ESSAY 



ON THE 



THEORY OF THE EARTH 



PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS. 



IN my work on Fossil Bones, the object which 

 I proposed was to discover to what animals the 

 osseous remains, with which the superficial stra- 

 ta of the glohe are filled, may have belonged. 

 In pursuing this object, I had to follow a path 

 in which but little progress had hitherto been 

 made. As an antiquary of a new order, I was 

 obliged at once to learn the art of restoring these 

 monuments of past revolutions to their original 

 forms, and to discover their nature and relations ; 

 I had to collect and bring together in their ori- 

 ginal order, the fragments of which they consist- 

 ed ; to reconstruct, as it were, the ancient beings 

 to which these fragments belonged ; to reproduce 

 them with all their proportions and characters ; 



A 



