Werner according to Cuvier. 251 



stationary in a level or in a mountainous district, separating itself 

 in process of time from the neighbouring dialects, and becoming 

 always so much the more distinct, as the natural obstacles to 

 communication became more insurmountable. 



He endeavoured even to trace the laws of the military art by 

 those of geology ; and, if he had been to be believed, all gene- 

 rals should have begun by studying some time at Freyberg. In 

 a word, he connected every thing with the object of his own 

 passion, and as Tournefort, the illustrious botanist, had fancied 

 that stones vegetated, Werner imagined that stones could speak. 

 He imagined that he might interrogate them respecting the whole 

 history of the world. 



Strangers Avho happened to be at Freyberg, and who expected 

 only to converse with a mineralogist, wei-e astonished at his con- 

 tinual discussions respecting tactics, politics, and medicine. They 

 were sometimes tempted to treat these discourses as reveries of 

 a highly excited imagination. Indeed, we may allow that there 

 was something of exaggeration in generalizing so far the relations 

 of one object; but we ought also to recollect how powerfully these 

 ideas, so varied, and so inviting, presented always gracefully, 

 and often with eloquence, must have warmed the imagination of 

 youth. At that age, when we naturally dislike exceptions, and 

 when we pass so easily over diificulties, the disciples of Werner 

 plunged into a career which, as he showed it to them, was so 

 vast and profound. A mineralogy purely mineralogical, would 

 probably have disgusted many of them ; but they gave them- 

 selves up with eagerness to this mineralogy, which seemed to 

 put into their hands the key of nature ; and although as the 

 result of this analysis, there might only remain to them the 

 foundation of the science, would they not still have had reason 

 to bless the pleasant illusions by which they had been conducted 

 to it ? Many individuals, who afterwards became great mine- 

 ralogists, had only wished to hear him, that they might gain a 

 summary idea of the science of minerals ; but, having once 

 listened to him, that science became the profession of their lives. 



It is to this irresistible influence that the scientific world has 

 been indebted for those discoveries and observations which have 

 rendered the names of Humboldt, Buch, and a host of other 

 geologists, renowned throughout Europe. We may say of 



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