For far too long there existed in the minds of naturalists a systematic prejudice against the Genesis account concerning the creation of the world. In some, this prejudice was the fruit of ignorance and preconceptions; in others, it was a consequence of their aversion to everything connected with Christianity.

As soon as geology had taken its place among the sciences, as soon as it presented a certain number of facts capable of a truly scientific coordination, these naturalists flattered themselves that they could use it as a valuable auxiliary, and on several occasions they attempted to explain, in their own way, the formation of the earth’s crust. They

took good care not to disregard the authority of the Bible, the sole living monument of the primitive traditions of humanity; but while appearing to accept its testimony, they intended to subordinate its value to their pretentious systems, to preconceived and settled doctrines which, unfortunately, were often erroneous or incoherent, and always incomplete. The Mosaic account, as was natural, showed itself to be in intolerable discord with the requirements and formulas of such a science; and then the latter, wounded by this obstinate antagonism, found it more convenient to reject the Bible with the same offhandedness with which the Indian cosmogonies are rejected.

Our century, thanks be to Heaven, our century, enlightened by more thorough investigations and by a host of discoveries favorable to the biblical account, has shown itself less hostile. Several lay scholars have even rendered solemn homage to the Book of Genesis; but none among them has yet known how to rise to the level of the sacred historian, so as to take him as the regulator of his course, as the surest guide in his labors. And yet human genius, even were it raised to its highest power, could not traverse, without monstrous deviations and bitter disappointments, the immense orbit

of the sciences, any more in the natural sciences than in the others. God delivered the world to the disputes of men,¹ said the Wise Man: it seems to us that in this grave utterance there is a certain mysterious shade of irony which ought more than once to give pause, at least, to those who repeat it. God delivered the world to our disputes: what does this mean? After age-long disputes, shall we therefore be unable to arrive at certain conclusions, at definitive results, at incontestable principles? Alas! Certain or not, every day we see these conclusions, these results, these principles called into question; and there is no subject concerning which men do not incessantly begin their eternal disputes anew. Nevertheless, let us hasten to proclaim it: science, that is to say, the knowledge of truth, exists just as truth itself exists; but God is the master of the former just as he is the principle of the latter: Deus scientiarum dominus est [God is the Lord of knowledge].² It therefore belongs to this master, to this Word through whom all things were made and without whom nothing was made, to teach us how everything was made, coordinated, distributed, arranged; it belongs to him to direct the soaring of our mind, to restrain it in its faltering

course, and finally to initiate it, in a certain measure, into some of the secrets of his adorable wisdom.³

Now, if it is in the first chapter of the Pentateuch that God deigned to deposit the germ of all the knowledge that man might acquire concerning his works, if it is there that he deigned to lift a corner of the veil covering what might be called the embryogeny of nature, it is doubtless there also that, according to the habitual method of his providence, he traced the rules to be followed in order to assure oneself of the truth and to shelter oneself from error. But how? Is it by plunging headlong into the field of

the most rash exegesis, by building the scaffolding of the most arbitrary hypotheses upon words whose meaning one distorts at will? No; it is by believing humbly and simply that, when God deigned to speak to men, he also deigned to borrow their language, because he spoke to them only in order to make himself understood; it is by regarding as essentially positive and indisputable the facts and principles which he set before them as the theme that, in their researches, they ought to aim only to expound and develop. Man is free to depart from this natural path, and consequently from the only rational one, the only one conformable to the designs of God; in his pride he may come to disregard the necessity of light from above; but then God takes reprisals against this creature so proud of itself: he confounds its false wisdom by abandoning it to the aberrations of its thoughts; and soon it loses even its own wisdom, according to this saying: sapientia eorum devorata est [their wisdom has been swallowed up].⁴ Daily experience proves that, when man wishes to subordinate divine revelation to his conceptions, instead of testing his conceptions by divine revelation, he ends only in difficulties

that are insoluble, in a thousand extravagances and contradictions, and thence in absurd consequences.

It is therefore in the inspired historian that we must take our point of departure, if we wish to give our researches and our labors a sure direction and to construct a cosmogony resting upon solid foundations.

In surveying the various modern cosmogonic systems, we find that these systems, with some modifications, all resemble one another and may be reduced to two: the one which, in order to explain geological facts, admits an indefinite interval between the first creative utterance, In principio Deus creavit cælum et terram [In the beginning God created heaven and earth], and the first day, on which God created light; and the one which regards the days of Genesis as epochs lasting several thousand centuries, during which God would have given the terrestrial globe the form in which we see it. Both suppose successive cataclysms, repeated catastrophes, indeterminate series of evolutions in which the seas would have shifted several times - by virtue of some law or other! - and would have destroyed the beings living upon the surface of the earth, so that each time the new continents would have been peopled with inhabitants newly arrived from no one knows where.

Splendid suppositions, wholly gratuitous conjectures, which we believe equally contrary to the account of the sacred writer and to sound geology.

Such is the thesis that we shall attempt to establish in this modest work. As it is the bold counterpart of the thesis hitherto maintained by the loftiest luminaries of science, we do not conceal from ourselves the arduous and perilous aspect of our task. One does not attack a theory generally taught by learned men without meeting resistance, without provoking doubts, incredulity, denials - what am I saying? - without inspiring a kind of astonishment and pity, or even profound repugnance, in many people who willingly follow the current of opinion and almost always swear only by the words of their master, reserving the recovery of a little independence for the moment when it is a matter of running up against a doctrine or an interpretation of the Church. Nevertheless, truth often ends by triumphing; and, thanks be to Heaven, it sometimes has only to show itself in order to subjugate the most rebellious minds. When Galileo stood up among the academicians and learned men of his century to maintain the immobility of the sun and the movement of the earth (an immobility and a movement that Cardinal of Cusa had already divined before him and before Copernicus), the astonishment was great: all the astronomers

protested against the extravagance, the impossibility, etc., of this new system of the world.

“If your system were true,” people said to Copernicus, “Venus would have phases like the moon; yet it has none; therefore the whole new theory vanishes.”

“I admit that I have nothing to answer,” replied the illustrious astronomer; “but God will grant that an answer be found.”

“Indeed,” says de Maistre,⁵ “God granted it (but after the death of the great man) that Galileo found the telescopes with which he saw the phases; so that the insoluble objection became the complement of the demonstration.”

Thus Galileo’s ideas prevailed with time; and if, by chance, some Don Quixote of science today took it into his head to set himself up as the champion of an irrevocably lost cause, our physicists would content themselves with answering him with a smile: E pur si muove [And yet it moves].⁶ Such, we are convinced, will be, in a more or less near future, the fate of the biblical thesis, which, regarding all the great phenomena of creation as miraculous acts performed by divine Omnipotence, does not

recognize the necessity of resorting to hypotheses in order to explain them, and gives the expressions of the sacred historian their natural and literal sense. This conviction will be shared, we hope, by all those who deign to read us without prejudice and with the sole desire of discovering the truth.

But, it will be said, why busy oneself with combating a doctrine generally accepted by competent men, upheld by excellent Catholics, and confirmed by the Fathers of Christianity? Is there not imprudence and temerity in offending every mind, in inspiring distrust of religion and driving people from its bosom, by wishing to oblige them to believe things that appear to them incompatible with the data of science, and to renounce opinions that the Church has not condemned? In whose interest should one seek to tear up the treaty of peace that, for some years now, geology has concluded with theology, a treaty so precious to both, and so dear to the true friends of science and religion?

Both, we shall answer, have an interest in the search for and discovery of truth, and particularly of a truth that touches the fundamental principles of religion; for, it must be observed, all peoples have raised upon their cosmogonic system their religious

edifice. Admit the allegorical interpretation of the first texts of Genesis, following the example of Origen and Philo the Jew; admit that one expression in these texts can be taken in a symbolic sense: why not, then, the entire chapter? Why not the second, the third, the fourth, etc.? But then, step by step, you will fall into outright mythicism. Even if you had the right to limit the application of your exegetical principles to the first chapter of Genesis, that would suffice to require the origin of the world, the creation of the earth, and the formation of man to be regarded as intelligible and supernatural things hidden beneath the veil of sensible and material objects. But others will go farther than you; they will present the whole of sacred history as a vast symbol; and once they have entered upon this path, nothing will prevent them from treating personal or individual historical facts as they treat general facts; and Strauss himself, seeing nothing but a glorious myth in the life of the divine Savior, will be able to claim that you are his first masters.

