sirable to make special provision for the permanence and stability of a building, recourse was had to kiln-dried bricks. The superior value of these seems to have been thoroughly appreciated from an early period, and may be still seen in the perfect state of preservation in which they have been actually found. While the crude bricks have either crumbled into dust or run together into an unshapely lump, the burnt bricks, even of the earliest buildings, are still as hard and brittle as ever. The distinctive colours of the various qualities have been preserved, some being described as of a yellowish-white tint, others of a blackishblue, and others still, the most ancient of all, of a pale red colour. Owing to the cost of production, they were but sparingly used in building, and were principally reserved for the more important purposes of construction. The keystones of arches

unparalleled abundance. The soft clammy mould, | continually impregnated with the moisture of the great rivers, furnished an inexhaustible supply of clay admirably adapted for brick-making; indeed, the whole plain could, if required, have been easily turned into an immense brick-field, and was perhaps more favourably situated for the prosecution of this particular industry than any other place in the world. The Valley of the Nile is perhaps the only other district which can be compared with it in natural advantages for the rapid and successful development of this branch of manufacture. Herodotus, with his keen eye for natural peculiarities, was struck with the extraordinary capacities of the soil, and the skilful way in which the inhabitants had turned them to account in building the great walls of Babylon. | "And here," says he, "I may not omit to tell the use to which the mould dug out of the great moat was turned, nor the manner wherein the wall was wrought. As fast as they dug the moat, the soil which they got from the cutting was made into bricks, and when a sufficient number was completed they baked the bricks in kilns. Then they set to building, and began bricking the borders of the moat, after which they proceeded to construct the wall itself, using throughout for their cement hot bitumen." The system thus described by the historian was very much the same as that which had been practised from a very ancient date. It was the method which would most readily suggest itself to men in the infant stage of civilization, whose material and artificial resources were alike scanty. No great stretch of ingenuity or expenditure of labour was required to convert the masses of raw material supplied by the soil into a substance suitable for building. Little more was needed than to fashion the clay into the requisite shape, and let it lie exposed for a short time to the burning heat of a tropical sun, in order to make it fit for use. The crude brick thus obtained was largely used in the composition of all the great structures of the country, and though liable to crumble from ex- If further confirmation of the sacred narrative posure to the air, is yet capable of standing for be required, it will be found in connection with ages, when the main body of the brick-work has the cement used by the builders of the Tower. been welded into a tough coherent mass by pres- The slime mentioned in our Authorized Version is sure from above or other causes. generally believed to refer to the bituminous subBut on all occasions when it was considered de- stance which bubbles up from the ground on the

and the corners of walls were formed of kiln-dried bricks; but they were chiefly used for facing the heavy masses of crude brick of which the inner portions of the great edifices were constructed. By this contrivance the vast amount of labour and expense involved in building wholly of kilndried brick was saved, and a sufficient degree of permanence obtained for all practical purposes. Hence, to build a great edifice exclusively of burnt brick, as the builders of the Tower of Babel would seem to have proposed, must have necessitated an expenditure of labour and fuel which forcibly illustrates the gigantic proportions of their plan of operations, and the mingled energy and daring of their enterprise. From the silence of Scripture on the use of crude bricks in the erection of the Tower, it is impossible to conclude with certainty that they were not used in any part of the building. It is, of course, quite a possible thing that they may have been used to some extent; but as the whole gist of the narrative points in the direction of something so extraordinary as to border on the superhuman, the probabilities of the case seem all to lie in favour of the exclusive use of burnt brick.

