fiction, they are bound to assure themselves that they do so
because the plainest teachings of Nature (apart from all
doubtful speculations) are irreconcilable with the assertions
which they reject.

At the present time, it is difficult to persuade serious
scientific inquirers to occupy themselves, in any way, with the
Noachian Deluge. They look at you with a smile and a shrug, and
say they have more important matters to attend to than mere
antiquarianism. But it was not so in my youth. At that time,
geologists and biologists could hardly follow to the end any
path of inquiry without finding the way blocked by Noah and his
ark, or by the first chapter of Genesis; and it was a serious
matter, in this country at any rate, for a man to be suspected
of doubting the literal truth of the Diluvial or any other
Pentateuchal history. The fiftieth anniversary of the foundation
of the Geological Club (in 1824) was, if I remember rightly, the
last occasion on which the late Sir Charles Lyell spoke to even
so small a public as the members of that body. Our veteran
leader lighted up once more; and, referring to the difficulties
which beset his early efforts to create a rational science of
geology, spoke, with his wonted clearness and vigour, of the
social ostracism which pursued him after the publication of the
"Principles of Geology," in 1830, on account of the obvious
tendency of that noble work to discredit the Pentateuchal
accounts of the Creation and the Deluge. If my younger
contemporaries find this hard to believe, I may refer them to a
grave book, "On the Doctrine of the Deluge," published eight
years later, and dedicated by its author to his father, the then
Archbishop of York. The first chapter refers to the treatment of