Apart from this reef, already so formidable, there is another. Pantheism and materialism are the two cankers that gnaw modern society under various forms; they have invaded our public courses and our academies; they have penetrated into

every rank and every class. In order to lessen, if not to halt, their ravages, is it not important to block, so far as possible, all their outlets, to close all their avenues, to dry up all their sources?

Well! We do not hesitate to say it: the two systems that we propose to combat tend, indirectly no doubt, but all too effectively, if not to justify, at least to favor and propagate this twofold impiety. These numerous and incalculable revolutions of the globe that are lost in the night of time; these successive creations, destructions, and renovations, to which, si parva licet componere magnis [if it is permitted to compare small things with great], our scholars would readily compare their chemical manipulations; all these fine things lead, without great exertions of logic, to pantheistic consequences.

What, indeed, do pantheists of every kind and every stripe say? Some say that, if for so many centuries men, as well as animals, have been born incessantly to replace those who fall each day, there is no reason to believe that it was ever otherwise, and that consequently the world must always have been and will always be as it is today. Others claim that, God being the great whole, all beings, to whatever

rank they belong, are emanations of this one and universal substance, with which they are identified by virtue of their very origin. Still others are willing to admit a creation, but on an arbitrary condition conformable to their pantheistic ideas: they believe that the laws of what they call nature have organized everything in the world; that they transform, perfect, and perpetuate the genera and species of animals as well as plants; and that for this nature needs only time, that is to say, an interminable series of centuries.

Without doubt these doctrines are rejected by the religious geologists who defend these unfortunate systems, from which it is not difficult to derive them; but when one does not wish to admit a consequence, one must carefully avoid positing its premises, and remember that the logic of the masses is not that of scholars, and that it matters very little to most men to violate the rules of dialectic when reasoning supplies excuses for their passions.

Will it be said that the epochs, although unlimited in their duration, do not carry the creation of the world back to infinity, and that, according to the most accredited authors, each of them does not exceed a few thousand years? One might first ask by what right these

authors claim for themselves the right thus to reduce the number of centuries which, according to them, must have preceded the formation of our globe. Is it not evident that this calculation is necessarily abandoned, by the nature of things and without any possible control, to the more or less judicious appraisal of all geologists, and that, if some know how to remain within bounds that may be called reasonable, others will not fail to overstep them without limit or measure?

Here is an example.

A short time ago, we found ourselves on a railway, face to face with a traveler whose conversation and language soon revealed to us the literary profession. On getting out of the carriage at a station, we had left half-open upon our bench a work of geology that we were reading. When we had resumed our place, our neighbor said to us:

“It appears, Father, that you occupy yourself with geological studies?”

Upon our affirmative reply, he informed us that he taught this science at the Faculty of … The conversation then began upon this interesting subject, and we readily understood that our interlocutor was a proponent of the epochs. Not wishing to enter upon a discussion that we would not have had time to bring to a conclusion, we confined ourselves to timidly addressing a few questions to him,

among others this one:

“Authors do not agree upon the number of centuries that should be assigned to each geogenic epoch, in order that the phenomena or the results might have been produced as they manifest themselves to our eyes; some make it last three thousand years, others longer. You, Sir, who are so profoundly versed in these studies, how many centuries do you give it?…”

“For my part,” he replied, “I do not hesitate to give each epoch millions and millions of centuries.”

This unexpected answer closed our mouth and reduced us to silence. Well! This man, whose name I believe I ought to withhold, is one of the most distinguished professors of our faculties; he is the author of several works; his name carries authority in the scientific world. And yet that is the doctrine he teaches in his courses and in his books! Now, we ask, is there no affinity between these millions of centuries that you unroll beyond creation and the eternity of matter? Is this indefinite interval that, according to you, separates us from the first origin of things not suited, if not to destroy, at least to weaken considerably in men’s minds the idea of the fundamental dogma of society, that of creation, the primitive source and essential basis of God’s sovereign dominion over the

world? Without doubt, at the end of these myriads of centuries, every serious mind will eventually find God, the first author of all beings; but, we repeat, the intelligence of the masses will stop along the way in order to draw pantheistic conclusions from them.

