ABOUT VOLCANOS AND EARTHQUAKES. 3 



lential vapours, and lightnings decompose and destroy 

 them j but both the one and the other often annihilate 

 the works of man, and inflict upon him sudden death. 

 Well, then, I think I shall be able to show that the vol- 

 cano and the earthquake, dreadful as they are, as local 

 and temporary visitations, are in fact unavoidable (I had 

 almost said necessary) incidents in a vast system of 

 action to which we owe the very ground we stand upon, 

 the very land we inhabit, without which neither man, 

 beast, nor bird would have a place for their existence, and 

 the world would be the habitation of nothing but fishes. 

 (3.) Now, to make this clear, I must go a little out 

 of my way and say something about the first principles 

 of geology. Geology does not pretend to go back to 

 the creation of the world, or concern itself about its 

 primitive state, but it does concern itself with the 

 changes it sees going on in it now, and with the evi- 

 dence of a long series of such changes it can produce in 

 the most unmistakable features of the structure of our 

 rocks and soil, and the way in which they lie one on 

 the other. As to what we SEE going on. We see every- 

 where, and along every coast-line, the sea warring 

 against the land, and everywhere overcoming it j wearing 

 and eating it down, and battering it to pieces ; grinding 

 those pieces to powder ; carrying that powder away, and 

 spreading it out over its own bottom, by the continued 

 effect of the tides and currents. Look at our chalk 

 clirTs, which once, no doubt, extended across the Chan- 

 nel to the similar cliffs on the French coast. What 

 do we see 1 Precipices cut down to the sea-beach, 



