The Expositor's Bible: The Book of Isaiah, Volume 1 (of 2)Smith, George Adam
Religion
The Expositor's Bible: The Book of Isaiah, Volume 1 (of 2)
Smith, George Adam
Bible. Isaiah -- Commentaries
Nor is this Bible answer,--of which the book of Genesis gives us the one
end, and this text of Isaiah the other,--a mere pious opinion, which the
true history of man's dealing with wild beasts by extermination proves
to be impracticable. We may take on scientific authority a few facts as
hints from nature, that after all man is to blame for the wildness of
the beasts, and that through his sanctification they may be restored to
sympathy with himself. Charles Darwin says: "It deserves notice, that at
an extremely ancient period, when man first entered any country the
animals living there would have felt no instinctive or inherited fear of
him, and would consequently have been tamed far more easily than at
present." And he gives some very instructive facts in proof of this with
regard to dogs, antelopes, manatees and hawks. "Quadrupeds and birds
which have seldom been disturbed by man dread him no more than do our
English birds the cows or horses grazing in the fields."[38] Darwin's
details are peculiarly pathetic in their revelation of the brutes' utter
trustfulness in man, before they get to know him. Persons, who have had
to do with individual animals of a species that has never been
thoroughly tamed, are aware that the difficulty of training them lies in
convincing them of our sincerity and good-heartedness, and that when
this is got over they will learn almost any trick or habit. The
well-known lines of Burns to the field-mouse gather up the cause of all
this in a fashion very similar to the Bible's.
[38] Darwin, _Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication_, pp.
20, 21.
"I'm truly sorry man's dominion
Has broken nature's social union,
And justifies that ill opinion,
Which makes thee startle
At me, thy poor earth-born companion
And fellow-mortal."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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