GAEL VON LINNE AS A GEOLOGIST NATHORST. 735 



and accessible to the entire scientific world. This fact makes it at 

 once evident that they could not have been without influence on the 

 development of geological science, and, as I have previously pointed 

 out in my work, Jordens Historia, Werner was doubtless influenced 

 by them. This influence seems to have been partly direct and partly 

 conveyed through Torbern Bergman's Physical Description of the 

 Globe, the first edition of which appeared in 17G8 and the second 

 in 1773-1774:. The opinion of Linne, quoted in that work, as to the 

 formation of the rock strata from marine sedimentary deposits, was 

 revised by himself and is identical with the one we have become 

 acquainted v/ith above. But Bergman built still higher on the 

 foundation laid by Linne, and he recognized the fact that below 

 the stratified rocks there were what he called the " primitive " or 

 " primeval," or what we now term the "xVrchaean " rock. He further 

 brought the loose earth strata together as a separate group, " flung 

 together " or " piled up " rocks, and in addition treated the volcanoes 

 as a distinct type. The constructive work of geolog}^ as a science was 

 thus quite essentially improved and enlarged upon, and through the 

 efforts of the German, A. G. Werner, its framework may be said to 

 have reached its first completion, as the latter divided the stratified 

 rocks into two principal groups, i. e., metamorphic rocks and sedi- 

 mentary rocks, each with several subdivisions. 



Werner has generally been considered the founder of the science of 

 geolog}', and his merits as such are in no degree diminished by the 

 circumstance that he constructed his system on the foundation laid 

 by Linne and Bergman, a fact which he himself would surely have 

 been the first to admit. If it be asked v/hether he was aware of the 

 works of the Swedish investigators, the answer would be that he not 

 only knew them, but that he himself had quoted them extensively. 



* * :|: * * - * * 



* * * S. Haughton, the English geologist, who naturally can not 

 be suspected of partiality in either direction, also says that — 



he [Werner] seemed to have obtained his idea of dividing the rock species 

 according to their order of succession through a study of Linne's worlv, but 

 he further elaborated this idea in supposing that each different roclv species had 

 beeu deposited during a (Jefinite period." 



* * * * * * * 



It is quite evident that in order to be able justly to determine the 

 value of a discoverer's contribution to science, the position of that 

 particular science during the period of his activity must, as has here 



" Samuel Haughton, Manual of Geology, second edition, London, 186G, p. 128. 

 In this worli " the celebrated Linne " is cited as the first who knew how to 

 assign a certain age to each group of rock species. (This is perhaps somewhat 

 exaggerated). There is further an account of what Linne says in the Systema 

 NatursB concerning the order of succession and origin of the rock species. 



