light, at the command of God. All men familiarly apprehend the sadness of the former, and the delight of the latter; and they are, therefore, instantly sensible of the glorious nature of the change which was then so suddenly produced. But the nature of the change which must necessarily have taken place, in suddenly rendering visible a part of a solid globe. the universal surface of which had been overflowed and concealed by a flood of waters, is not so familiarly or so instantly apprehended; the mind, therefore, does not care to dwell upon it, but is contented with receiving the general information that the sea was formed. Hence, both commentators and geologists have equally failed to draw the immediate and necessary inference from the revelation of that great and undeniable geological fact."*

There is, besides, this further reason for our regarding the creation of light with more wonder and admiration than that of the " gathering together of the waters;" that however great and stupendous the latter operation must have been, it comes more easily within the scope of our intelligence than the former. We can imagine to ourselves secondary causes which could produce hollows in the surface of the earth, but the creation of light is far beyond the reach of our finite understandings. Although we can study its effects, and although science has made many brilliant discoveries with regard to these effects, yet we can in no way comprehend its origin. Its nature is beyond our reach its creation, therefore, excites our admiration, in proportion to the difficulty we feel in comprehending it; but we are not, on this account, to form an erroneous estimate of the great operation which we are now to consider; for the formation of a bed for the ocean could be the work of that intelligence alone, which was able, at the first, to create that ocean.

This depression, small as it proves to be, compared with the diameter of the whole earth, was sufficiently deep and extensive to cause vast changes in the structure of a great part of the surface of the globe. In whatever mode the bed of the ocean was sunk, it is quite certain that the shores of the newly gathered waters must have been left in a rough, broken, and precipitoùs state. The descending portion of the solid earth, which was to form the bottom of the new sea, ́must have been subjected to extensive fracture and derange

* Comp. Estim., vol. i. p. 212.

ment, and must instantly have been acted upon by that continual movement, and circulation, which were then decreed, and have ever since been kept up, in the great body of the waters.* The tides, and the currents, these unceasing agents, would then commence their unwearied labours; and the immense debris of primitive rocks, would, by constant movement and friction, be reduced to the various stages in which they are now often found. From that day forth, the vapours exhaled from the waters by the heat of the sun, were to be converted into the various meteoric phenomena with which the firmament is charged. The clouds were to descend upon the now "dry land;" the rills, the brooks, the rivers, were now to begin their never ending courses, each charged with its load of moveable particles, destined to be deposited in the bed of the new sea. The sands, and gravels of the new shores, would then be unmixed with those various secondary, or shelly substances, we now find amongst them in such abundance. Their appearance would then be altogether crystalline and primitive; and the first strata arranged by the ocean on the granitic surface of the sea's bed, would naturally be formed of such substances, and without any vestige of animal bodies which had not then been created; and which, though soon afterwards "brought forth abundantly," could not, for a long time, have left their shelly remains in the abundance we have reason to know they subsequently did.†

* “The transition rocks include a considerable variety of earthy substances; but they are generally composed of the primitive rocks, reduced to a state of disintegration, apparently by a mechanical cause, and afterwards re-united into conglomerate masses, by some kind of cement, of an argillaceous or calcareous nature."-Edin. Encyclop. Physical Geography, p. 488.

+"No fossil remains have ever been found in what are termed the oldest formations. In the transition rocks," (the formation of some of which we are above considering,)" where they first occur, they are but very rare; yet in the newer" (or upper) "transition rocks they increase considerably in quantity. In the fleetz formations they continue increasing in quantity to the newer formations."-Edin. Encyclop. Mineralogy, p. 409.

In considering the fossil remains of shell fish, which are by far the most abundant of all fossils, we must remember that the accumulation of their shelly remains would be progressive. Those of the first generation, for instance, would exist through many generations of living fish; and at the end of a hundred generations, we should find nearly all the shells of these generations, though the numbers of living creatures were not increased from the first year. We can thus

If an opportunity, therefore, were given us for the examination, we should expect to find various strata composed of broken masses of primitive rocks, reposing upon these same rocks in their solid and unbroken condition. The opportunity has been placed within our reach, and we do find such strata as were to be anticipated, and to which, even the chaotic geology has given the name of transition or fragmentary formations; a name evidently suggested by their appearance and composition.

