164 STUDIES OF NATURE. 



through which, at prefent, flow a multitude of 

 rivers, fuch as the Rhone, the Po, the Danube, &c. 



Befides, it is not fufficicnt to fuppofe, that the 

 Ocean forced a paffage into the bed of the Medi- 

 terranean, as a river fpreads over a champaign 

 country, after having overflowed it's banks ; it: 

 muft farther be fuppofed, that the track of land 

 innundated was lower than the Ocean, a pheno- 

 menon not to be met with in any other part of the 

 terra-firma, all of which is above the level of the 

 Sea, thofe parts excepted which have been wrefted 

 from the Deep by means of human induftry, as is 

 the cafe in Holland. 



It mufl Hill farther be fuppofed, that a lateral 

 finking of the Earth muft have taken place all 

 round the bafon of the Mediterranean, to regulate 

 the circuits, declivities, canals, and windings of 

 fo many rivers, which come from fuch a diftance 

 to empty themfelves into it, and that this linking 

 mufl have been effected with admirable propor- 

 tions : for thefe rivers, iffuing, in many cafes, from 

 one and the fame mountain, arrive, by the fame 

 declivities, to diftances widely different, without 

 their channel's ceafmg to be full, or their water's 

 flowing too fafb or too flow, notwithftanding the 

 difference of their courfes and levels. 



It 



