Another geological argument has often been ad duced as bearing strongly against a general deluge. In Auvergne, and other districts of central France, there occurs a series of volcanos which have not been in action within the historical period. From the association of the remains of long extinct animals among the products of these volcanos, it has been inferred that the era of eruption must be assigned to a time long anterior to the appearance of man. Yet these volcanic cones are in many instances as perfect as when they were first thrown up. The writer of this article has climbed their sides and descended into their craters, and can bear testimony to the fact that they consist of dust and cinders still so loosely aggregated that the traveller sometimes sinks over the ankle in volcanic debris. Such light material has assuredly been exposed to the action of no large body of water, which would have swept it at once away. And hence, since these volcanos belong to a period earlier than that of man, the deluge cannot have extended over central France.
But perhaps the most startling of all the diffi culties in the way of the belief in a universal deluge, are presented to us in the researches of the zoologist. From him we learn that, even taking the cubit by which the ark was measured to have been of the longest, the ark was totally inadequate to contain the animals even of a single continent. It would occupy too much space to enter here into the de tails of this part of the subject. We refer the reader to one of the lectures in Hugh Miller's Testimony of the Rocks,' where the subject is treated with the vigour and picturesqueness so characteristic of that lamented writer. Sir Walter Raleigh thought he had exhausted the capabilities of the ark, when, after calculating the amount of space that would be occupied by the animals known to himself at the time, he concluded that `all these two hundred and eighty beasts might be kept in one storey or room of the ark, in their several cabins, their meat in the second, the birds and their provisions in the third, with space to spare for Noah and his family, and all their necessaries.' Since Raleigh's time, however, the known number of terrestrial animals has been enormously in creased. Of mammalia alone there are now known between 1600 and 17oo species. To these must be added upwards of 6000 birds, 650 reptiles, and 550,00o insects, all of which would require room and a provision of food in the ark. It is needless to remark, that no vessel ever fashioned by man could have accommodated a tithe of these inmates.
But over and above the impossibility of construct ing a vessel large enough to contain all the species of terrestrial animals that inhabit the globe, it would have been equally impossible in the days of Noah, just as it would be utterly impossible in our own day, to collect all these creatures alive into one corner of the earth. No one needs to be informed that the animal tribes are not all represented in any one country, that certain races are confined to high latitudes, that others- roam among the temperate zones, while others are found only between the tropics. Nor is it necessary to do more than allude to the fact that there is a similar grouping on all high land, altitude above the sea being thus repre sentative of recession from the equator, so that the bald head of a lofty mountain may be white with the snows of an eternal winter, its shoulders clad with the spring-like vegetation of the temperate latitudes, while its feet lie rich in the glories of a tropical summer. But besides this arrangement, according to climate and temperature, there is a still further subdivision into provinces, and these again into generic and specific centres. Thus, while each zone of latitude has its peculiar facies of animal and vegetable life, it contains so many distinct and in dependent areas, in which the animals and plants are to a large extent generically or specifically different from those of contiguous areas. The evidence of these localized groups of organisms points in part to old geological changes of sea and land, and possibly to other causes which are still far from being understood. Professor Edward Forbes treated them as centres of creation, that is, distinct areas in which groups of plants and animals had been created, and from which, as a common centre, they had gradually radiated, so as to en croach more or less upon the neighbouring areas. Hence, to collect specimens of all the species of terrestrial creatures inhabiting the earth, it would be necessary not only to visit each parallel of lati tude on both sides of the equator, but to explore the whole extent of each parallel, so as to leave out none of the separate provinces. With all the appli ances of modern civilization, and all the labours of explorers in the cause of science throughout every part of the world,the task of ascertaining the extent of the animal kingdom is probably still far from being accomplished. Not a year passes away with
out witnessing new names added to the lists of the zoologist. Surely no one will pretend that what has not yet been achieved by hundreds of labourers during many centuries could have been performed by one of the patriarchs during a few years. It was of course necessary that the animals should be brought alive. But this, owing to their climatal susceptibilities, was in the case of many species im possible, and even with regard to those which might have survived the journey, the difficulties of their transport must have been altogether insuper able. Noah, moreover, was busy with his great vessel, and continued to be 'a preacher of repent ance' to his fellow-men—occupations which ad mitted of no peregrinations to the ends of the earth in search of inmates for the ark. It is indeed be yond our power to follow up the train of impossi bilities which such a notion implies. We fear, with the learned and amiable Dr. J. Pye Smith, that the idea of a collection of all the terrestrial animals of the globe brought by Noah to the ark cannot be entertained, ' without bringing up the idea of mira cles more stupendous than any that are recorded in Scripture, even what appear appalling in com parison ; the great decisive miracle of Christianity —the resurrection of the Lord Jesus—sinks down before it.' The existence of distinct provinces of plants and animals is a fact full of the deepest interest, and opens out many wide fields of inquiry. Its bear ing on the question of the deluge is of course that phase which more especially requires to be noticed here. In addition to what has just been said, it may be remarked further, that these provinces have a geological as well as a zoological significance. Laying aside as utterly impossible the idea of the representation in the ark of every terrestrial species, we may obtain some confirmatory evidence that the existing races of plants and animals have never been interrupted by a general catastrophe. A careful study of these provinces shews that some are older than others, just as some parts of the earth's surface are geologically older than other parts. In certain cases a province is found to con tain within itself the relic of an older province which once occupied the same spot. In the pro founder depths of the maritime lochs that indent the western coast of Scotland, there exist little groups of shell fish which are not now found alive in the shallower parts. Yet they once lived even in the shallower water, and their remains are now found fossil along the shores of the Firth of Clyde and elsewhere. They have become gradually ex tinct in the upper part of the sea, owing probably to a change of climate, and are now confined to the very deepest zones. These and other facts of the same kind point to slow and gradual changes unbroken by any great cataclysmal event. Among plants, too, similar phenomena abound. It should not be lost sight of, that, had the whole earth been covered for a year by a sheet of water, the greater part of our terrestrial plants must have perished. On the disappearance of the flood there would hence require to be a new creation, or rather re-creation, all over the world—a supposi tion for which there is no evidence either in Scrip ture or nature, and which is opposed to all that we know of the method of the Divine working. Plants are grouped, like animals, in greater and lesser pro vinces ; and these, too, differ greatly from each other in antiquity. Some assemblages of plants have spread over wide districts, and either extirpated those which had previously occupied the ground or driven them into sheltered corners. In Great Bri tain and Ireland, for instance, there are five dis tinct groups of plants which have also correspond ing suites of animals. The successive migrations of these groups can still be traced, leading us to a knowledge of certain vast changes which have taken place among the British islands within a comparatively recent geological period. England was still united to the Continent when the oldest group of plants began to flourish. The northern half of the island, with the whole of Scotland, was submerged beneath the sea, and again elevated before the great mass of the British plants crept westward across the plains that united the islands with the Continent. And it was after the whole of our present groups of plants and animals had be come fixed in their existing habitats that the isthmus was broken through by the waves and Britain became an island. These changes could not have been brought about save during the lapse of a protracted series of ages. They give evidence of no sudden break, no temporary annihilation and subsequent creation, such as the idea of a general flood would require, but, on the contrary, shew very clearly that the present races of plants and animals have gone on in unbroken succession from a time that long preceded the advent of man.