PRESIDENTS ADDRESS—SECTION C. 99 
but progress has been made. Formidable obstacles have been 
removed, and much new information has been gained. No doubt 
the outlook is still foggy, but the horizon is clearing, and we may 
hope that when we have fuller knowledge of the movements of 
the crust we shall find a clear explanation of their cause. And 
now, as I bring my address to a close, the thought will come that 
you may say all this is mere speculation which can never be 
verified, and not true science. I readily acknowledge the truth 
of the criticism, but in my defence I will quote a passage from 
Dr. Whewell’s ‘‘ Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences.” He says, 
“Who can attend to the appearances which come under the 
notice of the geologist,—strata regularly bedded, full of the 
remains of animals such as now live in the depth of the ocean, 
raised to the tops of mountains, broken, contorted, mixed with 
rocks such as now flow from the mouths of volcanos,—who can 
see phenomena like these and imagine that he best promotes the 
progress of our knowledge of our earth’s history by noting down 
the facts and abstaining from all inquiry whether these are really 
proofs of past states of the earth and of subterraneous forces, or 
merely an accidental imitation of the effects of such causes? In 
this and similar cases, to proscribe the inquiry into causes would 
be to annihilate the science.” 
