The scheme of revelation manifests itself to be of God, not only by the peculiar testimony of prophesy and miracle to which it appeals, but by the resemblance which it bears, in the order and character of its dispensations, to the established constitution of creation and providence;—so intimate and striking as, in fact, to leave no doubt, in every impartial mind, that the author of the one must be the author of both. We have already stated that a progression is manifested in the order and arrangement of the rocky masses which compose the earth’s crust—in the nature and qualities of its mineral contents—and in the various revolutions which are indicated by the fossil organic remains that lie entombed in the strata of the interior. Take the most useful of all the sections of the earth’s crust, namely, what is denominated the carboniferous or coal formation, here we have a regular sequence or series of beds resting one upon another, and all so disposed, from the lowest to the highest, as to be most suitably adapted for reaching and bringing to the surface the inclosed treasure. Nor did nature all at once bring to maturity those prodigious masses of plants and vegetables of which this wonderful deposit is composed. Her flora seems to have been upon a limited scale at first, until the earth, being prepared for its accumulation and preservation, throws from its teeming bosom, with a profusion unknown before or since, the vegetable matter out of which our coal is formed. Consider, again, the dip and dislocation of the strata connected with it, and you have a proof of a new order of causes being brought, subsequently, into operation, before coal could be available for man’s use. Examine, next, the vast accumulations which repose upon the coal—the curious relics which are imbedded in them—the evidences thereby afforded of relative changes in the sea and land—of the elevation of mountains, the denudation and formation of valleys—and you cannot fail to infer, from all this, that the surface of the earth was not always as it now is; that there was a period when man could not have existed on it; and that for him who was the last in the order of all God’s creations, it was gradually and progressively prepared as a suitable habitation.