294 liirEEFECTION OF GEOLOGICAL RECOED. Chap. L\. 



we ma}' pcrliaps believe that avc sec, in these large areas, the 

 many formations long anterior to the Silurian epoch in a com- 

 pletely metamorphosed and denuded condition. 



The several difficulties here discussed — namely, that, though 

 •\vc find in our geological formations many links between the 

 species which now exist and which formerly existed, we do not 

 find infiiutely numerous fine transitional forms closely jouiing 

 them all together; the sudden manner in which several whole 

 groups of species first appear in our European formations ; 

 the almost entire absence, as at present known, of formations 

 rich in fossils beneath the Cambrian strata, are all, undoubted- 

 ly, of the most serious nature. A\'e see this in the fact that 

 tlie most eminent paleontologists — namely, CuA-ier, Agassiz, 

 Barrande, Pictet, Falconer, E, Forbes, etc., and all our great- 

 est geologists, as Lyell, IMurchison, Sedgwick, etc., have unan- 

 imously, often vehemently, maintained the immutability of 

 species. But Sir Charles Lyell now gives the support of his 

 high authority to the opposite side; and most other geologists 

 and paleontologists are much shaken in their former belief. 

 Those who believe that the geological record is in any d(>gree 

 perfect, will undoubtedly at once reject the theory. For my 

 part, following out Lyell's metaphor, I look at the geological 

 record as a history of the world imperfectly kept, and written 

 in a changing dialect ; of this history we possess the last vol- 

 ume alone, relating only to two or three countries. Of this 

 volume, only here and there a short chapter has been pre- 

 served; and of each page, only here and there a few lines. 

 Each word of the slowly-changing language, more or less dif- 

 ferent in the successive chapters, may represent the forms of 

 life, which arc entombed in our consecutive formations, and 

 which falsely appear to us to have been abruptl}' introduced. 

 On this vicAV, the difficulties above discussed are greatly dimin- 

 ished, or even disappear. 



