120 THEORY OF THE EARTH. 



still retained their forms very perfectly #. We 

 do not find in ancient fields of battle that the ske- 

 letons of men are more wasted than those of horses, 

 except in so far as they may have been influenced 

 by size ; and we find among fossil remains the 

 bones of animals as small as rats, still perfectly 

 preserved. 



Every circumstance, therefore, leads to the con- 

 clusion, that the human species did not exist in 

 the countries in which the fossil bones have been 

 discovered, at the epoch of the revolutions by 

 which these bones were covered up ; for there 

 cannot be a single reason assigned, why men should 

 have entirely escaped from such general cata- 

 strophes, or why their remains should not be now 

 found like those of other animals. I do not pre- 

 sume, however, to conclude that man did not exist 

 at all before this epoch. He might then have in- 

 habited some narrow regions, whence he might 

 have repeopled the earth after those terrible events. 

 Perhaps also, the places which he inhabited may 

 have been entirely swallowed up in the abyss, 

 and his bones buried at the bottom of the present 

 seas, with the exception of a small number of in- 

 dividuals, which have continued the species. 



* Fourcroy has given an analysis of them in the Annales 

 du Museuni, vol. x. p. 1. 



