2. The beginning of activity in matter would manifest itself by the production of light, since light is a resultant of molecular activity. This corresponds to the statement in _verse 3_. As the result of condensation, the nebula becomes luminous, and this process from darkness to light is described as follows: “_there was evening and there was morning, one day_.” Here we have a day without a sun—a feature in the narrative quite consistent with two facts of science: first, that the nebula would naturally be self-luminous, and, secondly, that the earth proper, which reached its present form before the sun, would, when it was thrown off, be itself a self-luminous and molten mass. The day was therefore continuous—day without night.
3. The development of the earth into an independent sphere and its separation from the fluid around it answers to the dividing of “_the waters under the firmament from the waters above_,” in _verse 7_. Here the word “_waters_” is used to designate the “primordial cosmic material” (Guyot, Creation, 35-37), or the molten mass of earth and sun united, from which the earth is thrown off. The term “_waters_” is the best which the Hebrew language affords to express this idea of a fluid mass. _Ps. 148_ seems to have this meaning, where it speaks of the “_waters that are above the heavens_” (_verse 4_)—waters which are distinguished from the “_deeps_” below (_verse 7_), and the “_vapor_” above (_verse 8_).
4. The production of the earth’s physical features by the partial condensation of the vapors which enveloped the igneous sphere, and by the consequent outlining of the continents and oceans, is next described in _verse 9_ as the gathering of the waters into one place and the appearing of the dry land.
5. The expression of the idea of life in the lowest plants, since it was in type and effect the creation of the vegetable kingdom, is next described in _verse 11_ as a bringing into existence of the characteristic forms of that kingdom. This precedes all mention of animal life, since the vegetable kingdom is the natural basis of the animal. If it be said that our earliest fossils are animal, we reply that the earliest vegetable forms, the _algæ_, were easily dissolved, and might as easily disappear; that graphite and bog-iron ore, appearing lower down than any animal remains, are the result of preceding vegetation; that animal forms, whenever and wherever existing, must subsist upon and presuppose the vegetable. The Eozoön is of necessity preceded by the Eophyte. If it be said that fruit-trees could not have been created on the third day, we reply that since the creation of the vegetable kingdom was to be described at one stroke and no mention of it was to be made subsequently, this is the proper place to introduce it and to mention its main characteristic forms. See Bible Commentary, 1:36; LeConte, Elements of Geology, 136, 285.