30 HISTORY OF 



" The surface of the earth," says he,* " must 

 have been in the beginning much less solid than 

 it is at present ; and, consequently, the same 

 causes which at this day produce but very slight 

 changes must then, upon so complying a sub- 

 stance, have had very considerable effects. We 

 have no reason to doubt, but that it was then 

 covered with the waters of the sea; and that 

 those waters were above the tops of our highest 

 mountains, since, even in such elevated situations, 

 we find shells, and other marine productions, in 

 very great abundance. It appears, also, that 

 the sea continued for a considerable time upon 

 the face of the earth ; for, as these layers of 

 shells are found so very frequent, at such great 

 depths, and in such prodigious quantities, it 

 seems impossible for these to have supported their 

 1 numbers all alive at one time; so that they must 

 have been brought there by successive deposi- 

 tions. These shells are also found in the bodies 

 of the hardest rocks, where they could not have 

 been deposited all at once, at the time of the 

 deluge, or at any such instant revolution ; since 

 that would be to suppose, that all the rocks in 

 which they are found, were, at that instant, in a 

 state of dissolution, which would be absurd to 

 assert. The sea, therefore, deposited them where- 

 soever they are now to be found, and that by 

 slow and successive degrees. 



" It will appear also, that the sea covered the 

 whole earth, from the appearance of its layers, 



* Theorie de la Terre, vol. i. p. 111. 



