Progress of Geology. 443 



printed to this departixrent of natural histwy, condensation of 

 facts and opinions is indispensable. All that can be under- 

 taken is an outline of characteristic features. Those of our 

 own country naturally demand our earliest and chief atten- 

 tion ; and it appears expedient, for the present, to reserve for 

 some future article the subject of continental geology, and its 

 relations with this island. In briefly tracing the rapid progress 

 of the science, we shall derive gratification from enumerating 

 many successful investigators and distinguished authorities. 



The necessities of man, doubtless, led him, in the first in- 

 stance, when in search of the useful productions of the mineral 

 kingdom, to take cursory notice of the rocks in which those 

 substances were embedded. As his wants and luxuries mul- 

 tiplied, his knowledge of the earths, of the metals, coals, stones, 

 and marbles, their uses and properties, increased, and his ob- 

 servations necessarily became more minute. Such observations 

 would be essential to save labour, and to acquire those valued 

 productions at the smallest cost, and at the least sacrifice of 

 time. To accomplish these objects, he found it necessary to 

 study obscure indications ; and, however imperfect the evidence 

 and scattered the data, to trace the subjects of his search, to 

 mark their position, and to define the extent of their deposi- 

 tories. Thus far advanced, he began to reason on the nature 

 of those substances, on the phenomena observable in their 

 matrices, on the origin of those singular organic forms incor- 

 porated in the solid rocks, and on the infinite variety manifested 

 in their structure, their situations, and attendant circumstances. 

 Hence originated his first geological speculations, which were 

 not unmixed with a portion of superstition. Surrounded by 

 so many interesting objects, of which all his reasonings could 

 not afford a satisfactory explanation, his imagination readily 

 suggested a solution of those difficulties which his ignorance 

 of natural science left unaccounted for. He observed every 

 where, whether on the earth's surface, or in its profoundest 

 depths, traces of a different state of things at some vastly re- 

 mote period. With that sensation of awe, which the sublimity 

 of such scenes would inspire, he viewed the uplifted peaks, 

 and pinnacled summits of the primitive mountains, piercing 

 through the clouds, covered with perpetual snows, and inac- 

 cessible to human foot. In their neighbourhood he saw other 

 rocks, of somewhat less rugged and imposing contour, whose 

 masses every where bore marks of violent disturbances, and 

 contained within them the substances best adapted for his 

 domestic purposes. Beyond these rocks he observed a nume- 

 rous group of others, of yet more softened outline, with sur- 

 faces more favourable to cultivation ; and in whose structure 



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