10 ASPECT OF SOCIETY WITH RESPECT TO 



gree, perhaps, than any which has taken place among scien- 

 tific men, since the memorable discussions respecting the 

 infinitesimal analysis, (pronounced by the late Professor Play- 

 fair, " the greatest discovery ever made in the mathematical 

 sciences,") between the two original though independent au- 

 thors of that discovery, Newton and Leibnitz, and their respec- 

 tive followers. I allude to the controversy which the publication 

 of Mr. LyelPs " Attempt to explain the former changes of the 

 Earth's Surface, by reference to causes now in operation"* is 

 now calling forth; and which, with much temper and judgement, 

 has been commenced, on the opposite side, by Mr. Conybeare. 

 The former geologist contends, and other acute observers will 

 support him, that all the geological phenomena with which 

 we are acquainted, indicate a uniform and constant operation 

 of the same causes, in the production 'of the present state of 

 the globe, acting, from the earliest period to the present, with 

 the same intensity, and under the same circumstances. The 

 latter will maintain, doubtless with the aid of many associates 

 in the investigation of nature, that there has taken place a 

 great though gradual change in those respects, and that the 

 successive periods in the formation of the world, as we now 

 behold it, have often given rise to such new circumstances, as 

 must, in a very great degree, have modified the forces which 

 were originally in action. To pretend even to institute a 

 comparison between the leaders of the great mathematical 

 controversy of the last centuiy, and the leaders, or those 

 men of science who may probably hereafter become the 

 leaders, of the geological controversy we are about to witness, 

 would on the present occasion be as irrelevant as it would be 

 arrogant and invidious. But I may be permitted to say that 

 no controversy has ever taken place, more pregnant with im- 

 portant consequences to the value of natural knowledge, than 

 that which has just begun. It will ultimately involve the de- 

 termination, of to what extent, and in what manner, the phy- 

 sical sciences are to be considered as means of research, into 

 the Wisdom of God, as manifested in the works of creation : 

 For, it will consist, essentially, in the discussion of this ques- 

 tion, Whether any indications can be discovered in the 

 earth, either by immediate observation, or by induction, of 

 the processes by which the matter composing it assumed the 

 planetary form, or of those, by which, having become a planet, 

 it was prepared for the habitation of man ; or NOT. Full, 

 free, and fair discussion, by those who are profoundly ac- 

 quainted with the phaenomena of nature, can alone educe the 



* More generally known, perhaps, by the more prominent part of its title, 

 " Principles of Geology." 



