THE 



PHILOSOPHICAL MAGAZINE 



AND 



ANNALS OF PHILOSOPHY. 



[NEW SERIES.] 



JANUAR Y 1831 



I. Reply to a Note in the Rev. Mr. Conybeare's Paper entitled 

 "An Examination of those Phenomena of Geology, which 

 seem to bear most directly on theoretical Speculations." By 

 C. LYELL, Esq. F.R.S. For. Sec. G.S. Sfc. 



To the Editors of the Philosophical Magazine and Annals. 



Gentlemen, 



T OBSERVE in the first page of your last Number (De- 

 " cember 1830) the following passage, in a paper by my 

 friend the Rev. W. D. Conybeare : " While on classical sub- 

 jects, I would just' remark how much I am gratified by finding 

 every quotation in Mr. LyelPs able remarks on the attention 

 of the ancients to geology, identical with those previously 

 given in my own Outlines, with the single exception of the 

 passage from Strabo, to which, however, I have given a re- 

 ference although certainly partial and imperfect : as there is 

 not a word of acknowledgement, of course this coincidence is 

 accidental." Surprised at this unexpected charge, I imme- 

 diately compared the second chapter of my " Principles of 

 Geology" with those two pages of the introduction to the 

 " Outlines," (pp. 38, 39,) which comprise the whole of Mr. 

 Conybeare's allusions to the geological doctrines to be met 

 with in the writings of classical antiquity. The authors cited 

 in those pages are Aristotle, Lucretius, Seneca, Plutarch, 

 Pliny, Herodotus, Polybius, Strabo, Pausanias, Xenophon, * 

 Theophrastus, and Ovid. Of these twelve, five only are to 

 be found among the classical authorities adverted to by me ; 

 viz. Aristotle, Seneca, Pliny, Strabo, and Ovid. The passages 

 N.S. Vol.9. No. 49. Jan. 1831. B which 



