VI PREFACE. 



facts, well convinced that true philosophy and religion go hand in 

 hand, and that if "an undevout astronomer is mad,'* so must be 

 an undevout geologist How vast, and how ennobling the ideas 

 of Creative Power and Wisdom, which these sister sciences af- 

 ford. The mind is overwhelmed by the immensity of creation, 

 whether it strives to reach beyond the faintest and fartherest star 

 yet discovered through optic glass, or whether it endeavors to 

 reckon the years elapsed since the first granite rocks upreared 

 their rugged steeps amid the primeval waters. Though we have 

 gazed for whole nights at those dim streaks of nebulous matter in 

 the heavens, at the planets, and revolving stars, when there were 

 companions with us, no longer upon earth ; and though we have 

 split open the sandstone shales, and picked out the fossil shells, and 

 looked for hours at little fragments of fossils through the micro- 

 scope, we do not feel our time as wasted, or wholly spent in vain, 

 if we may be the means of communicating to others a knowledge 

 of these pleasant subjects. However imperfect the execution of 

 our work may be, yet to it we have given long and patient atten- 

 tion. We cannot claim much merit for originality. Among the 

 host of scientific men whose lives have been spent in original in- 

 vestigations, it would be strange could we not find better illustra- 

 tions than our own ; we are still but learners. 



Should the present attempt to produce a popular work upon 

 Astronomy and Geology prove successful, it is anticipated follow- 

 ing it up with a volume upon the planets and stars ; for in the 

 present, only so much of Astronomy is presented as is necessary 

 to understand the motions and general phenomena of our earth 

 The chapters on fossil remains are not as many as might seem 

 desirable; perhaps we may more perfectly and fully review the 

 same subjects hereafter in another volume. 



It is but right to say that the engravings have all been executed 

 in this city by Mr. J. Brainerd; and when we add that they are 

 not from transfers, but from pencil drawings, they will be ac- 

 knowledged as very creditable specimens of the artist's skill. 



Cleveland, August, 1848. 



