422 THE CHEMISTRY OF CREATION. 



was to be made salt by the lixiviation of the 

 crust of the earth, can we suppose that so im- 

 portant a result, one so vitally connected with 

 the existence of all the inhabitants of the world 

 of waters, would be permitted to the operation 

 of accident? If, instead of employing lime- 

 stone, it had pleased God to employ baryta in 

 the important office of constructing the great 

 mass of the earth's crust, or if many other 

 elements beside those enumerated had taken a 

 larger share in this work, the ocean, receiving 

 the washings of the earth thus formed, would 

 have been unfit for the residence of a single 

 living creature. The saltness of the ocean is, 

 therefore, a wonderful instance of the fore- 

 thought and wisdom of the world's Creator, 

 linked as it, upon this view of its origin, 

 inseparably is linked with the number and 

 nature of the elements employed in the construc- 

 tion of the chief solid matter of the globe. All 

 nature is as one ; for its various parts have been 

 bound together by an Almighty hand. 



Just as the power of diffusion tends to pre- 

 serve the uniform composition of the air, so the 

 same or a similar force tends to intermix the 

 saline contents of the ocean with the enormous 

 volumes of fresh water continually added to it. 

 Without this, the ocean would in time become 

 divided into an underlying constantly increasing 



