Letier to the Countess of Gosford, Be. 359 
aud arrangement of its materials, as sustained by their school ; 
no general positions or propositions are laid down, so as to ad- 
’ mit being controverted. 
*© A numerous mass of assertions of geological facts, is arbi- 
trarily produced, without any reference to the places where they 
are to be found; besides these arrangements and facts, so deci- 
dedly pronounced, are generally false—mere inventions to coun- 
tenance the Neptunian theory, in whose support they are de- 
vised, 
** No other theory sets out so plausibly as the Neptunian; for 
its advocates show, they were once in possession of the greater 
part of the world, by the marine exuviz so generally dispersed : 
but when we enter into detail, and examine the arrangements of 
our strata, and the circumstances attending them, the incom- 
patibiiity of these facts, with Neptunian opinions, becomes jn- 
stantly apparent; hence no doubt, they so involve themselves in 
loose assertions, that they are not to be caught hold of. 
“ As to the diversity of opinions on the formation and arrange- 
ments of the materials of our world, Mr. Cuvier gives us nine 
or ten pages, -ommencing with the 40th, containing a list of 
world-makers, who seem to have thought that Nature had 
whispered her secret in their ear, and that they are able to de- 
tail her proceedings, and develope all her operations; six of 
these are great men; tie opinions of six or seven more, he states 
without their names, and then he tells us, he could add twenty 
to the list. 
‘* Now I venture to say, every one of these philosophers has 
fallen into the same error, and from the same cause; they have 
every one looked inwards, and consulted their own imaginations, 
how things might be done—while not one of them looked out- 
wards, and took a cool view of the face of Nature, to make 
themselves acquainted with what had actually been done. 
*¢ They had in their hands a mighty subject, THE WoRLD, 
which they asswmed to be a vast whole, formed and arranged by 
great and general causes, acting uniformly; and of course in- 
ferred that the corresponding effects must be general and uni- 
form. 
‘It never occurred to these philosophers, to examine if the 
world before them corresponded with these ideas; nor to in- 
quire if the effects were general, as they had assumed the causes 
to be. Wad they examined, they would have found the state of 
things very different—no trace of a general operation—eftects 
local, partial, diminutive, and unconnected. 
** If the world is to be considered as a whole, it wil! be found 
composed of most heterogeneous parts, an infinite number of 
4 little 
