I 



produced ly the Action of the Ocean. 13(9 



ration, to everv natural system, wherein no human calcula- 

 tion can trace out either a beiiuiuing or an end. Chance, 

 nnschievous irregularity, or accidLnial violence of action, 

 have no place in the execution of these undeviat.nij; laws; 

 they are oniv the blind applications of our blind and partial 

 views of things. 



The proloMired preservation of the ephemeral species, w hose 

 buzzmg progLUv commence and tcminale their existence 

 on the <ame dav, is, as far as we can san see and judge, as 

 efFcctually provided for and secured, as that of the solar 

 system. 



And shall we look upon the. stupendous and ma^^sive 

 effects which the exterior and interior survey of our globe 

 everv where displays; and search for their causes amongst 

 tempcjrary and extuict agents ? Sliall so mighty an occur- 

 rence, iu the scheme of terrestrial existence, as the stratified 

 conformation and transition arrangements of the vast mate- 

 rials of our earth, have no permanently established laws for 

 their rciiulation and governance, while the fluttering insect 

 of an hour is provided with its peculiar rules of formation 

 and perpe'ual duration? It was the impressive convic- 

 tion that all geological pbaenomena have resulted from 

 systematic and permanently operanncr laws, which are now 

 in full activity, and the reprobation of all fortuitous hypo- 

 thesis in their investigation, that first induced me to offer 

 my sentinients on a subject which had previously occupied 

 my attention only in common with other branches of natu- 

 ral history: and I will now proceed with the sketch of that 

 outline, which I offer with the utmost diffidence, as a remote 

 approxnnation towards a theory of the geology of our earth. 

 'J'he submersion of our present continents for an indefinite 

 duration, and the foruiation of all their strata by marine 

 action, are no longer questions in modern science ; but it is 

 yet an unascertained, and perhaps the tnost important of all 

 geological queries : — Whettter the present conformation of 

 the interior of our earth has been derived from owe, or from 

 many successive innnersions of the same country ? and un- 

 til a specific and decisive answer can be given to this most 

 interesting interroiatorv, the multifarious pbaenomena of ge- 

 ological discovery will continue to be, as they have hitherto 

 been, the prey and the sport of ingenious sophisi7i and de- 

 lusive hypothesis. 



There are, I conceive, several distinct circumstances, 

 which will authorise a probable decision on this most im- 

 portant question of singular or plural immersion. ls\\ 

 stratified rock, not evidently the produce of marine shells 



i>l 



