CHAPTER II. 



Sketch of the History of the Science Lost Work of Theophrastus on Fossil 

 Shells Strabo Ovid Justin Livy Errors and Superstitions Revival 

 of the Pursuits of Science with those of Letters Boccaccio Leonardo da 

 Vinci Fracastoro Conrad Gessner Agricola Palissy Nicolaus Ste- 

 non Vallisneri Moro Soldani Swedenborg Hooke Woodward 

 Ray Leibnitz Lehman Werner Dr. Toulmin Dr. Hutton Wil- 

 liam Smith The Geological Society The British Association for the 

 Advancement of Science. 



IN offering a brief outline of the progress of this study, we 

 pass over the extravagant representations of ancient Oriental 

 writers ; though it is probable- that some of their opinions, 

 particularly those on the antiquity of our planet, have ori- 

 ginated, not merely in the exuberance of Eastern fancy, but 

 have been suggested by an examination of the physical 

 structure of the earth. 



We find in the works of several of the most distinguished 

 philosophers and poets of antiquity, frequent allusion to the 

 phenomena of geology, and the occurrence of fossil organic 

 remains. These remarks, however, are usually introduced 

 with the view of illustrating other objects, and are seldom 

 discussed as independent questions. In the destruction of 

 ancient letters, the greatest loss which we have sustained, in 

 this department of knowledge, probably consists in that of 

 many of the works of Theophrastus, the writer on natural 

 history, who, we are informed, wrote two books on fossil 

 shells ; a subject which could scarcely have failed to lead him 

 into discussions as to their nature and origin, and the 

 agencies by which they had been deposited and preserved. 

 These writings are supposed to have been known to Pliny, 

 and to have afforded him some information in that part of 

 his history in which he treats of fossil remains. Herodotus* 

 mentions the occurrence of petrified shells in the mountains 



* Book ii. sec. 12. 



