482 ON THE SUCCESSIVE FORMS 



To enquire of the revolutions to which the coal series 

 may have been subjected, it is necessary to proceed to 

 the next stage in the changes of the earth's surface, or 

 to that set of strata which immediately follows it. 

 Did none follow, and did it now remain on the surface, 

 in a state of nudity as of repose, we might imagine 

 that the earth had undergone no more revolutions. 

 In some places, it is actually the uppermost, as is the 

 case in Scotland, But, even there, it is not horizon- 

 tal and undisturbed, as it ought on this supposition 

 to be: whence we may safely conclude, that all the 

 coal strata yet known have undergone an analogous 

 if not a simultaneous disturbance, whether now ac- 

 tually followed, or not, by those which, in some places, 

 succeed to them. 



It might be sufficient here to name the magnesian 

 limestone and the red marl as two strata immediately 

 following the coal with us. Where that series is not 

 present, they succeed, of course, the next inferior 

 stratum, as might be expected. Now these are of 

 marine origin; since they contain marine remains, as 

 do the multifarious beds, up to the Chalk, which 

 follow them. Their materials were therefore depo- 

 sited under the ocean, before being indurated and 

 elevated as we now find them. And when their ac- 

 tual superposition to the coal strata is proved, especi- 

 ally in an unconformablc order, the doubts just stated 

 are excluded. 



Putting aside the fantastical theory of augmenta- 

 tions and diminutions in the ocean, under which, were 

 it not in itself perfectly untenable, the coal series must 

 have been horizontal, as the superior ones must have 

 also followed in consecutive order, the land must 

 have subsided to have produced these effects. Else, 

 the red marl and the subsequent marine strata could 

 not have been generated. Here then is a revolution 



