52 LIFE OF BENJAMIN SILLIMAN. 



Sussex beds extend, as has been some time known, into the 

 Isle of Wight, but no bones were found in them till the 

 last autumn. The condyle of a thigh-bone in Mr. Man- 

 tell's museum at Lewes I measured* 5 : it was thirty-five 

 inches in circumference ! ! Have you seen Dr. Ure's book 

 on geology ? It was intended as a catch for religious peo- 

 ple to satisfy them that the world was made, as he says, in 

 " six working days " ; but he violates the Mosaic account as 

 much as any preceding writer, for he makes a seventh 

 working-day after the Deluge to create the present race of 

 animals. Dr. Ure is profoundly ignorant of practical geol- 

 ogy, and places the lias next to the chalk. Dr. Ure is said 

 not to be a practical religionist any more than he is a prac- 

 tical geologist. In this country a pretence to religion and 

 principle is more often esteemed than the reality. He is 

 no true friend to religion who would force astronomical 

 and geological observations to coincide with the literal 

 Scripture phraseology addressed to mankind in their infant 



state, and never intended to teach the sciences 



I live rather out of the world, and have little new to com- 

 municate. A few weeks since, Mr. Mantell, the discoverer 

 of the Iguanodon, and Mr. Lyell, foreign secretary to the 

 Geological Society, came to breakfast with me. Mr. Lyell 

 has published a work in two volumes, entitled " Principles 

 of Geology," being an attempt to trace present appear- 

 ances on the globe to causes at present existing and in ac- 

 tivity. There is on this subject much diversity of opinion. 

 Dr. Buckland supports the opinion that the surface of our 

 planet has been cut out and made by causes not at present 

 going on, the action of deluges. I have not yet seen 

 Mr. Lyell's book; but I am convinced that we must resort 

 to both ordinary and extraordinary causes to explain geol- 

 ogical phenomena 



