200 LAY SERMONS, ESSAYS, AND REVIEWS. [xi. 



By UNIFORMITARIANISM, I mean especially, the teaching of 

 Hutton and of Lyell. 



That great though incomplete work, &quot; The Theory of the 

 Earth,&quot; seems to me to be one of the most remarkable con 

 tributions to geology which is recorded in the annals of the 

 science. So far as the not-living world is concerned, uniformi- 

 tarianism lies there, not only in germ, but in blossom and fruit. 



If one asks how it is that Hutton was led to entertain views 

 so far in advance of those prevalent in his time, in some 

 respects; while, in others, they seem almost curiously limited, 

 the answer appears to me to be plain. 



Hutton was in advance of the geological speculation of his 

 time, because, in the first place, he had amassed a vast store of 

 knowledge of the facts of geology, gathered by personal observa 

 tion in travels of considerable extent ; and because, in the second 

 place, he was thoroughly trained in the physical and chemical 

 science of his day, and thus possessed, as much as any one in 

 his time could possess it, the knowledge which is requisite for 

 the just interpretation of geological phenomena, and the habit 

 of thought which fits a man for scientific inquiry. 



It is to this thorough scientific training that I ascribe 

 Button s steady and persistent refusal to look to other causes 

 than those now in operation, for the explanation of geological 

 phsenonlena. 



Thus he writes : &quot; I do not pretend, as he [M. de Luc] does 

 in his theory, to describe the beginning of things. I take things 

 such as I find them at present ; and from these I reason with 

 regard to that which must have been.&quot; l 



And again : &quot; A theory of the earth, which has for object 

 truth, can have no retrospect to that which had preceded the 

 present order of the world ; for this order alone is what we have 

 to reason upon ; and to reason without data is nothing but 

 delusion. A theory, therefore, which is limited to the actual 

 constitution of this earth cannot be allowed to proceed one step 

 beyond the present order of things.&quot; 2 



1 The Theory of the Earth, vol. i. p. 173, note. 2 Ibid. p. 281. 



