It was to give day the
privileges of seniority that Scripture put the end of the first day
before that of the first night, because night follows day: for, before
the creation of light, the world was not in night, but in darkness. It
is the opposite of day which was called night, and it did not receive
its name until after day. Thus were created the evening and the
morning. Scripture means the space of a day and a night, and afterward
no more says day and night, but calls them both under the name of the
more important: a custom which you will find throughout Scripture.
Everywhere the measure of time is counted by days without mention of
nights. "The days of our years," says the Psalmist; "few and evil have
the days of the years of my life been," said Jacob; and elsewhere "all
the days of my life."
"And the evening and the morning were the first day," or, rather, one
day.--(_Revised Vers_). Why does Scripture say "one day," not "the first
day?" Before speaking to us of the second, the third, and the fourth
days, would it not have been more natural to call that one the first
which began the series? If it, therefore, says "one day," it is from a
wish to determine the measure of day and night and to combine the time
that they contain.
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