Page:Geology and Mineralogy considered with reference to Natural Theology, 1837, volume 1.djvu/23

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No reasonable man can doubt that all the phenomena of the natural world derive their origin from God; and no one who believes the Bible to be the word of God, has cause to fear any discrepancy between this, his word, and the results of any discoveries respecting the nature of his works; but the early and deliberative stages of scientific discovery are always those of perplexity and alarm, and during these stages the human mind is naturally circumspect, and slow to admit new conclusions in any department of knowledge. The prejudiced persecutors of Galileo apprehended danger to religion, from the discoveries of a science, in which a Kepler, and a Newton found demonstrations of the most sublime and glorious attributes of the Creator. A Herschel has pronounced that "Geology, in the magnitude and sublimity