OR FOSblL REMAINS. 101 



At length S(nne geologists, and Bertrand in particular, conceived a 

 more simple idea than the preceding, and held ihat these "figured stones" 

 dated from the first creation, and had been formed together with crystals 

 at the same time that the mountains and all other created bodies were 

 brought into being. 



These diverse theories were not destined to survive. About the be- 

 ginning of the sixteenth century, they were attacked by naturalists, who 

 recognized in these fossils tiie veritable remains of animals wliich had 

 lived in epochs anterior to our own. Timidly at first, but more boldly 

 afterwards, some foresighted men dared to suggest the idea that the '•'fig- 

 ured stones," ages ago, had life, and had been deposited by water in the 

 strata in which they are now found. The idea was violently assailed, 

 and even by men, who had rendered themselves illustrious in anatomical 

 and physiological investigations. Thus Fallope, for instance, held that 

 fossils shells were the result of subterranean fermentation, and that the 

 elephants' tusks found in Italy, were nothing else than earthy concre- 

 tions. But the true tlieory, that they were deposited by water, at length 

 gained the ascendency. 



This point being established, immense difliiculties still presented 

 themselves to find an explanation of the fiow of the water of the sea 

 over the mountains and the present continents. The idea mainlainexl 

 by most of the learned men of the second half of the seventeenth cen- 

 tury was, that fossils were the monuments of tlie Noachic deluge, and 

 had been transported from their original habilats, when the waters were 

 raised over the tops of the highest mountains. 



Unfortunately at this period, the theologians believed that religion 

 was attacked by the geological theories. In the sixteenth century, the 

 men, who held that fossils were really the remains of animals, were re- 

 garded as enemies of the Scriptures, because their views seemed to be 

 opposed to the order of creation as given by Moses. In the seventeenth 

 century, on the other hand, theology was reconciled to this idea, because 

 it saw in this theory a proof of the biblical deluge, but still those men 

 were considered profane rejectors of the Scripture, who hesitated about 

 explaining all these phenomena by a single universal deluge, and who 

 held that these deposits were made at difi^erent epochs, and that the crust of 

 the earth had endured frequent disruptions, which displaced or upheaved 

 the strata formed at the bottom of the seas. These accusations contrib- 

 buted much to arrest the progress of the science, and an entire age was 

 lost in vain hyphtheses and sterile debates. 



Scilla, an Italian painter of natural history, may perhaps be consid- 

 ered as one of the fn'st founders of the dlluoial Ikcorg. Alter him, some 



