Old Ocean as a Builder 



forms of it are known to us, such as amethyst, 

 agate, and jasper. But we have now to do with 

 the humbler relatives of those aristocratic gems ; 

 with the more commonplace kinds of quartz, such 

 as sandstone. 



Sandstone rock is chiefly made of grains of 

 sand, firmly compacted together. An especial 

 interest belongs to the rounded shape of these 

 little grains. Like many voiceless things in the 

 world of inanimate Nature, it tells its own tale, 

 if only we will pause to hear. 



Why should grains of sand be rounded ? Why 

 not square, or pointed, or angular ? 



That is just what they were, not very long 

 ago. Each sand-speck, when first detached from 

 rock or stone, had its angles and corners. But 

 these have been gradually rubbed away ; and by 

 the very same process which, in the course of 

 years, rubs away angularities and eccentricities 

 from the characters of human beings. 



The work has been done through contact with 

 its neighbours not by an occasional rub, but 

 by steady friction, long continued. Each grain of 

 sand, rubbing against and being rubbed by its 

 companion-grains, has been rounded, smoothed, 

 polished, till it has grown into the finished 



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