But, it is added, the system of periods has not been condemned by the Church; it is therefore permissible to adopt it. We know this; but does the silence of the Church upon any point whatsoever consecrate its truth, or even presuppose it in the least? Evidently not. The Church passes over the earth, continuing to fulfill the mission with which her divine Founder charged her; she aspires and labors only to conquer and save souls. If, in comparison with this supreme interest, everything else were not indifferent, the Savior of men would not have lived thirty-three years among them without enlightening them upon a host of questions that they discussed then as they do today, and which they will perhaps discuss until the end of time. Yielding to a fairly natural illusion, the human mind delights in singularly exaggerating the importance of a thousand doubtful things that it erects into scientific questions, but which, at bottom, are only a very wretched relative good before the absolute of eternity. This is why the divine Word did not judge it useful, when he appeared among men, to dispel the darkness

of their ignorance concerning that which did not concern their eternal salvation; this is also why the Church has abstained from pronouncing upon many philosophical or scientific systems which, at a given hour, were recognized as false.

To cite only one example, concerning a subject connected with Genesis, Ptolemy’s system regarding the stability of the earth and the movement of the sun had not been condemned, and nevertheless it was erroneous.

If the two hypotheses in question had been condemned, there would no longer be any room for discussion: every Catholic would have to abandon them and pass the same judgment as the Church, under pain of grave sin, say the doctors. And this for three reasons, which Suarez develops in these terms:

1. Because what is done imprudently in a matter as important as sacred doctrine is not done without fault; now, it is extremely imprudent rashly, or in some analogous manner, to form and express erroneous opinions concerning sacred doctrine; therefore, this cannot be done without sin.

2. Because an error of this kind leads to greater wanderings and even to heresy; consequently, whoever forms such opinions exposes himself to the danger of falling into graver

errors, and by that very fact he sins.

3. There is also sin here in relation to others, because of the scandal that is given them, and certainly also because of the danger of producing grave errors in their minds.⁷

But apart from these formally condemned opinions, there are others that the Church rejects without, however, branding them with any note of error, and which it is at least dangerous to embrace. Here is what the same theologian says concerning them:

“Although the truth of the things that the Church believes only as pious and probable is not certain, if the Church pronounces herself upon a question of this kind, it must be held that she does not err, not only from the practical point of view, which is

manifest, but even from the speculative point of view. The reason is that the universal Church, even considered solely as a human society containing within herself a great number of enlightened minds, humanly possesses the highest authority. If, therefore, she judges a thing to be probable, that thing is thereby evidently probable; and it is then highly likely that the Holy Spirit specially assists and enlightens the doctors of the Church. This must be recognized even with regard to natural truths.”⁸

We shall also cite, in support of Suarez, another theologian who indisputably occupies the first rank among French theologians, Abbé Martinet. Speaking of the fire of hell, he says:

“Scripture and Tradition suppose a real fire

which will cause the reprobate to suffer a punishment distinct from the punishment of loss, and it would be rashness to admit only a metaphysical fire identical with moral sufferings. This was the opinion of Origen and Lactantius, not formally condemned, but visibly contradicted by the unanimous teaching of the Fathers, and irreconcilable with the principles of sacred criticism, since the Bible speaks in a hundred places of the fire of hell without any indication of metaphor.”⁹

Now, is it permissible to class among those opinions “not formally condemned by the Church, but visibly contradicted by the teaching of the Fathers and irreconcilable with the principles of sacred criticism” those of the geologists whom we are combating? We think so, and we hope to establish it in the course of this work by irrefutable testimonies, despite all the contrary assertions so often repeated. We shall see the Church profess, through the mouth of her Fathers and her doctors, whether Greek or Latin, and even through her councils, a doctrine opposed to this theory of periods, and that the language of those whom it is thought possible to invoke in their favor does not, once it is studied in its form and in its motives, have the scope that one wishes to give it.

We have added that the study of this question is equally of interest to science. All serious men who occupy themselves with cosmogony and geology deplore the little progress made by these so important branches of human knowledge: all acknowledge that, despite the persistent labors of so many eminent men who have devoted themselves to them for so many years with incredible ardor and perseverance, these sciences are still in the swaddling clothes of infancy.

