August 4, 1892] 



NATURE 



1^1 



Inaugural Address by Sir Archibald Geikie, LL.D., 

 D.Sc, For.SecR.S., F.R.S.E., F.G.S., Director- 

 General OF THE Geological Survey of the United 

 Kingdom, President. 



In its beneficent progress through these islands the British 

 Association for the Advancement of Science now for the fourth 

 time receives a welcome in this ancient capital. Once again, 

 under the shadow of these antique towers, crowded memories 

 of a romantic past fill our thoughts. The stormy annals of 

 Scotland seem to move in procession before our eyes as we walk 

 these streets, whose names and traditions have been made 

 familiar to the civilized world by the genius of literature. At 

 every turn, too, we are reminded, by the monuments which a 

 grateful city has erected, that for many generations the pursuits 

 which we are now assembled to foster have had here their con- 

 genial home. Literature, philosophy, science, have each in 

 turn been guided by the influence of the great masters who have 

 lived here, and whose renown is the brightest gem in the 

 chaplet around the brow of this " Queen of the North." 



Lingering for a moment over these local associations, we 

 shall find a peculiar appropriateness in the time of this renewed 

 visit of the Association to Edinburgh. A hundred years ago a 

 remarkable group of men was discussing here the great problem 

 of the history of the earth. James Hutton, after many years of 

 travel and reflection, had communicated to the Royal Society of 

 this city, in the year 1785, the first outlines of his famous 

 "Theory of the Earth." Among those with whom he took 

 counsel in the elaboration of his doctrines were Black, the 

 illustrious discoverer of " fixed air" and " latent heat " ; Clerk, 

 the sagacious inventor of the system of breaking the enemy's 

 line in naval tactics ; Hall, whose fertile ingenuity devised the 

 first system of experiments in illustration of the structure and 

 origin of rocks ; and Playfair, through whose sympathetic 

 enthusiasm and literary skill Hutton's views came ultimately to 

 be understood and appreciated by the world at large. With 

 these friends, so well able to comprehend and criticize his efforts 

 to pierce the veil that shrouded the history of this globe, he 

 paced the streets amid which we are now gathered together ; 

 with them he sought the crags and ravines around us, wherein 

 Nature has laid open so many impressive records of her past ; 

 with them he sallied forth on those memorable expeditions to 

 distant parts of Scotland, whence he returned laden with trea- 

 sures from a field of observation which, though now so familiar, 

 was then almost untrodden. The centenary of Hutton's 

 "Theory of the Earth" is an event in the annals of science 

 which seems most fittingly celebrated by a meeting of the 

 British Association in Edinburgh. 



In choosing from among the many subjects which might 

 properly engage your attention on the present occasion, I have 

 thought that it would not be inappropriate nor uninteresting 

 to consider the more salient features of that "Theory," 

 and to mark how much in certain departments of inquiry has 

 sprung from the fruitful teaching of its author and his 

 associates. 



It was a fundamental doctrine of Hutton and his school that 

 this globe has not always worn the aspect which it bears at 

 present ; that, on the contrary, proofs may everywhere be culled 

 that the land which we now see has been formed out of the 

 wreck of an older land. Among these proofs the most obvious 

 are supplied by some of the more familiar kinds of rock, which 

 teach us that, though they are now portions of the dry land, 

 they were originally sheets of gravel, sand, and mud, which had 

 been worn from the face of long-vanished continents, and after 

 being spread out over the floor of the sea, were consolidated 

 into compact stone, and were finally broken up and raised once 

 more to form pait of the dry land. This cycle of change in- 

 volved two great systems of natural processes. On the one hand, 

 men were taught that by the action of running water the 

 materials of the solid land are in a state of continual decay and 

 transport to the ocean. On the other hand, the ocean-floor is 

 liable from time to time to be upheaved by some stupendous in- 

 ternal force akin to that which gives rise to the volcano and the 

 earthquake. Hutton further perceived that, not only had the 

 consolidated materials been disrupted and elevated, but that 

 masses of molten rock had been thrust upward among them, and 

 had cooled and crystallized in large bodies of granite and other 

 eruptive rocks which form so prominent a feature on the earth's 

 surface. 



