341 



the different species of ostrea, gryphcea, trigonia^ and se- 

 veral others. 



But the most decided proofs of these fossils being the 

 remains of a prceadamifAc creation, is their containing the 

 relics of a tribe of enormous marine animals : quadrupeds, 

 possessing the blended structure of fish and lizard ; the 

 ichthyosaurus^ plesiosavrus, &c. no traces of which have been 

 discovered in any of the preceding strata. 



The fossil remains through the succeeding higher forma- 

 tions of oolite, green sand, chalk, and clay, show new genera 

 both of saurian and testaceous animals ; among the former 

 are crocodiles, monitors, &c. ; and among the latter are 

 numerous turbinated and turretted shells. But when we 

 follow, on the surface of the vast mass of upper clay, the 

 traces of diluvial torrents, and the desolation which accom- 

 panied the last grand catastrophe which the planet appears 

 to have sustained, we there find the remains of another 

 creation, the terrestrial quadrupeds ; a new order of animals, 

 differing in almost every respect from those which had pre- 

 ceded them, and of which not a single bone is to be found 

 in any of the preceding formations. 



It appears that the devastating effects accompanying 

 the vast change which this planet then underwent were so 

 extensive, that not only some species of quadrupeds were 

 entirely removed, of some genera, such as the elephant, 

 rhinoceros, and hippopotamus, of which other species still 

 remain ; but that other genera, as mastodo?i, palcBotherium, 

 and anoplotherium, were completely annihilated through all 

 their species. 



These changes in the state of the planet, and this partial 

 destruction of quadrupeds, appear to have been succeeded 

 by the creation of man, and of such quadrupeds and other 

 animals as were fit inhabitants of the earth after its last 

 change. But man did not retain his dominion uninterrupted 

 long. The Scriptures teach us, that a flood of waters was 



