1 30 The Founders of Geology LECT. 



ence widened and new facts accumulated, the modifications 

 to which I have referred were so serious that they might 

 well make the author of the system pause, and raise in his 

 mind some doubts whether the fundamental conception on 

 which the system was based could possibly be true. 1 It 

 was eventually found, for instance, that some granite 

 overlies instead of underlying the slates of the Primitive 

 series ; that some greenstones, instead of occurring among 

 the Primitive rocks, lie in the Floetz division ; that there 

 are ever so many horizons for porphyry, which was at first 

 believed to be entirely Primitive. These contradictions 

 were surmounted by affixing such adjectives as " oldest " 

 or " newest " to the several appearances of the same rock, 

 or by numbering them according to their various horizons. 

 Thus there were oldest and newest granites, oldest and 

 newer serpentine, and first, second, and third porphyry 

 formations. 



This patching up of the system may have saved it in 

 appearance, but a moment's reflection will show us that 

 it was fatal to Werner's fundamental doctrine of a series 

 of successive chemical precipitates from a universal ocean, 

 which by the deposition of these precipitates was gradu- 

 ally altering its constitution. The modifications rendered 

 necessary by fresh discovery proved that the supposed 

 definite sequence did not exist. In fact, as was well said 

 by a critic at the time, they were mere " subterfuges by 



1 D'Aubuisson, a loyal and favoured pupil of Werner, remarks that 

 ' ' Werner has continued from year to year to modify, and even to recast, 

 some parts of his doctrine, while his disciples, following his teaching, in 

 proportion as their observations have multiplied, have added, and are 

 continually adding new improvements to his system." TraiU de Geog- 

 nosie (1819), preface, p. xvi. 



