Some millions of years ago the moon
completed its journey in a week instead of taking twenty-eight days as
at present. Looking back earlier still, we find the month has dwindled
down to a day, then down to a few hours, until at that wondrous epoch
when the moon was almost touching the earth, the moon spun around the
earth once every three hours.
In those ancient times I see our earth to be a noble globe, as it is as
present. Yet it is not partly covered with oceans and partly clothed
with verdure. The primeval earth seems rather a fiery and half-molten
mass, where no organic life can dwell. Instead of the atmosphere which
we now have, I see a dense mass of vapors in which perhaps, all the
oceans of the earth are suspended as clouds. I see that the sun still
rises and sets to give the succession of day and of night, but the
day and the night together only amounted to three hours, instead of
twenty-four. Almost touching the chaotic mass of the earth is another
much smaller and equally chaotic body. Around the earth I see this small
body rapidly rotating, the two revolving together, as if they were bound
by invisible bands. The smaller body is the moon.
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