The

was bedaubed by the dexterous hands of an affectionate mother. In this case, also, there can be no doubt of the real meaning of the word, the old unchanging customs of the East still remaining to testify to the actual use of bituminous substances in the making and repairing of river- boats. Secondly, the early translators for the most part seem to have understood the expression in the same sense; the Septuagint, for example, render

Thirdly, the oldest remains hitherto discovered prove the substance in question to have been used from the earliest times as a cement in brick-laying. Not only so, but in every instance in which burnt brick is made use of for building purposes, it has been found that such bricks are laid in bitumen, whilst for cementing layers of crude, or sun-dried brick, a tenacious kind of mud has been regarded as sufficient. Lastly, it is not a little remarkable that the language even of modern travellers, in describing these bituminous springs of Mesopotamia, seems almost imperceptibly to slide into the actual expressions of our English Bible; as in that notable passage where Layard describes the firing of the pits at Nimroud. "Tongues of fire," says that traveller, "and jets of gas, driven from the burning pit, shot through the murky canopy. To break the cindered crust, and to bring fresh slime to the surface, the Arabs threw large stones into the spring. As the fire brightened, a thousand fantastic forms of light played through the smoke. In an hour the bitumen was exhausted for the time, the dense smoke gradually cleared away, and the pale light of the moon gradually shone over the black slime pits."

plains of Babylon. Travellers and scholars of all ages and nations have remarked with surprise the inexhaustible abundance of the springs from which it is obtained. Herodotus was probably the first to call attention to the bituminous springs of the district, and particularly to those of Is, the modern Hit, a town not far from Babylon, on a small stream flowing into the Euphrates from the west. Still fuller accounts have been given of this singular spot by later observers. "Having spenting it asphalt, and the Latin Vulgate bitumen. three days and better," says an old traveller, "from the ruins of old Babylon we came unto a town called Ait (Hit), inhabited only by Arabians, but very ruinous. Near unto which town is a valley of pitch very marvellous to behold, and a thing almost incredible, wherein are many springs throwing out abundantly a black substance like unto tar and pitch, every one of which springs maketh a noise like a smith's forge in puffing and blowing out the matter, which never ceaseth night nor day; and the noise is heard a mile off, swallowing up all mighty things that come upon it. The Moors call it the mouth of hell." principal bitumen pit at Hit is described by Mr. Rich, Political Resident at Baghdad, as "having two sources, and divided by a wall in the centre, on one side of which the bitumen bubbles up, and on the other the oil of naphtha." It is said that when the river is flooded by the melting of the snow, the spring overflows in consequence, and the bitumen is carried in large masses down the stream. In this state the Arabs gather, dry, and use it for fuel. In the liquid form it is commonly used for building purposes, and for smearing the wicker-work boats used on the Euphrates, so as to make them water-tight. That this bitumen is identical with the slime of Scripture, there seems to be no reasonable ground for doubting. For, in the first place, the word used in the original to describe it is the same as that which is employed to designate the slime-pits of the Vale of Siddim (Gen. xiv. 10), that celebrated tract of country presently covered by the Dead Sea, whose other name, the Lake of Asphaltites, indicates with sufficient clearness the bituminous character of the springs there referred to. The same term (chêmâr) is made use of to describe the material with which the ark of bulrushes, invented for the preservation of the infant Moses on the Nile,

Here then we have a connected series of facts, every one of which is brimful of meaning. 1. Stone was not used in the construction of the Tower, because no such material could be procured. 2. Brick was used instead, because from the special adaptations of the soil it could be obtained at once easily and expeditiously. 3. Throughout the whole subsequent history of the country brick continued to be made use of as the staple material in building operations, the use of stone being quite exceptional. 4. The district is famous for the abundance of its supply of the bitumen or slime referred to in the Scripture statement. 5. The

remains of the oldest buildings, and particularly | quisite precision to the nicest minutiae of modern those which consist of burnt bricks, are actually cemented with this bitumen. If, finally, we add to this list of coincidences the native custom, already referred to, of building sacred edifices in the form of a tower, we possess a small body of beautifully compacted circumstantial evidence, which it seems very difficult for human ingenuity to explain away. For suppose the document we are accustomed to call inspired is nothing better than a poor old story, which by some freak of chance has survived the wreck of ages, how does it happen to fit in with the most ex

discovery? Are common legends usually remarkable for such exactness of detail? Quite the contrary. Indeed, their distinguishing peculiarity would seem to consist in this, that whatever general foundation in fact they may possess, they are seldom able to stand the test of a searching cross-examination. But the remarkable thing in this case is, that the deeper we dig about the roots of the subject, the fuller and clearer is the harmony which reigns between the Inspired Record and the facts on which its statements are founded.

