38 NATURAL HISTORY. 



amongst all the botanists of his own, or perhaps any 

 other time.' 



The second division of Ray's works includes his theo- 

 logical treatises, of which two attained great celebrity 

 namely, ' The Wisdom of God in the Creation,' which went 

 through many editions, and his three ' Physico-theological 

 Discourses concerning the Chaos, Deluge, and Dissolution 

 of the World,' of which three successive editions appeared. 

 The first of these is an elaborate and learned survey 

 of nature in general, and of the structure of the body 

 of man and animals in particular, from the teleological 

 point of view. From that point of view, it is a wonder- 

 ful production for the time in which it was written 

 clear in conception, full in illustration, elevated in 

 sentiment, and dignified in language. The second of 

 the works just referred to is, in the main, a cosmogony 

 and a theory of geological action. 



As was natural at the time he wrote, and with his 

 views, Ray did not wholly eschew hypothetical causes in 

 his endeavour to explain how the earth had reached its 

 present condition. All the geologists of his day relied 

 upon imaginary causes, or invoked hypothetical agencies 

 in their explanations of the formation of the earth. Ray, 

 however, was in this respect more advanced than most 

 of his contemporaries, for he relied upon known physical 

 agencies, whenever it seemed to him possible to account 

 for the presumed course of events by the ordinary and 

 recognised operations of nature. He not only showed 

 a desire to get rid of imaginary causes in his explana- 

 tion of the creation of the world; but he endeavoured 

 to explain the anticipated dissolution of the world by 