It is not my intention, in this place, to proceed with the consideration of the three last days of the creation, as recorded in the Mosaic history, because they do not present the same grounds for geological inquiry which are to be found in the operations of the first three days, which we have now been considering. We have seen that the creation of the primitive portions of the earth, that is, of rock, of water, and of the aerial atmosphere surrounding both, could have been effected only by the fiat of the Almighty architect of the universe. We have found no reason to cast a shadow of doubt upon the Mosaic record, where it informs us that the various parts of creation were produced in six separate and distinct days, which, from their evenings, and their mornings, must have each comprised one revolution of the globe upon its axis. On the contrary, we have seen, that the very remarkable coincidence of the first visible appearance of the moon, at the very time alone when she could have been first seen from the earth, (viz. on the third evening of her revolution,) affords us the strongest corroborative evidence of the truth of that part of the record. Since we have found reason to conclude, that, at the end of the third day, all those laws by which the earth was afterwards to be governed (excepting those of animated beings which had not yet been created,) had begun to act; that the various influences of the sun, and of the moon, were from this time forth to be in force; it now remains for us to proceed to the consideration of these laws, and of these influential causes; and to endeavour to discover whether they are not sufficient to produce many of the secondary appearances, so general over the whole surface of the earth.

easily and naturally account for the scarcity of fossil shells in the earlier formations, and for their progressive abundance in the subsequent ones.

CHAPTER IV.

Constant Changes in Nature.-Origin of Secondary Formations.-Primitive Soils, for the Nourishment of a Primitive Vegetation.-Constant Circulation in the Fluids of the Earth.-Springs, Brooks, and Rivers.-The Tides.—Their Cause Explained.-The Currents of the Ocean, and their present existing System.-Effects naturally arising from these powerful Causes.

Taken in a general sense, we may, perhaps not unaptly, liken our earth, surrounded with its atmosphere, to the various contents of a vessel hermetically sealed up, and kept in constant agitation. This continued movement would cause a constant change in the relative situation of every part of its contents. But the exact number, or quantity, would for ever remain the same. No extraneous substance could find admittance; no particle from within, could escape. Thus every created atom now contained within our atmosphere must have been so, under some form or other, "in the beginning.'

99

It requires but a slight glance around us to perceive, that by the laws to which all things have been submitted by the Almighty, (to which we generally give the unmeaning name of the laws of nature,) matter is constantly assuming a different form. The stately oak moulders into dust, and becomes food for other plants. The ox changes grass into flesh; his flesh passes at his death into other beings, who, in their turn, undergo the same metamorphosis. All created beings move, without ceasing, from one form to another. Man himself, being laid in the earth, fertilizes the soil: his flesh becomes food for plants, which are eaten by animals, which man, in his turn, devours. His Creator has announced to him this

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great truth, "For dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return.' 99* Even the most solid portions of the mineral world are not exempted from the influence of these laws. The primitive and solid granite, when acted upon by cold, by heat, or by moisture, becomes slowly, but gradually decomposed. Its minute parts become detached, and are removed far from their parent rock, by the action of the running waters. Frequent movement rubs off their angles; they assume a new form; they are known by a new name; they become sand or gravel. In either of these new forms, they are hurried to the great deep, and add their mite to that immense treasury. The same currents in the ocean bring the same materials, until either the one becomes expended, or the other differently directed. A bed, or stratum, is formed, which, under certain circumstances, becomes hardened into stone. It again assumes a new form, and is again known by yet another name; it becomes the free stone, or conglomerate of geologists. Thus we may trace the materials of secondary formations to the decomposition of the primitive creations.

"The primitive rocks of Werner are the following, amounting to fourteen: granite, gneiss, micaceous schistus or mica slate, argillaceous schistus or clay slate, primitive limestone, primitive trap, including hornblend and greenstone, serpentine, porphyry, sienite, topaz rock, quartz rock, primitive flinty slate, white stone, and primitive gypsum.

"Some geologists consider this catalogue as too limited, and include jasper, hornstone, pitchstone, and puddingstone, in the number of primitive rocks. All these rocks, though some of them be occasionally found mingled or alternated in strata with each other, are crystalline deposits, and are absolutely without any trace of organic remains, either of plants

To say with Pythagoras, that the soul of a man can pass into the body of a bird, is to extend to a moral sense, this great truth in natural history. Nothing can be more contrary to reason or revelation than this idea; but, on the other hand, nothing is more certain, than that the alimentary matter of which a body is composed, is transformed into the flesh of the vulture that devours it.

+ Mr. Scoresby, in his account of Spitzbergen, says, "the invariably broken state of the rocks," (upon a high mountain, the ascent of which he was attempting,) "appeared to be the effect of frost. No solid rock was met with, and no earth or soil. On calcareous rocks not impervious to moisture, the effect is such as might be expected; but how frost can operate on quartz, is not so easily understood.— Arctic Regions, vol. i. p. 122.