Apologetics for the People.

BY DR. R. PATERSON, CHICAGO.

II.

DID THE WORLD MAKE ITSELF?

"Understand, ye brutish among the people and ye fools, when will ye be wise? He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? he that formed the eye, shall he not see? he that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct? he that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know?"-Ps. xciv. 8-10.

I. ETERNITY OF MATTER, AND THE DEVELOPMENT THEORY.

AS the Creator of the world common sense? Did he know what he was about in making it? Had he any object in view in forming it? Does he know what is going on in it? Does he care whether it answers any purpose or not? Strange questions, you will say; yet we need to ask a stranger question: Had the world a creator, or did it make itself? There are persons who say it did, and declare that the Bible sets out with a lie when it says that "in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Whereas, say they, "we know that matter is eternal, and the world is wholly composed of matter; therefore, the heavens and the earth are eternal-never had a beginning nor a creator."

But, however fully the Atheist and the Pantheist may know that matter is eternal, we do not know any such thing, and must be allowed to ask, How do you know? As you are not eternal, we cannot take it on your word. The only reason which anybody ever ventured for this amazing assertion is this, that "all philosophers agree that matter is indestructible by its very nature; that it can never cease to exist. You may boil water into steam, but it is all there in the steam; or burn coal into gas, ashes, and tar, but it is all in the gas, ashes, and tar: you may change the outward form as much as you please, but you cannot destroy the substance of anything. Wherefore, as matter is indestructible, it must be eternal.

Profound reasoning! Here is a brick fresh from the kiln, which will last for a thousand years to come; therefore, it has existed for a thousand years past!

The foundation of the argument is as rotten as the superstructure. It is not agreed among all philosophers that matter is, by its own nature, indestructible, for the very satisfactory reason that none of them can tell what matter in its own nature is.* All that they can undertake to say is, that they have observed certain properties of matter, and, among these, that "it is indestructible by any operations to which it can be subjected in the ordinary course of circumstances observed at the surface of the globe." + The very utmost which any man can assert in this matter is a negative, a want of knowledge or a want of power. He can say, "Human power cannot destroy matter;" and, if he pleases, he may reason thence that human power did not create it. But to assert that matter is eternal because man cannot destroy it, is as if a child should try to beat the cylinder of a steam-engine to pieces, and, failing in the attempt, should say, "I am sure this cylinder existed from eternity, because I am unable to destroy it."

But we are not done with the absurdities of the

* It will be seen that the proof of the being of God here presented rests upon the impossibility of self-existent design in

matter.

Reid's Chemistry, Chap. ii., § 37: Chambers's Educational

Course.

eternity of matter. We say to our would-be philoso- | of a creator than before? The atoms must be material,

phers, When you tell us that matter is eternal, how does that account for the formation of this world? What is this matter you speak of? This world consists not of a philosophical abstraction called matter, nor yet of one substance known by that name, but of a great variety of material substances, oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, sulphur, iron, aluminum, and some fifty-one others already discovered. Now, which of these is the eternal matter you speak of? Is it iron, or sulphur, or clay, or oxygen? If it is any one of them, where did the others come from? Did a mass of iron, becoming discontented with its gravity, suddenly metamorphose itself into a cloud of gas or a pail of water? Or are they all eternal? Have we fifty-seven eternal beings? Are they all eternal in their present combinations? or is it only the single elements that are eternal? You see that your hypothesis-that matter is eternal-gives me no light on the formation of this world, which is not a shapeless mass of a philosophical abstraction called matter, but a regular and beautiful building, composed of a great variety of matters. Was it so from eternity? No man who was ever in a quarry or a gravel pit will say so, much less one who has the least smattering of chemistry or geology. Do you assert the eternity of the fifty-seven single substances, either separate, or combined in some other way than we now find them in the rocks and rivers and atmosphere of the earth? Then how came they to get together at all, and particularly how did they put themselves in their present shapes?

