CONSTITUTION OF THE GLOBE. 29 



which it is actually undergoing, and appears to have 

 undergone, from the waste of its surface and the pro- 

 trusion of rocks from its interior parts. 



If it were a solid sphere surrounded by an ocean of 

 a limited depth, and that a certain movement of ro- 

 tation became communicated to it, the water on the 

 equatorial regions would rise so as to produce a zone, 

 while the polar surfaces would become dry. Thus the 

 division of sea and land would form two circumpolar 

 continents with an intermediate ocean. If again it be 

 imagined that from any causes of destruction, the ex- 

 posed land were worn down, and its ruins carried 

 forwards into this sea, a series of strata would be 

 formed, inducing a disposition to the statical figure 

 of the solid earth. The ultimate result of this change, 

 is the ellipsoid already mentioned. At the same time, 

 the unequal hardness of the originally exposed land, 

 would be the cause of irregularities in its new form, 

 similar to those existing on the dry surface of this 

 globe. Under similar circumstances, be the actual 

 figure of the globe and its irregularity what they may, 

 there would be the same constant approach to the 

 statical figure ; nor could any rest take place till, by 

 the general balance of forces, this ultimate form had 

 been assumed. The only figure calculated to resist 

 the effect of gradual changes, is that which is pro- 

 duced by the changes themselves. 



The result of this reasoning is, that any spheroid of 

 solid matter, which is partly covered with water, and is 

 subject to those actions of waste above it, accompanied 

 by processes of reconsolidation beneath, which exist 

 in the earth, must ultimately assume the form of an 

 ellipsoid of rotation, as perfectly as if it had been fluid 

 throughout. Time alone is necessary for that per- 

 fect change ; and it is supposed that we have no rra- 



