demonstrated that the fashions which have gradually become antiquated in music have mathematically deserved their failure and that the modes which have increased in favor among earnest, cultivated people have a demonstrable mathematical superiority, which in all probability is the cause of their aesthetic conquests.

And if the species and genera, families, orders, and classes in the organic world have been produced as Charles Darwin says, through the gradual variation of the species, and survival of the fittest, the whole being the present accidental and still slowly shifting result of an accidental balance of forces, then the classifications of organic beings is unworthy the labor bestowed on it by such men as Aristotle, Linnaeus, Cuvier, De Candolle, and Agassiz. If the evolution of the species (granting there has been one) has taken place in the Darwinian method, then the labors of these naturalists become as worthless as the conversation between Polonius and Hamlet on the shifting form of a cloud. Fortunately, for the interests of truth and of man there are instinctive faiths in our intellect, which the sophistry of our reasoning never destroys. Could we, as modern Darwinism bids us do, destroy our faith in the real existence of order, symmetry, plan, in the universe, we should also destroy all interest in studying it; the study of nature would become then a mere amusement like the finding of profiles on mountain crags, or of faces in the crowded petals of a rose. The best students of natural science have believed that the distinctions in nature are real, and sharply defined, even where we fail to discover the line; and that their work was discovery, not invention; they have agreed with the Hebrew Psalmist, rather than with Comte concerning the language of the sky.

And as the mathematician has brought demonstration to the aid of aesthetics in music, so shall he in the future bring demonstration to the aid of the naturalist who reverently believes that in his essay at classification he is partly decyphering and reading a divine plan of infinite simplicity in its

apparent complexity. As Erasmus Darwin was mistaken in supposing that harmony of proportions and tones is dependent on accidental associations of ideas, so Charles is mistaken in supposing that the harmony of organic forms is dependent on accidental associations of circumstances. The beautiful harmonies of music, and of coloring, and the beautiful proportions, not only of temples, but of plants and animals, arise from the fulfilment of simple numerical relations; in that particular modern investigations confirm the prophecies of Pythagoras.

The mathematical student believes that the organic worlds are built upon simple original formulae, which admit of an immense variety of definite changes. He looks for the day when the botanist and geologist, having drunk deeper draughts from the Darwinian spring and become sober again, shall discover and define more sharply distinctions between forms which they are now confusing. He trusts that the mathematician will finally be able to discover simple equa tions which will express by changes in the constants, the varieties of organic forms. The first steps towards such mathematical natural history have already been taken by Peirce in his Lectures on Analytical Morphology.

Dr. Darwin's theory of evolution was closely connected with his scheme of classifying diseases; the most signal defect of that scheme was its failure to recognize any other differences than differences of degree. There was no sharpness of definition anywhere. It is, I confess, patent to every eye that some disorders in the human system have this indefinite character. There seems to be no dividing line between the highest state of health and complete disorganization and prostration; the one runs into the other more gradually than the oaks into the chestnuts. But, on the other hand, there are, certainly, some diseases which are sharply defined. The modern microscope, modern chemical reagents, and the modern spirit of experimental science are producing indisputable results in this field. The revulsion from Darwin's method of classifying diseases will, we think, be followed by revulsion from its method of classifying organic beings.

The first duty of every student, and of students of the natural sciences as well, is to seek for the truth, wherever it may lie. That the student may also be assured that the truth is always more likely to be found by one who seeks it with reverent awe; by one who, rejoicing in that which he has been permitted to unfold, remembers also that, in the words of Emerson, "Nature never became a toy to a wise spirit." The higher one's aim, the higher is likely to be his attainment; and no aim can be higher than the aim reverently to read, gratefully to obey, the teaching of the Infinite Spirit which framed the worlds.

ARTICLE IV.

SUCCOTH AND PENUEL NOT YET IDENTIFIED.

BY PROFESSOR J. A. PAINE, PH.D.

AN identification of Succoth and Penuel published in the Bibliotheca Sacra for October last ought not to pass without review. An obligation, perhaps, rests upon every one specially informed on the subject, to apprise biblical students whether the opinion therein expressed can be relied upon or not. Having thoroughly explored every portion of Eastern Palestine from the Arnon to Damascus two and three years before Dr. Merrill's observations, and now having given four years of study, aided by every work of reference that could be desired, to its geography and places in a biblical point of view, I might be expected to judge intelligently respecting the merits of this proposition. Though extremely reluctant to speak adversely to any proposal he may make, I am compelled to dissent from Dr. Merrill's view for many reasons, among others the following.

General Considerations.

1. The topographical character of the valley forbids it. From the point where the Zărqâ approaches the region of

the Jordan, as far up as the ford of Jărăsh called Meshra' ez-Zublîyeh, its ravine is a profound chasm, comparable only to the abyss-like cañons in the territories and mountains of our far West. On the north a mountain rises directly upward, and scarcely pauses in ascent to its summit at an elevation of fully five thousand feet. On the south a wall of rock and earth lifts up from seven to twelve hundred feet in height, whose summit, by the wear of lateral wadies, takes the form of headlands or precipitous bluffs jutting out toward the stream. The bed is for the most part a wild, rugged cleft, ascending at the rate of two hundred feet per mile, either obstructed by rocks laid bare, or half closed by great blocks rolled down from the hill-sides. Here and there a level or a little opening may happen, but such gaps are extremely few. Aside from these rare places the depths of the gorge would never be visited by man, except for the necessity of drink in summer's drouth or of crossing from one mountain to the other. Far down in this narrow channel the stream of the Zărqâ flows with great swiftness, generally in rapids, often in cascades, always dashing noisily against the stones of its bed or sides, and in unceasing windings.

Now this valley was always practically uninhabitable. The bed of the stream is infested with the spiny zizyphus, thickets of oleander, now and then a dwarfed plane-tree, many reeds, and with them many wild boars, but the moment the limit of water is passed the mountain-sides afford nothing whatever beside thin, wiry broom or rotam bushes. It never could support inhabitants, or their necessary flocks. Men may have dwelt on Tulûl edh-Dhăhăb, chosing it on account of the easily defensible character of the hill-tops, and finding partial subsistence on an opening lower down stream, but they were not many in number. People could not live in the depths of the valley on account of extreme aridity, intense heat, and want of air. Even as high up stream as Meshra' ez-Zublîyeh Captain Warren found the heat excessive. It strikes one with surprise to find that men did not live 'n cities along the fertile banks of the Jordan, or even on its

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open plain, except quite close to the foot-hills on either side; far less, then, could and did men try to live in the barren, torrid, constricted gorge of the lower Zărqâ.

This valley, moreover, was practically impassable. Its sides were too steep for Jacob to cross with his live stock. On the south side the lateral ravines allow difficult ascension to the table-land running back with more or less rise to the summit Jebel 'Ausha', but on the north the mountainside is too abrupt for the passage of any beast of burden.

To the present hour natives, as, for example, those of es-Salt going to Jebel Ajlûn or those of Jebel 'Ajlûn travelling southward, do not attempt to cross with loaded animals this rapid torrent plunging at the bottom of its defile. Everything laden is invariably sent round by the way of the eastern Meshra' ez-Zublîyeh, above the beginning of this yawning gulf. In our expeditions our own muleteers always avoided