It was a special characteristic of this philosophical system that 



NO. II 88, VOL. 46] 



it sought in the changes now in progress on the earth's surface 

 an explanation of those which occurred in older times. Its 

 founder refused to invent causes or modes of operation, for those 

 with which he was familiar seemed to him adequate to solve 

 the problems with which he attempted to deal. Nowhere was 

 the profoundness of his insight more astonishing than in the 

 clear, definite way in which he proclaimed and reiterated his 

 doctrine, that every part of the surface of the continents, from 

 mountain-top to sea-shore, is continually undergoing decay, and 

 is thus slowly travelling to the sea. He saw that no sooner will 

 the sea-floor be elevated into new land than it must necessarily 

 become a prey to this universal and unceasing degradation. He 

 perceived that, as the transport of disintegrated material is car- 

 ried on chiefly by running water, rivers must slowly dig out for 

 themselves the channels in which they flow, and thus that a 

 system of valleys, radiating from the water-parting of a country, 

 must necessarily result from the descent of the streams from the 

 mountain crests to the sea. He discerned that this ceaseless 

 and widespread decay would eventually lead to the entire demo- 

 lition of the dry land ; but he contended that from time to time 

 this catastrophe is prevented by the operation of the underground 

 forces, whereby new continents are upheaved from the bed of 

 the ocean. And thus in his system a due proportion is main- 

 tained between land and water, and the condition of the earth 

 as a habitable globe is preserved. 



A theory of the earth so simple in outline, so bold in concep- 

 tion, so full of suggestion, and resting on so broad a base of 

 observation and reflection, ought, we might think, to have 

 commanded at once the attention of men of science, even if it 

 did not immediately awaken the interest of the outside world ; 

 but, as Playfair sorrowfully admitted, it attracted notice only 

 very slowly, and several years elapsed before any one showed 

 himself publicly concerned about it, either as an enemy or a 

 friend. Some of its earliest critics assailed it for what they as- 

 serted to be its irreligious tendency — an accusation which Hutton 

 repudiated with much warmth. The sneer levelled by Cowper 

 a few years earlier at all inquiries into the history of the universe 

 was perfectly natural and intelligible from that poet's point of 

 view. There was then a widespread belief that this world came 

 into existence some six thousand years ago, and that any attempt 

 greatly to increase that antiquity was meant as a blow to the 

 authority of Holy Writ. So far, however, from aiming at the 

 overthrow of orthodox beliefs, Hutton evidently regarded his 

 "Theory" as an important contribution in aid of natural reli- 

 gion. He dwelt with unfeigned pleasure on the multitude of 

 proofs which he was able to accumulate of an orderly design in 

 the operations of nature, decay and renovation being so nicely 

 balanced as to maintain the habitable condition of the planet ; 

 but as he refused to admit the predominance of violent action 

 in terrestrial changes, and on the contrary contended for the 

 efficacy of the quiet, continuous processes which we can even 

 now see at work around us, he was constrained to require an 

 unlimited duration of past time for the production of those 

 revolutions of which he perceived such clear and abundant 

 proofs in the crust of the earth. The general public, however, 

 failed to comprehend that the doctrine of the high antiquity of 

 the globe was not inconsistent with the comparatively recent 

 appearance of man — a distinction which seems so obvious now. 



Hutton died in 1797, beloved and regretted by the circle of 

 friends who had learnt to appreciate his estimable character and 

 to admire his genius, but with little recognition from the world 

 at large. Men knew not then that a great master had passed 

 away from their midst, who had laid broad and deep the founda- 

 tions of a new science ; that his name would become a house- 

 hold word in after generations, and that pilgrims would come 

 from distant lands to visit the scenes from which he drew his 

 inspiration. 



Many years might have elapsed before Hutton's teaching met 

 with wide acceptance, had its recognition depended solely on 

 the writings of the philosopher himself. For, despite his firm 

 grasp of general principles and his mastery of the minutest 

 details, he had acquired a literary style which, it must be ad- 

 mitted, was singularly unattractive. Fortunately for his fame, as 

 well as for the cause of science, his devoted friend and disciple, 

 Playfair, at once set himself to draw up an exposition of Hutton's 

 views. After five years of labour on this task there appeared 

 the classic "Illustrations of the Huttonian Theory," a work 

 which for luminous treatment and graceful diction stands still 

 without a rival in English geological literature. Though pro- 

 fessing merely to set forth his friend's doctrines, Playfair's 



