16 GEOLOGY AND HISTORY 



the statements of written or traditional history. There 

 would seem, however, to be now in our possession 

 sufficient facts to link the human period to those 

 which preceded it, and thereby to sweep away a large 

 amount of misconception and misrepresentation in 

 one department at least of the relations of natural 

 science with history. 



I have called the subject with which we are to 

 deal the meeting-place of two sciences. In reality, 

 however, it might be embraced under the name 

 anthropology, the science of man, which covers both 

 his old prehistoric ages as revealed by geology and 

 archaeology, and the more modern world which is 

 still present, or of which we have written records. 

 The main point to be observed is that it is necessary 

 to place distinctly before our minds the fact that 

 we are studying a period in which, on the one hand, 

 we have to observe the precautions necessary in 

 geological investigation, and on the other to examine 

 the evidence of history and tradition. A failure either 

 on the one side or the other may lead to the gravest 

 errors. 



In studying the subjects thus indicated it will be 

 necessary first to notice shortly the history of the 

 earth before the human period, and its condition 

 at the time of man's introduction. We may then 

 inquire as to the earliest known remains of man 

 preserved in the crust of the earth, and trace his 

 progress through the earlier part of the anthropic or 

 human period, in so far as it is revealed to us by the 



