When, therefore, we notice that the fifth and sixth days correspond to two periods, in the first of which reptiles and birds, and in the second mammalia, were the prominent types, the words of the sacred historian seem to have an adequate interpretation in that fact. There is no contradiction between the two records. Moses describes but a very few of the facts which geology has brought to light, but those few facts are in exact accordance with the results of independent observation. The acts of Creation of which Moses speaks correspond to remarkable developments of the orders of animals to which he refers. To have noticed the time of the appearance of the first individual member of each class, as distinguished from the time when that class occupied the foremost place in the ranks of creation, would have been inconsistent with the simplicity and brevity of the narrative, while it would have been unintelligible to those for whom the narrative was intended, since these primeval types had passed out of existence ages before the creation of man. It is, however, noteworthy, that the first appearances of the several orders follow precisely the same arrangement as the times of their greatest development. SECTION 3. SIMULTANEOUS CREATION. This objection may be very briefly disposed of, though it appears to be one which has made a very deep impression on Mr. Darwin. [Footnote: Origin of Species, p 1, &c.] It is entirely an inference drawn from the old interpretation of the six days. While that interpretation was received it followed, as a necessary consequence, that the creation of all kinds of plants on the third day, and of reptiles, birds, and mammalia on the fifth and sixth days respectively, must have been simultaneous. But if that interpretation is proved to be untenable, the inference drawn from it falls to the ground. The language of the narrative seems to point in an opposite direction. There is one instance in the chapter in which the words used seem to point to an instantaneous result. "And God said 'Let light be' and Light was," though in this case the words probably have a further significance, which has been brought out by the discovery of the nature of light. But in these three cases the command is first recorded, with (in two cases) the addition "and it was so," and then the narrative goes on to speak of the fulfilment of the command, as if the command and its fulfilment were distinct things. SECTION 4. DEATH. CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS.