But, after all, would such an interpretation have ever been thought of, had not the discoveries of geology seemed to demand it? This can be answered by inquiring whether any of the writers on the Bible, who lived before geology existed, or had laid claims for a longer period previous to man's creation, whether any of these adopted such an interpretation. We have abundant evidence that they did. Many of the early fathers of the church were very explicit on this subject. Augustin, Theodoret, and others, supposed that the first verse of Genesis describes the creation of matter distinct from, and prior to, the work of six days. Justin Martyr and Gregory Nazianzen believed in an indefinite period between the creation of matter and the subsequent arrangement of all things. Still more explicit are Basil, Caesarius, and Origen. It would be easy to quote similar opinions from more modern writers, who lived previous to the developments of geology. But I will give a paragraph from Bishop Patrick only, who wrote one hundred and fifty years ago. "How long," says he, "all things continued in mere confusion after the chaos was created, before light was extracted from it, we are not told. It might have been, for any thing that is here revealed, a great while; and all that time the mighty Spirit was making such motions in it, as prepared, disposed, and ripened every part of it for such productions as were to appear successively in such spaces of time as are here afterwards mentioned by Moses, who informs us, that after things were digested and made ready (by long fermentation perhaps) to be wrought into form, God produced every day, for six days together, some creature or other, till all was finished, of which light was the very first."--_Commentary, in loco._ Such evidence as this is very satisfactory. For at the present day one cannot but fear that the discoveries of geology may too much influence him insensibly to put a meaning upon Scripture which would never have been thought of, if not suggested by those discoveries, and which the language cannot bear. But those fathers of the church cannot be supposed under the influence of any such bias; and, therefore, we may suppose the passage in itself to admit of the existence of a long period between the beginning and the first demiurgic day. Against these views philologists have urged several objections not to be despised. One is, that light did not exist till the first day, and the sun and other luminaries not till the fourth day; whereas the animals and plants dug from the rocks could not have existed without light. They could not, therefore, have lived in the supposed long period previous to the six days.