THEORY OF THE EARTH. 7 



great depth, but horizontal strata composed of sub- 

 stances more or less varied, and containing almost 

 all of them innumerable marine productions. Si- 

 milar strata, with the same kind of productions, 

 compose the lesser hills to a considerable height. 

 Sometimes the shells are so numerous as to con- 

 stitute of themselves the entire mass of the rock ; 

 they rise to elevations superior to the level of every 

 part of the ocean, and are found in places where 

 no sea could have carried them at the present day, 

 under any circumstances ; they are not only en- 

 veloped in loose sand, but are often inclosed in 

 the hardest rocks. Every part of the earth, every 

 hemisphere, every continent, every island of any 

 extent, exhibits the same phenomenon. 



The times are past when ignorance could main- 

 tain, that these remains of organized bodies are 

 mere sportings of nature, productions generated 

 in the womb of the Earth, by its own creative 

 powers ; and the efforts made by some metaphy- 

 sicians of the present day, will not probably suc- 

 ceed in bringing these exploded opinions again 

 into repute. A scrupulous comparison of the forms 

 of these remains, of their texture, and often even 

 of their chemical composition, does not disclose the 

 slightest difference between the fossil shells and 

 those which still inhabit the sea: the preserva- 

 tion of the former is not less perfect than that of 

 the latter; most commonly we neither observe 



