222 HEROES OF SCIENCE. 



two great geological factions, one asserting that all 

 rocks were the product of heat, and the other 

 denying tliis in toto and deciding that water was 

 the originator. Many, and indeed nearly all, geolo- 

 gists taught that nature had acted during the past, 

 by fits and starts, and that great convulsions had 

 occurred, bringing the earth at last to its present 

 condition. The common sense of mankind was 

 opposed to many of these beliefs, and there was 

 moreover a very great indisposition, on the part of 

 many educated men, to credit that the earth was 

 more than six thousand years old. Not a few 

 believed that the hills and dales, mountains and 

 plains, cliffs and valleys, were first formed as they 

 are now. 



A Scottish gentleman, a quiet retiring man, having 

 some means of his own, studied the structure of 

 the rocks and taught himself physical geography. 

 He mastered a great number of undoubted facts, 

 and reasoned upon them, and produced a theory 

 which made geology a science, instead of a jumble 

 of guesses flavoured with the love of the marvellous. 



James Hutton was the son of William Hutton, a 

 merchant living in Edinburgh, and was born in that 

 city on the 3rd of June, 1726. His father, a man 

 highly respected for his good sense and integrity, 

 and who had held the important office of city 

 treasurer, died whilst the boy was young. The 

 mother was a woman of considerable ability, and 

 she determined that her child should have a good 

 education. He went, consequently, to the High 



