4. The first firmament was composed of tangible gases or waters, so called; the second is the expanse of heaven. The cause of the separated waters is seen in what follows. These fluids that evolved out, leaving the ring separated, are now in a condition that they only have to be gathered together into one place to be a sea. It was then steam. The suggestion is that an immense field of oxygen and hydrogen had united by the spark which separated the ring, and as the union was superheated steam, it evolved out into the voids of space as a globe. It is plain then “And God made a firmament in the midst of the waters,” means he made a globe, from which the visible expanse is seen. The vision now places the prophet upon this globe, the changes of which will occupy his attention to the end. 5. Whether any or all the planets were formed at the same time, we are not told. No allusion is made to them except an incidental one, on the fourth day, so that all things should be traced back to God as their Maker. If the union of two gases took out a segment of the ring, leaving it “separated,” it would only be temporary, as the ring would close up again. Whether our planet was the first, third, or last formed, no mention is made. The vision is designed henceforth to unfold what we need to know of Earth, not found in nature. Our globe in chaos of gases, sweeping around the sun in the form of a ring, is evening, being “without form.” Our globe in steam, having a firmament of its own, is in shape, and this is “morning.” Solomon must have given such an interpretation to the account of the second day. Prov. 8:27. Tracing the unmeasured age of wisdom, “Before the mountains were settled, before the hills, while as yet he had not made the Earth, when he prepared the heavens, I was there; when he set a compass (or circle) upon the face of the depth.” A globe of steam, possibly highly charged with electricity, revolving in an orbit outside the ring of planetary gases, was all that constituted Earth at this time. “And the evening and the morning were the second day.” Section 3. The Work of the Third Day.