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" hitherto decided ; for in this fubjed there is naturally lefs 

 " defe(5t of evidence, although philofophers, led by prejudice or 

 " naifguided by falfe theory, have negle(5led to employ that 

 " light." This paragraph feems to me fomewhat obfcvire ; the 

 cxiftence of thofc data on w^hich fcience is to reafon being only 

 hypothetically laid down in the firft part, but in the conclufion 

 the exiflence of fuch data feems pofitively affirmed, fincc philo- 

 fophers are reproached with negledling to employ the light 

 refulting from them ; this is however but of little confequence. 

 " But to proceed, in purfuing further our general preparatory 

 " ideas, a folid body of laiid could not anfwer the purpofe of 

 " an habitable world, for a foil is necefTary to the growth of 

 " plants, and this confifls of materials colledled from the 

 " deflrudtion of folid land. Therefore the furface of the land 

 " inhabited by man is made by nature to decay, in diffolving 

 " from that hard and compadl ftate in which it is found below 

 " the foil, and this foil is neceffarily wafhed away by the con- 

 " tinual circulation of the water running from the fummits of 

 " the mountains towards the general receptacle of that fluid." 

 Page 214. Here we muft arrefl the courfe of our ingenious 

 philofopher. He aiTerts that the terreftrial part of the globe 

 was originally a folid compadl mafs, fromi the difTolution of 

 which the lefs compadl and loofer earths, as chalk, clay, mag- 

 nefia and moulds have arifen. This preliminary propofition 

 cannot be allowed ; for the earthy and flony part may be of 

 eqxial antiquity, or the terreftrial part may have been originally 

 formed in a highly comminuted ftate, and have afterwards 

 partially coalefced into ftony mafles, and the remainder may 



have 



