DANA'S FIRST LECTURE 



Wernerians and Huttonians were arrayed in a contest. 

 The disciples of Werner believed that all rocks had been 

 deposited from aqueous solutions, from a foul chaotic 

 ocean that fermented and settled, and so produced the 

 succession of strata. The disciples of Hutton had no 

 faith in water, and would not take it even half and half 

 with their more potent agency, but were for fire, and fire 

 alone. Thus, as when the earth itself was evolved from 

 chaos, fire and water were in violent conflict ; and out of 

 the conflict emerged the noble science. 



" Professor Silliman when at Edinburgh witnessed the 

 strife, and while, as he says, his earliest predilections 

 were for the more peaceful mode of rock-making, these 

 soon yielded to the accumulating evidence, and both 

 views became combined in his mind in one harmonious 

 whole. The science, thus evolved, grew with him and 

 by him ; for his own labors contributed to its extension. 

 Every year was a year of expansion and onward develop- 

 ment, and the grandeur of the opening views found in 

 him a ready and appreciative response. Like Nature her- 

 self, ever fresh and vigorous in the display of truth, 

 bearing flowers as well as facts, full and glowing in his 

 illustrations, and clear in his views and reasonings, he 

 became a centre of illumination for the continent. The 

 attraction of that light led his successor out of Oneida 

 County, N. Y., to Yale; and I doubt not, if all should 

 now speak that have been guided hither by the same 

 influence, we should have a vast chorus of voices. 



" Geology from the first encountered opposition. Its 

 very essence, indeed the very existence of the science, 

 involved the idea of secondary causes in the progress of 

 the creation of the world whilst Moses had seemingly 

 reduced each step of progress to a fiat, a word of com- 

 mand. The champions of the Bible seemed called upon, 

 therefore, to defend it against scientific innovations; and 

 they labored zealously and honestly, not knowing that 

 science may also be of God. Professor Silliman being an 

 example of Christian character beyond reproach, personal 

 attacks were not often made. But thousands of regrets 

 that his influence was given over to the dissemination of 

 error were privately, and sometimes publicly, expressed. 

 An equal interest was exhibited by the lecturer in the 

 welfare of his opponents and the progress of what he 



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