The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 42
Genesis and Joshua
Genesis and Joshua.
I will now read you a paragraph which, for misapprehension, stupidity, and buffoonery, can only be equalled by the gentleman himself:
"At the time spoken of, it would seem that light and darkness were mixed,—and of course any one would perceive how this could be. Darkness was evidently believed to be an entity. It was said to have spread over Egypt so thick that it could be felt, and some of it was afterwards exhibited at Rome in a bottle."
"The next day 'they' made the sun and moon,—the sun to rule by day, the moon by night,—and set them for signs and for seasons. The man who wrote that must have thought the sun was about three feet in diameter, for, according to the same book, the sun was stopped a whole day to give a general by the name of Joshua time to kill a few more Amalekites, and another time it was turned ten degrees backward to convince Hezekiah that he was not going to die of a boil. How much easier it would have been to cure the boil! It had been calculated by one of the best mathematicians and astronomers that to stop the world would cause as much heat as it would take to burn a lump of solid coal three times as big as the earth. Col. Ingersoll said he supposed he would be damned if he didn't believe it, and he'd be damned if he did believe it."
In respect to accuracy of statement, that excels almost any paragraph in the whole speech. It contains five sentences, and yet there are but three clearly pronounced untruths in it! Now, for such a man, with such a subject, and on such an occasion, the restraints of conscience must have been severe to cause him to adhere so closely and tamely to the facts. The sun is not said to have stood still when Joshua fought with the Amalekites. There is no statement as to when the sun, moon, and stars were made. There is no evidence that any one supposed the sun was about three feet in diameter. No one said the world stood still. But then he had more sentences than positive slips of statement, and that is well for him.
As to the existence of light before the transparency of the fourth day, or how the light of day was continued while Joshua fought against the Amorities, or by what means the shadow was made to recede from Hezekiah, I know nothing. But I accept these revelations on their own basis, and can believe them to be the work of divine power. All miraculous occurrences must ever remain beyond our reach while we are in the flesh.