darkness which might be felt, for three whole days[282]:--more than _that_; if I believe, (as I _do_ believe,) the solemn prediction of my LORD, that at the consummation of all things, "The Sun shall be darkened, and the Moon shall not give her light, and the Stars shall fall from Heaven[283]:"--shall it move me to incredulity, if God tells me, that six thousand years ago it was His Divine pleasure that the same phenomenon should prevail for a season? Surely,--(I say to myself,)--surely this is He "which removeth the mountains, and they know not: which shaketh the Earth out of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble. _Which commandeth the Sun, and it riseth not; and sealeth up the Stars[284]!_" 1. But it was now GOD'S pleasure to bring Beauty out of Chaos, and to establish a fresh order of things upon the surface of our Earth. And, as the first step thereto, "the SPIRIT of GOD moved upon the face of the waters." The Hebrew phrase implies no less than the tremulous brooding as of a bird,--causing the dreary waste to heave and swell with coming life. "And GOD said, Let there be Light. And there was Light." "He spake and it was done[285]." From Himself, who is "the true Light," (not from the Sun, which,--like the rest of the orbs of Heaven,--is but a lamp of His kindling);--from Himself, I say, a ray of Light went forth; and _that_ is why He was pleased to praise it. Look through the chapter, and you will find that it is the only one of His creatures of which it is specially said that "GOD saw that it was good[286]." ... Thus, one hemisphere was illumined,--whereby "GOD divided the light from the darkness;" and when the Earth had completed a single revolution, there had been a Day and there had been a Night,--so named by the Word of GOD: "and the evening and the morning were the first Day[287]." ... Do you see any impossibility so far? I, certainly, see none. It does not seem to me absurd that "the Light of the world[288]," "dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto[289]," should cause "the light to shine out of darkness[290]." We shall perhaps come upon the absurdity by and by. Let us hasten forward. 2. "And GOD said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters." The Hebrew word (_an expansion_), and the context, shew plainly enough what is meant. The atmosphere was now created,--whereupon the watery particles either subsided into sea, or rose aloft in the form of clouds. "And the evening and the morning were the second Day,"--which is the only day of which it is not said that GOD saw that it was good.