THE FIRST CRUST OF THE EAKTH. 325 



forms. Every form, as the temporary result of a multi- 

 plicity of phenomena of motion, is as such perishable, and 

 of limited duration. But, in the continual change of forms, 

 matter and the motion inseparable from it remain eternal 

 and indestructible. 



Now, although Kant's Cosmological Gas Theory is not able 

 to explain the development of motion in the whole universe 

 in a satisfactory manner, beyond that gaseous state of chaos, 

 and although many other weighty considerations may be 

 brought forward against it, especially by chemistry 

 and geology, yet we must on the whole acknowledge its 

 great merit, inasmuch as it explains in an excellent 

 manner, by due consideration of development, the whole 

 structure of all that is accessible to our observation, that is, 

 the anatomy of the solar systems, and especially of our 

 planetary system. It may be that this development was 

 altogether different from what Kant supposes, and our 

 earth may have arisen by the aggregation of numberless 

 small meteorides, scattered in space, or in any other manner, 

 but hitherto no one has as yet been able to establish any 

 other theory of development, or to offer one in the place 

 of Kant's cosmogeny. 



After this general glance at the monistic cosmogeny, or 

 the non-miraculous history of the development of the 

 universe, let us now return to a minute fraction of it, to our 

 mother earth, which we left as a ball flattened at both poles 

 and in a fiery fluid state, its surface having condensed by 

 becoming cooled into a very thin firm crust. The crust, on 

 first cooling, must have covered the whole surface of the 

 terrestrial sphere as a continuous smooth and thin shell. 

 But soon it must have become uneven and hummocky ; for. 



