By JULIAN. “Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas Quique metus omnes et inexorabile fatum— Subjecit pedibus, strepitumque Acherontis avari.” Virgil . “Know, then, thyself—Presume not God to scan; The proper study of Mankind is Man.” Pope’s Essay on Man . “If it be possible to perfect mankind, the means of doing so will be found in the Medical Sciences.” Descartes . Lewes : GEORGE P. BACON, STEAM PRINTING OFFICES. 1871....

“ The myths of paganism,” says Professor Huxley, [3] “are as dead as Osiris or Zeus, and the man who should revive them, in opposition to the knowledge of our time, would be justly laughed to scorn; but the coeval imaginations current among the rude inhabitants of Palestine, recorded by writers whose very name and age are admitted by every scholar to be unknown, have unfortunately not yet shared their fate; but even at this day are regarded by nine-tenths of the civilised world as the authoritat

It is not our intention to go with any minuteness into the thrice-told tale of the antagonism between the Mosaic cosmogony and the revelations of geology.  That only five days intervened between the creation of heaven and that of man is contradicted by every stratum of the earth. We readily admit that the word “day” is used in Scripture in a very vague sense, and that even the limiting phrase “evening and morning” by no means circumscribes the interval to twenty-four hours.  As the sun did not e

As a supplement to the cosmogony, comes the legend of the Fall.  Of course, the object of this tale is to account for the fancied imperfection of the works of God.  The gist of the matter is this: Adam and Eve were commanded to abstain from a certain tree growing in Eden.  This abstinence was to be the test of their obedience.  The devil tempted Eve to eat of the forbidden fruit, and Eve induced Adam to do the same.  In consequence of this disobedience, God cursed the serpent whose form Satan ha

What we said of the cosmogony we repeat under this head also: it is not our intention to enter upon this subject at any length.  It has been proved to demonstration that no single trace of such a cataclysm can be detected in the rocks or features of the earth; but all these rocks and all these features bear their testimony against such an event. No doubt the stratified rocks speak of the agency of water, but that agency was not the deluge.  No doubt the gravel and the boulders found so extensive

The writer of the Book of Genesis represents Cain as a tiller of the ground.  His son was Enoch, who built a city called Enoch; and during the lifetime of Adam lived Jabal, Jubal, and Tubal-Cain, all sons of Lamech.  The first of these was the “father of such as dwell in tents,” the second the inventor of both “harp and organ,” and the third a forger of “every artifice in brass and iron.” The Flood came and swept away the whole race of man except the arkites; but the grandsons of Noah were Mizra

We shall confine our remarks under this head to three instances—the builders of Babel, the age of Abraham, and the Exodus from Egypt.  Other instances will doubtless recur to the reader, but the scope of argument would be much the same in every example. The builders of Babel are placed about 100 years after the flood.  The general impression left by the Bible account is, that the race of man was pretty numerous.  “The whole earth,” says the writer, “was of one language and one speech.”  This wou

Akin to the above is the extravagant numbers given in Scripture of the fighting men mustered on several occasions by the petty kingdom of Israel before it was divided, and of the still more petty states of Judah and Israel after the revolt of the ten tribes.  The whole undivided kingdom was nominally 60 miles broad, and 140 miles long, less than the county of Yorkshire.  Much of this never came into the power of the Hebrews, and more than three-fourths was desert.  After the division each kingdo

A procession of priests is said to have walked round the fortifications of Jericho, and when they blew with their trumpets “the walls fell down flat.” Shamgar, we are told, slew 600 of the Philistines with an ox-goad.  Doeg, the Edomite (1 Sam., xxii., 18), “with his own hand,” slew in one day 85 persons “who wore a linen ephod,” besides “all the men and women, children and sucklings, asses, oxen, and sheep,” of the town of Nob.  Abishai, David’s brother-in-law (2 Sam., xxiii., 18), slew 300 wit

The first example we would bring forward refers to Saul’s daughter Michal, who is called in the book of Samuel “the wife of Adriel.”  Now, Adriel did not marry Michal (Saul’s youngest daughter), but Merab.  Michal married first David and then Phalti. This will be evident by a reference to 1 Sam. xviii., 19, 27, where it is said: “When Merab, Saul’s daughter, should have been given to David, she was given to Adriel to wife.  And Michal, Saul’s daughter, loved David; and Saul gave him Michal, his

These are so numerous it is universally allowed that no dependence is to be placed upon them; but the instances subjoined are sufficiently striking, and in any book except the Bible would be termed errors. Here the writer says that twenty-nine cities towards the coast of Edom were awarded to the tribe of Judah, and he gives the names; but if any one will count the names set down he will find they amount to thirty-eight. The enumeration occupies twelve verses, two of which contain four names, and

God is represented as saying: “I appeared unto Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, by the name God Almighty [El Shadday], but by my name JEHOVAH was I not known to them.” Now the name Jehovah occurs over and over again in the Book of Genesis, and has given rise to the Jehovistic and Elohistic controversy, made familiar to English readers by Bishop Colenso.  Abraham, we are told, built an altar to Jehovah near Bethel [Gen. xii. 8.], and another in Hebron [Gen. xiii., 18.] but stranger still, when the sacr

In the former part of this division numerous examples have been brought together to prove that the scope of Scripture in one place is not reconcilable with the statement given in another; it now remains to go one step further, and show that one Scripture positively contradicts another.  In the former part the passages alluded to are obviously in error; in this part one text will be contrasted with another contradictory text, but it will not be possible to pronounce which is right, or whether bot

The apology that a certain degree of variance is a proof of independent testimony is quite beside the present question, and so is the argument of Dr. Whately about Napoleon.  No doubt half-a-dozen correspondents describing any event in the late war would dwell on different incidents, and see matters from different stand-points; one would have a bias towards the French and another towards the Prussians, one would be cast in a Tory mould and another would have Radical proclivities, one would see w

No. 1.—“On the Identity of the Vital and Cosmical Principle.”  By R. Lewins , M.D., Staff Surgeon-Major to Her Majesty’s Forces. No. 2.—“The Physical Theory of Animal Life.”  A Review by Julian . No. 3.—“The Nature of Man Identical with that of other Animals.”  By Julian . No. 4.— Biology versus Theology ; or “Christ and the Christian Idea, viewed from a Biological standpoint.”  By Julian . No. 5.— Biology versus Theology ; or “The Mosaic and Christian Ideas wholly without Originality.”  By Juli