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preceding the commencement of the geological record as we consider it. 

 This portion of" the earth's history is generally known under the term 

 cosmogony, and under this head we consider the many changes which 

 have transpired previous to the formation of the first solid crust. 

 While of necessity this portion of the earth's history must be treated 

 almost entirely from a theoretical standpoint, it has always been en- 

 dowed with peculiar interest and the theories connected therewith can 

 be traced back for many hundreds and even thousands of years. Any- 

 one who has ever read that great work " Lyell's Principles" must have 

 been astonished and interested in the many curious and diverse views as 

 to the early stages of the earth's history there presented. To enumerate 

 these would form material for many hours talk alone. Thus we learn 

 that the earliest Indian and Egyptian schools of philosophy ascribed 

 the first creation of the world to an omnipotent and infinite Being who 

 had existed from all eternity and by whom the earth and its inhabi- 

 tants bad been repeatedly destroyed and reproduced. The frequent 

 submergence of land beneath the waters of the universal ocean was 

 also held by them, and the act of creation of life was ascribed to that 

 }>erson of the Hindoo Trinity called Bramah, thus : " In the beginning 

 of things the first sole cause created with a thought the waters, and 

 then moved upon their surface in the form of Bramah the creator, 

 by whose agency the dry land was produced and the earth peopled 

 with plants, animals, celestial beings and men." The Egyptian phil- 

 osophy also held the theory of recurrent creations; the retui'ns of the 

 great catastrophes by which the surface of the earth was destroyed 

 were determined by the period of the Annus Magnus or Great Year-, a 

 cycle composed of the revolutions of the sun, moon and planets, and 

 terminating when these returned to the same sign from which they set 

 out at some remote epoch, the duration of which cycle was estimated 

 at from 120,000 to 350,000 years. 



While it would be of great interest to examine the many theories 

 propounded for the creation of the world by such men as Pythagoras. 

 Strabo, Aristotle and other early philosophers, lack of time prevents. 

 The idea of repeated inundations of the globe appears to have been held 

 by most of them, the different relative levels of land and sea, had been, 

 even so early as that time, oljserved. The theories for the repeopling of 