Each of them is a piece of matter of which inertia is a primary and inseparable property. "Matter of itself cannot begin to move, or assume a quiescent state after being put in motion." Will you tell us that the fiftyseven primary elements danced about till the air and sea and earth somehow jumbled themselves together into the present shape of this glorious and beautiful world, with all its regularity of day and night, and summer and winter; with all its beautiful flowers and lofty trees; with all its variety of birds, and beasts, and fishes? To bring the matter down to the level of the intellect of the most stupid Pantheist, tell us, in plain English, Did the paving-stones make themselves?

Absurd as it seems to every man of common sense, there are persons claiming to be philosophers who not only assert that they did, but will tell you how they did it. One class of them think they have found it out by supposing everything in the universe reduced to very fine powder, consisting of very small grains, which they call atoms; or, if that is not fine enough, into gas, of which it is supposed the particles are too fine to be perceived; and then by different arrangements of these atoms, according to the laws of attraction and electricity, the various elements of the world were made, and arranged in its present form.

Suppose we grant this uncouth supposition, that the world millions of ages ago existed as a cloud of atoms, does that bring us any nearer the object of getting rid

if a material world is to be made from them; and they must be extended; each one of them must have length, breadth, and thickness. The Pantheist, then, has only multiplied his difficulties a million times, by pounding up the world into atoms, which are only little bits of the paving-stones he intends to make out of them. Each bit of the paving-stone, no matter how small you break it, remains just as incapable of making itself, or moving itself, as was the whole stone composed of all these bits. So we are landed back again at the sublime question, Did the paving-stones make themselves?

Others will tell you that millions of years ago the world existed as a vast cloud of fire-mist, which, after a long time, cooled down into granite, and the granite, by dint of earthquakes, got broken up on the surface, and washed with rain into clay and soil, whence plants sprang up of their own accord, and the plants gradually grew into animals of various kinds, and some of the animals grew into monkeys, and finally the monkeys into men. The fire-mist they stoutly affirm to have existed from eternity. They do not allege that they remember that (and yet, as they themselves are, as they say, composed body and soul of this eternal fire-mist, they ought to remember), but only that there are certain comets which occasionally come within fifty or sixty millions of miles of this earth, which they suppose may be composed of the fire-mist which they suppose this world is made of. A solid basis, truly, on which to build a world! A cloud in the sky fifty millions of miles away may possibly be fire-mist, may possibly cool down and condense into a solid globe; therefore, this fire-mist is eternal, and had no need of a creator: and our world, and all other worlds, may possibly have been like it; therefore, they also never were created by Almighty God. Such is the Atheist's and Pantheist's ground of faith. The thinnest vapour, or the merest supposition, will suffice to build his eternal salvation upon; provided only it contradicts the Bible, and gets rid of God. We cannot avoid asking with as much gravity as we can command, Where did the mist come from? Did the mist make itself? Where did the fire come from? Did it kindle of its own accord? Who put the fire and the mist together? Was it red-hot enough from all eternity to melt granite? Then why is it any cooler now? How could an eternal red-heat cool down? If it existed as a red-hot firemist from eternity, until our Pantheists began to observe it beginning to cool, why should it ever begin to cool at all, and why begin to cool just then? Fill it as full of electricity, magnetism, and odyle, as you please ; do these afford any reason for its very extraordinary collduct? The utmost they do is to show you how such a change took place; but they can neither tell you where the original matter came from, nor why its form was changed. Change is an effect, and every effect requires a cause. There could be no cause outside of the firemist; for they say there was nothing else in the universe. Then the cause must be in the mist itself. Had it a