Traces of Primeval man.
It is well known to everybody, who has either ever read any work on geology himself or has heard any other person speaking of what he has
read on the subject, that in certain parts of the
earth, which at present are by no means congenist to the production of such animals, the remains of the elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and other animals, have been found in great quantities, and that they are supposed to have been there deposited by the last great geological inundation.
Especially have these remains been found in great quantities in the northeastern corner of
France and the parts of
England adjacent thereto.
As the latitude of this region ranges between forty-seven and fifty North, the wonder has been, not at the richness or rarity of the deposit, but at the fact of their having been found in such an out-of-the-way place.
These animals are all known to natives of tropical climates.
Either, then, our planet has slipped so far. North as to throw
England and
France out of their proper place by forty or fifty degrees, or some flood swept the earth before the days of
Noah, compared to which
Noah's flood was but an insignificant drizzle or these animals were indigenous, and formed to face the climate in which they were placed differing in that respect from their cognates in the torrid zone.
The last theory, we suspect, is the true one.
We are well aware that extreme antiquity is assigned to remains of this description, and that they have been made a text by some, from which to preach against the truth of the
Mosate Genesis.
How well founded such arguments may be, it is not for us to determine.
We can only say, that we have always found the Mosaic account the most rational of all others, so far as our apprehension goes, and that he who undertakes to ever-throw the Scriptures, has quite as much upon his hands as he is equal to.
Cuvier, the anatomist, was, we believe, the first that assigned to specimens of this character an antiquity much greater than that of the Creation, as described by
Moses. His reason for doing so was, that among all the enormous deposits of them, discovered in various parts of the earth, not a single vestige of contemporaneous man was found.
Geologists argued, from this supposed antiquity, that the world was made much more than six thousand years ago. They lost sight, in pursuing their investigations, of the reason which
Cuvier had assigned for believing them anterior to man, viz: that no traces of man were to be found among them.
They found other arguments, of a totally different character, to prove that the Mosaic theory was wrong, and that the world was created many ages before the time assigned by
Moses. Many eminently pious men became convinced by the study of geology, and endeavored to reconcile its discoveries to the book of Genesis, by supposing that the six day's means six indefinite periods, of thousands, or, it might be, millions, of years, during which Almighty power was preparing the world for the habitation of man. Recent discoveries seem to show that they took a great deal of unnecessary trouble.
Vestiges of man, contemporaneous with the remains of elephants, hippopotami, and other tropical animals, and lying intermingled with them in vast heaps, have been discovered in that quarter of
France to which we have alluded.
No human bones, it is true, have been discovered; but hatchets, knives, tools of various kinds' and warlike instruments in abundance, exist among the vestiges of the animals.
They are made of flint, and the ablest geologists have decided, not only that they are of human workmanship, but that they are quite as old as the remains among which they were deposited.
What are we to infer from these discoveries?
That the human race is older than we are told it is by
Moses! Not at all, according to our view of the subject.
Let it be recollected that
Cuvier inferred the antiquity of the remains, from the fact of their not being connected with any vestige of the human race.
Now, vast vestiges of the race have been discovered, the only fair inference is that the bones of the animals are not so old as
Cuvier supposed.--In other words, they are not older than the human race.
The question, then, turns upon the age of the human race, and for that we have no positive authority but the book of Genesis.
No discovery of any human remains bearing traces of an antiquity greater than six thousand years, so far as we know, have ever been discovered.
If there had been any such traces, the indefatigable labors of infidels would most assuredly have ascertained their existence.
It is true, it was stated that in digging the foundation for the gas-works at New Orleans fossil remains of a man fifty-four thousand years old had been discovered.
The age was computed by layers of earth, nine thousand years being required, according to geologists, to form one layer, and these remains being found under six.
This test, we presume, must have been regarded as fallacious, for we have seen it alluded to nowhere save in the
Book where it first appeared, and it has never been supported by other discoveries.
The simple truth, according to our belief, is that the animal remains are not so old as they were thought to be, not that man is not older than the scripture says he is.
