(a.) Here vs. 3–5 demand special attention, this first day being the model one.――――I understand “evening” to be the chaotic state of v. 2, when “darkness was on the face of the deep,” and “morning” to be that first “light” which God spake into being. The reason for using these words――“evening and morning”――in this sense I find in the universal sentiment of mankind that light is pleasant and darkness is not. This sentiment is indicated here; “God saw the light that it was good.” The state of chaos was in contrast with this――dismal, dreary, awakening no sense of beauty or order; no emotions of joy. The light of day brings joy, and the freshest and best sensation of it comes with the morning. Hence these words were fitly and beautifully appropriate to the two great creative states――first chaos; secondly, light――which together marked off the first of the six creative days.――――But we can not for a moment think of this chaotic state as being only twelve hours. We can not rationally think of the word “evening” applied to it as having any reference to time, duration. It was an evening only in the sense of being dark, desolate, any thing but joyous like the morning. The word “evening” may be chosen rather than night for the sake of a more perfect antithesis with “morning.” (b.) Throughout at least the first three of these creative epochs there was no sun-rising and setting to mark off the ordinary day. These therefore were not the common human day; but, as Augustine long ago said, these are the days of God――divine days――measuring off his great creative periods. God moved through these six great periods by successive stages of labor and of rest. Beginning with the long evening of chaos; then advancing to a glorious day of light; then, after a cessation analogous to man’s rest by night, he proceeded to the work of the second day――the joyous and beautiful development of the firmament in the heavens. So onward by stages of repose and of activity, these figurative evenings and mornings continued through the six successive epochs of creation.