempered weapons, to employ them in defence of the truth. This was, in fact, merely restoring these weapons to their legitimate proprietors, and bringing them into that service for which they were originally intended. The time has been, when Christians have felt as if the spirit of infidelity was inseparably connected with the particular armour by which it was defended. But they have since learned, that the tract system is not less efficacious for advancing the religion of the Gospel, because it was invented and first employed for the destruction of that Gospel; that revelation is not to be extended in the world by isolated efforts only, because the principle of combined effort was employed by the illuminati to subvert the very foundations of society; and that those copies of the scriptures which issue from the very press employed by Voltaire to print his blasphemies, are not thereby rendered the less pure or perfect. Indeed, since the children of this world are in their generation, wiser than the children of light,' Christians have learnt to profit by that superior wisdom, and to seize upon those plans for the defence and extension of revealed truth, which worldly sagacity had invented for its destruction. looked at creation with an unjaundiced eye, they found that the responses from the temple of nature harmonized with those of revelation. And their answer to every philosophic scoff was like that given by Newton to the infidel astronomer Sir Edmund Halley, when, he said the scriptures wanted mathematical demonstration :-" 'Mund, you had bet ter hold your tongue; you have never sufficiently considered the matter." And it is a fact that ought not to be overlooked, that the more thoroughly the phenomena of nature are understood, the more exact and striking is their coincidence with the scriptures; while apparent discrepancies vanish upon rigid examination. It had long been the proud feeling of scepticism that the wide fields of natural science were exclusively her own. Dressed in all the pride of a vain philosophy, she strutted and vapoured in the walks of science, fancying herself alone in the regions of light and truth, and looking down, with contempt, upon the weak and superstitious followers of the Naza rene. She reported with all the assurance of demonstration, that the history of the natural world was directly at variance with the sacred history. And it must be confessed, that during the reign of scholastic theology, those appointed for the defence of the Gospel, were not sufficiently conversant with the researches of natural philosophy, to determine whether the fact adduced from thence by sceptics were really, or only apparently, contradictory to the bible; and hence their only resort was, to commence an attack upon philosophy itself, and thus to separate the things that God had joined together, his work of creation and his work of From no science probably has so much corroborating evidence of the truth of the scriptures been derived, We are aware as from geology. that this may be thought by some to be an incorrect assertion. There are very many who view with extreme jealousy and even alarm, those theories which modern geologists have divulged relating to the Mosaic cosmogony: and some cannot but look on them as subversive of the bible and even as temding to atheism. We mean in this place to give no opinion concerning the truth or falsehood of those theories: though we are disposed to adopt the sentiment "Let every of Bishop Burnet: thing," says he, "be tried and examined in the first place, whether it be true or false; and if it be found false it is then to be considered, whether it be such a falsity as is preBut for judicial to religion, or no. every new theory that is proposed to be alarmed, as if all religion was falling about our ears, is to make the world suspect that we are very ill assured of the foundation it stands upon." Apart however from all cosmogonical hypotheses, we are persuaded, that the man who will institute a comparison between the revelation. But when such men as undeniable facts geology developes, Newton, and Bacon, and Boyle, en- and those of revelation, will be surtered the walks of philosophy, and prised at the striking coincidence between them; and this too, in regard to points where it was least expected; thus rendering the argument, like that of the Hora Paulinæ, more strong and conclusive. It cannot be denied also, that this confirmation of the sacred history, derived from geology, has not been exaggerated by any partialities which geologists have exhibited for revelation: for it is well known, that many of the most distinguished of them even such as were friendly to the bible, have manifested a fastidious avoidance of all support from the sacred record. Yet their results have approximated more and more to the Mosaic account: and the recent work of Cuvier, who stands first in this department of knowledge, contains an almost complete refutation of the objections of infidels to Moses' history; although he makes no reference to the scriptures as of more authority than any other history. Indeed, although the Mosaic history of the creation and the deluge, have long been a favorite and strong hold of infidels, yet we know of no intelligent one, who dare attempt, at this day, to take a decided stand upon it. The work of Professor Buckland is a striking exemplification of the increasing light and evidence geology is lending to revelation. No doubt many will look at its title page with 'a smile or a sigh', while the wild phantasms and airy dreams of Burnet and Whiston and Robinson and Hutchinson, float before their memories. It is not strange, indeed, that the vagaries of former writers on this subject, should have produced in logical minds a prejudice against every subsequent attempt to elucidate it: nor do we wonder that these writers were proverbially extravagant, with scarcely an exception, unless it be Catcott, when we consider the character of the age in which they wrote, and that geology was then in its earliest infancy. But it is unfortunate for the science, that a prejudice has thus been deeply rooted in the public mind, that even to this period VOL. VI.-No. 8. 53 prevents men from an impartial examination of the writings of geologists of the present day, which are as different from the works of the theorists above alluded to, as those of Doddridge, Edwards and Dwight are, from the scholastic parade of Thomas Aquinas or Duns Scotus. The work of Mr. Buckland is written in the cautious inductive spirit of Bacon and Newton, and is well calculated to do away every lingering prejudice against a science, of which he is, as we understand, an able and accomplished Professor, in the University of Oxford. His object is to give a view of all the evidence of a universal deluge geology has disclosed; an important portion of which, results from his own discoveries. Much, however, has been adduced in proof of the deluge, and is still insisted on, which has no relation to that catastrophe. And the want of discrimination between the true and the false evidences, has proved a source of endless confusion, and thrown an air of weakness over the whole argument. We propose, therefore, before entering directly upon the consideration of Mr. Buckland's work, to devote a few moments to the negative side of the question; and to show what is not proof of the Noachian deluge. We maintain A principal evidence of that deluge, is the existence in the earth of organic remains; such as animals and shells: but these are not evidence, unless they occur under certain circumstances. that all those shells, animals, and other relics of organized beings, found in the solid and regular strata of the earth, were not deposited by the deluge of Noah; and are, therefore, no proof of that event. The earth, it is well known, is composed near its surface, of numerous layers of different sorts of rocks, clay, sand and gravel. Over these, is spread, almost every where, a mantle of sand, pebbles and rounded stones, confusedly mingled together and not of great thickness, called by geolo |