We have here the first part of the sixth day's work. The sea was, the day before, replenished with its fish, and the air with its fowl; and this day were made the beasts of the earth, the cattle, and the creeping things that pertain to the earth. Here, as before, 1. The Lord gave the word; he said, Let the earth bring forth, not as if the earth had any such prolific virtue as to produce these animals, or as if God resigned his creating power to it; but, "Let these creatures now come into being upon the earth, and out of it, in their respective kinds, conformable to the ideas of them in the divine counsels concerning their creation." 2. He also did the work; he made them all after their kind, not only of divers shapes, but of divers natures, manners, food, and fashions--some to be tame about the house, others to be wild in the fields--some living upon grass and herbs, others upon flesh--some harmless, and others ravenous--some bold, and others timorous--some for man's service, and not his sustenance, as the horse--others for his sustenance, and not his service, as the sheep--others for both, as the ox--and some for neither, as the wild beasts. In all this appears the manifold wisdom of the Creator.
The Creation. (b. c. 4004.)