288 . DISCOURSE ON THE STUDY 



subject to be explored is taken into consideration, 

 can hardly yet be said to be more than commenced. 

 Yet, to make up for this, there is another important 

 difference, that while in the latter science it is im- 

 possible to recall the past or anticipate the future, 

 and observation is in consequence limited to a single 

 fact in a single moment ; in the former, the records 

 of the past are always present ; they may be exa- 

 mined and re-examined as often as we please, and 

 require nothing but diligence and judgment to put us 

 in possession of their whole contents. Only a very 

 small part of the surface of our globe has, however, 

 been accurately examined in detail, and of that small 

 portion we are only able to scratch the mere ex- 

 terior, for so we must consider those excavations 

 which we are apt to regard as searching the bowels 

 of the earth ; since the deepest mines which have 

 been sunk penetrate to a depth hardly surpassing the 

 ten thousandth part of the distance between its sur- 

 face and its centre. Of course inductions founded 

 on such limited examination can only be regarded 

 as provisional, except in those remarkable cases where 

 the same great formations in the same order have been 

 recognised in very distant quarters, and without ex- 

 ception. This, however, cannot long be the case. The 

 spirit with which the subject has been prosecuted for 

 many years in our own country has been rewarded 

 with so rich a harvest of surprising and unexpected 

 discoveries, and has carried the investigation of our 

 island into such detail, as to have excited a corre- 

 sponding spirit among our continental neighbours ; 

 while the same zeal which animates our countrymen 

 on their native shore accompanies them in their so- 



