CH. xxxix. SSI? CHARLES LYELL. 409 



some places at the rate of about two or three feet in a cen- 

 tury ; and in Greenland, where it is sinking, so that huts 

 built near the shore have to be moved inland because they 

 are becoming submerged in the sea. 



These are a very few of the facts which you can under- 

 stand, by which Lyell demonstrated that the surface of our 

 earth is always undergoing changes in our own day, and that 

 by similar changes going on in past times the whole of the 

 crust of our earth may have been built up and carved out. 

 In addition to this he showed how plants and animals are now 

 being buried in mud and earth, and how their remains are 

 washed into caves, or preserved in peat-mosses ; thus afford- 

 ing us examples of the way in which the remains of ancient 

 animals have become entombed in the earth's crust. 



Thus Sir Charles Lyell taught men to read the true his- 

 tory of the earth. It is difficult in the present day to under- 

 stand rightly how great a work he accomplished, for though 

 his ideas were ridiculed in the beginning, yet he lived long 

 enough to see all men agree with him, and his doctrines 

 received as self-evident truths. Like all other great men, 

 he was humble and reverent in his study of nature. His 

 one great desire was to arrive at truth, and by his con- 

 scientious and dispassionate writings he did much to per- 

 suade people to study geology calmly and wisely, instead 

 of mixing it up with angry disputes, like those which, in 

 the time of Galileo, disfigured astronomy. He travelled 

 a great deal, especially in America, and worked out a great 

 many facts in geology. But in future ages his name will 

 stand out among those of other geologists chiefly as having 

 shown that the changes in the crust of our earth have been 

 brought about in the course of long ages by causes like those 

 which are still in action. 



After the year 1830, when his 'Principles of Geology ' 

 19 