The celebrated Cuvier expressed the same thought in more bitter terms when he said to the Institute:

“For want of laying the first foundation of geology in the exact investigation of facts, this science has been changed into a tissue of hypotheses and conjectures so vain, and which have so greatly combated one another, that it has become almost impossible to pronounce its name without exciting laughter. The number of systems has so greatly increased that there are today more than eighty of them. These castles in the air vanish like vain appearances.”¹⁰

This severe language of Cuvier could be used today with the same reason. These complaints, unfortunately all too well founded, do they not arise from the fact that the point of departure is not the true one? As long as astronomers admired the movement of the sun and the fixity of the earth, astronomy, enveloped in darkness and guided by error, exhausted itself in imaginary theories and explanations which arose and destroyed one another in succession. It was the discovery of the movement of the earth and the stability of the sun that opened the field to the genius of Newton, Herschel, Laplace, etc., and permitted them to formulate those admirable laws of the sidereal world which men have become accustomed to regard almost as conquests of the human mind.

It would be the same for geology if at last it rested upon a more solid and more certain basis than all these gratuitous hypotheses, which rest upon no rational foundation, no human tradition, no historical monument, and which the discovery of a single fact can overturn from top to bottom. Indeed, let a human fossil or any object attesting the work of man, the existence of man at a given epoch, be found; let it be found in one of the numerous formations of strata that are called secondary, and at once all these systems will be seen rejected by all geologists without exception. Now, we ask it, what

credence do systems deserve which can be overturned so easily? Why would true scholars cling to a plank of salvation that the slightest gust of wind can take from them in the shipwreck of their theories? For, we repeat, the fate of these poor theories depends upon the more or less probable, more or less imminent discovery of a single fact; and this discovery, if it is not made today, will be made tomorrow, will be made sooner or later.

In the meantime, it is important to fix clearly the point of departure of the investigations, and especially of cosmogonic studies. Even if it were not hitherto scientifically indicated by geology, why would geologists not rest upon historical data which must, until proof to the contrary, appear to possess the most rigorous exactitude and the most absolute certainty? And, if they rested upon them, or if they wished merely to admit as possible the supposition that the two systems in vogue are false, that, consequently, the first day of Genesis was the first day of the world, and that it was what our days are, that is to say, a day of twenty-four hours, as the simple reading of the Bible naturally leads one to believe, is it not evident that this idea alone would give to the course of

science an entirely different direction and would cause it to arrive at entirely new results?

Thus, the discussions relating to this subject are far from being almost idle, as some writers take pleasure in saying. They have fixed the attention and aroused the zeal of the doctors, the Fathers of the Church, and the interpreters of Holy Scripture, all of whom believed that they ought to devote long studies to this matter and numerous pages in their writings. Besides, the works, pamphlets, memoirs, and newspaper articles that treat these questions multiply every day; how can they be regarded as without importance for Catholics? Does not everything that concerns the interpretation of the sacred books present the highest interest for them? Consequently, is it not useful, is it not necessary, that they resolutely enter the lists?

Yes, without doubt; and nevertheless, if some throw themselves forward, people go almost so far as to make their zeal a crime. Amid these conflicts of opinions, through this divergence of ideas, prudence and wisdom, it is said, command a discreet tolerance. And why, since dogmas are not at issue, why not make this concession to scholars, most of whom sincerely and laboriously seek the truth? This is the counsel given on several

occasions by the learned editors of the Civiltà cattolica.¹¹

We ask their permission not to be of their opinion. In general, we do not think that the system of concessions made at the expense of what one believes to be true is of a nature to bring back to the right path those who have strayed from it. Truth is one, indivisible, absolute, imperious, and experience has sufficiently demonstrated that it is not by employing accommodations incompatible with its essence that it triumphs over the resistance of men.

Like truth, the question that occupies us cannot admit of any compromise: the interval separating us from the proponents of periods or epochs is an abyss; if we are in the truth, they are in falsehood; these two extremes never enter into a pact: it is impossible to connect them by a middle term.

The fear these writers express of seeing our adversaries, irritated or wearied by these debates, distance themselves from religion does not seem well founded to us. It appears to us, rather, injurious to most of these honorable men, whose sole aim is the discovery of truth, and who, by their own admission, are not

sure of their system. How could they be wounded by the efforts and investigations of those who have the conviction that they are in the truth to dissipate their errors and to share with them the rich patrimony of which they believe themselves to be in possession?

