1 66 The Founders of Geology LECT. 



If Hutton's original sketch was defective in style and 

 arrangement, his larger work was even more unfortunate 

 in these respects. Its prolixity deterred readers from its 

 perusal. Yet it was a vast storehouse of accurate observa- 

 tion and luminous deduction, and it deserves to be care- 

 fully studied by every geologist who wishes to understand 

 the history of his own science. 



Fortunately for Hutton's fame, he numbered among his 

 friends the illustrious mathematician and natural philoso- 

 pher, John Play fair (1748-1819), who had been closely as- 

 sociated with him in his later years, and was intimately con- 

 versant with his geological opinions. Gifted with a clear 

 penetrating mind, a rare faculty of orderly logical arrange- 

 ment, and an English style of altogether remarkable preci- 

 sion and elegance, he was of all men best fitted to let the 

 world know what it owed to Hutton. Accordingly, after 

 his friend's death he determined to prepare a more popular 

 and perspicuous account of Hutton's labours. He gave in 

 this work, first a clear statement of the essential principles 

 of Hutton's system, and then a series of notes or essays 

 upon different parts of the system, combining in these a 

 large amount of original observation and reflection of his 

 own. His volume appeared in the spring of 1802, just 

 five years after Hutton's death, with the title of Illustra- 

 tions of the Huttonian Theory of the Earth. Of this great 

 classic it is impossible to speak too highly. After the 

 lapse of nearly a century it may be read with as much 

 profit and pleasure as when it first appeared. For preci- 



the possession of the Geological Society of London, but the rest seems to 

 have disappeared. It is much to be desired that this precious fragment 

 should be published. 



