48 The Founders of Geology LECT. 



Central France was the region that furnished Guettard 

 with his proofs of extinct volcanoes. It was the same 

 region that afterwards supplied fuel to the controversy over 

 the origin of basalt which raged with fury for so many 

 years. The story of this old battle is full of interest and 

 instruction. We learn from it how the advance of truth 

 may be impeded by personal authority ; how, under guise 

 of the most rigorous induction from fact, the most perverse 

 theories may be supported ; how, under the influence of 

 theoretical preconceptions, the obvious meaning and rela- 

 tions of phenomena may be lost sight of, and how, even 

 in the realm of science, dry questions of interpretation 

 may become the source of cruel misrepresentation and 

 personal animosity. 



To understand the history of this controversy, we must 

 trace the career of another illustrious Frenchman who, 

 with less opportunity for scientific work than Guettard, 

 less ample qualifications in all departments of natural 

 science, and less promptitude in putting the results of his 

 observations into tangible form, has nevertheless gained 

 for himself an honoured place among the founders of 

 modern geology. 



Nicholas Desmarest (1725-1815) was born in humble cir- 

 cumstances at Soulaines, a little town in France between 

 Bar-sur-Aube and Brienne, on 16th September 1725. 1 

 He was thus exactly ten years younger than Guettard. So 

 pinched were the conditions of his youth that he could 

 hardly read even when fifteen years old. From that time, on 

 the death of his father, better prospects dawned upon him. 



1 The biographical details of this sketch are taken from the well-known 

 eloquent lZloge\ of Desmarest by Cuvier, Recueil des filoges Historiques, 

 edit. 1819, vol ii. p. 339. 



