Price.] 122 pDec. 16, 



when the cold waters from the melting glacier bore ice-rafts which 

 dropped their boulders," pp. 4, 5, 6, 7. 



It seems apparent that the supposed ice-sheets or glaciers have been 

 greatly magnified by the first-named glacialists, both in their thickness 

 and extent, by reason of their taking the earth as a stable land-mark, 

 whereas it is less stable than the ocean. Great rocks have been taken for 

 boulders, though in situ, because they have been abraided by floating ice- 

 sheets and tlie rocks they have borne ; rocks supposed to have been trans- 

 ported and iipheaved hy glaciers, have been Qoated dotcmcards hy ice rafts or 

 icebergs, andafterwards have been lifted by the rising oscillation of the earth: 

 and mountain sides are supposed to have been scored by great glaciers 6000 or 

 more feet thick, yet the scorings may have been made much lower, and 

 afterwards have been carried upwards to such height by the rising moun- 

 tains. It seems not to be sober philosophy to seek abnormal causes when 

 the ordinary laws of nature may afford the suflicing explanation. A 

 sufficient cause is enough. The mountain tops have been higher and 

 colder, and been since lowered by erosions ; their oscillations have been 

 upwards and downwards ; the valleys have been raised by the debris of 

 the mountains, and have risen and fallen with the rocks beneath them ; 

 and how frequent are these alternations, and for what beneficent purpose, 

 may be seen in every seam of coal in the carboniferous regions; for each 

 was grown on a plain in the open air, and had the light and heat of the 

 sun, and then sank below the waters, that these might deposit the particles 

 to make the protecting covering rocks for the unknoAvn centuries that 

 followed, when again all were corrugated and lifted to bring them into 

 human reach for man's uses, in ages when skillful enough to win and 

 apply the coals, the products of the soil, water, air and sun, and 

 the life that God gave to the plants at a remote and momentous era of 

 creation. 



It becomes us not to unreasonably impeach the goodness of the Creator. 

 It seems, from all we know; not likely that He would destine the fairest 

 portion of this earth, where man has best developed his civilization, to 

 destruction by ice. The physical sciences, as well as those of morality 

 and religion, furnish the proof that there is a, limitation of forces that 

 conserve nature, and afford us the foundation of a scientific faith that 

 man's best home on earth is an abiding one for the race. Yet must science 

 observe all facts and heed all reasonable reasons ; and doing so mankind, 

 it is believed, will gain reassurance that they are held in safety by a 

 Creator who forever conserves His works. 



