36 ORIGIN OF THE 



CHAPTER II. 



IN our first chapter, we left the suns and 

 planets of the universe, in a liquid or molten 

 state, whirling through space around each other, 

 and ajound the great central sun j each being 

 accompanied by an intensely brilliant flame, or 

 light. Here let us leave them, for the present, 

 and confine ourselves to the planet we in- 

 habik 



The earth, then, we will suppose, presented a 

 smooth and glassy metallic surface, with a tem- 

 perature sufficiently high to keep all its compo- 

 nent parts in a liquid state, and surrounded by, 

 though not in contact with, oxygen, hydrogen, 

 nitrogen, and carbonic acid gases. These gases 