The counsel that we forbid ourselves to follow resembles, all due proportion being observed, that which would be given to Catholics to disguise from unbelievers a part of the religious doctrines, for fear that their full and entire exposition might offend them. These calculations, these accommodations, the Church condemns them, despite all her indulgence and all her charity: never has she made any concession of this kind, even at the risk of seeing schism or heresy hypocritically take advantage of her resistance: witness the conduct she maintained when the East and England detached themselves from her bosom.

An attempt is also made to oppose to us a very grave authority, that of Saint Thomas, from whom the following two passages are cited: we reproduce them in their entirety, because we do not wish to evade any difficulty or pass over any objection in silence.

“It seems to me that the safest course, with respect to what philosophers have generally admitted and which is not repugnant to our faith, is not to maintain it as a dogma of faith, although philosophers sometimes succeed in establishing its truth; and likewise not to reject it as contrary to the faith, for fear of giving to the wise of this world an occasion to despise the doctrine of the faith.¹²”

“As Saint Augustine teaches, there are two things to observe in questions of this kind. First, the truth of Scripture must be placed beyond all discussion; next, since divine Scripture can receive many different explanations, one must take good care not to attach oneself to any particular explanation with such force that, even when certain reasons should prove the falsity of something that one believed to be conformable to the sense of Scripture, one would not fear to maintain it; for one would thereby expose oneself to furnishing unbelievers with a pretext for turning Scripture into derision, or to closing to them the path of faith.¹³”

The first passage of the Angelic Doctor does not concern us: we do not present our opinion here as a dogma of faith.

The second is equally foreign to the question. Saint Augustine there recommends that one not obstinately maintain a particular exposition of Scripture when it has been demonstrated by certain reasons that it is false, si certa ratione constiterit id esse falsum [if it has been established by certain reasoning that this is false]. Now, it is far from being the case that the falsity of the literal interpretation of the days of Genesis has been demonstrated. Saint Thomas himself does not apply to it the maxim of the Doctor of Grace. After having cited it, he devotes no fewer than eighteen pages to the detailed study of this question, in which he establishes, as we shall show later, that these days must be taken in the natural sense.

In our turn, we can rely upon an authority which, it goes without saying, we do not intend to compare to that of the two great doctors whom it is wrongly wished to make intervene here, but an authority

of considerable and uncontested value, which has directly approached the question with which we are occupied. “Can hypotheses such as those of Deluc, Chalmers, and Buckland be maintained by theologians?” asks the author of the Solution of the Great Problems in the Theological Institutions which he has recently published. “No,” he replies emphatically, with all the gravity of his words and all the force of his arguments; “no, for fear that theologians might expose themselves to hearing these words of Isaiah: ‘Behold, you lean upon a reed, upon a broken reed… It enters into the hand of the man who leans upon it, and pierces it.’ Moreover, two things turn us away from opinions of this kind: the difficulty of reconciling them with a sound interpretation of the biblical account, and the insignificance of the geological reasons that are alleged: let us examine these two points rapidly.¹⁴”

We shall examine in its place the developments that the learned author gives to these considerations.

The plan of our work emerges manifestly from all that we have just said.

We shall first consider the days of Genesis from the point of view of the requirements of geology. This first part does not appear to us the most important, the question being more scriptural and theological than geological.

In a second part we shall see in what sense these days must be taken, according to the principles of sacred criticism and philology.

In the third part we shall report the opinions of the Fathers, the doctors, and the councils upon this question: this part of our work appears to us to dominate the entire question and to resolve it.

Finally, in the fourth part we shall indicate

the probable causes to which the present formation of the globe may be attributed.

We beg our readers to reject nothing a priori, and not to say what we have sometimes heard: It is impossible, therefore it is not. This plea of inadmissibility is a coin of base alloy which does not pass current in the scientific world. Testimonies and reasonings have a right to examination: the former, in order to be admitted or rejected; the latter, in order to accept or deny their consequences.

THE COSMOGONY OF MOSES

PART ONE

GEOLOGICAL POINT OF VIEW