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XXXV. Letter to the Right Hon. the Countess of GosroRn, on 

 the Speculations of Theorists, purtiadurly oj the Ncptunians. 

 By William Richardson, JD.D.* 



Jn my former letter to your ladyship, I stated the arrangement 

 of our materials in a very considerahle jjortion of Ireland, be- 

 ginning v.-ith its northern extremity, and stretching 130 miles 

 along its eastern side, including a considerable breadth : — my 

 object was to state facts in the reach of yonr ladyship and every 

 one, from which it must appear that in the original arrange- 

 ment of the materials of our world, the speculations of theorists, 

 and more particularly of the Ncptunians, received no support 

 from the pres;ent order of things and the disposition of our strata 

 as we now find them, upon the principles they lay down, and 

 under the suppositions tliesc wise philosophers make. 



Hence thev are reduced to the necessity of assuming various 

 changes to "have taken place, of which we have no record, nor 

 -even tradition; and of introducing agents, for whose existence 

 we have no authority, but the ipse dixit of these gentlemen. 



Thus thev, as well as other theorists, are used to get over all 

 difficulties embarrassing their favourite theories, by calling in the 

 aid of revolutions and convulsions, which, as they say, have de- 

 ranged and disturbed every thing : but an attentive examina- 

 tion of anv of our little systems, upon which I dwelled in my 

 last, will soon show that it, at least, has never been revolu- 

 tionized, and but very slightly disturbed ; a faint, yet steady and 

 uniform change, in the inclination of all the component strata, 

 probahlv at first horizontal, now slightly inclined. 



The local circumstances of each separate stratum, and its 

 junction with those contiguous to it, without any interruption 

 of the coritinuity or solidity of the lieterogeneous materials, show 

 plainly that they have not been acted on by any violent cause, 

 since their consolidation. 



From the local circumstances of our precipitous northern 

 coast, 1 once showed in controversy, that these powerful instru- 

 moiits, revolutions and convulsions, so necessary to theorists, had 

 never been in action in my country: — in reply, by way of com- 

 promise, it was offered to me l)y the Huttonians, that I should 

 model mv own country as I pleased, it' I would not interfere with 

 the rest of the world, but leave it to thcra to arrange. — I de- 

 clined the terms. 



Nor are the |)articular circumstances of our arrangements re- 

 concilcable to the general positions of the Ncptunians, as 1 shall 



* CoiniMiii)icatc(l by tho Aiitlior. 



Vol. 48. No.221. 5.V/J/. ISK). h be 



