ON THE GExVETiC VIEW OF NATURE. 291 



the teachings of the several natural pliilosophers who 

 initiated the genetic conception of natural phenomena. 

 One <if llie earliest wIki l»roke with the older and intro- 

 duced ihc modern metiiods was James Hutton, wlio to- 

 wards the end of the preceding century led that school in 

 geology which is called after him, and wliicli violently 

 opposed the ideas introduced from the Continent. The 

 controversy culminated in the wrangle of the Neptunists 

 and Vulcanists, those who looked to the agency of water 

 and those who upheld that of lire as the principal cause 

 of geological change. This difference, which at the time 

 impressed the popular mind, is hardly thai ]>y whicli, in 

 ii history of scientific thought/ tliis controversy has 

 become important. Hutton's position is marked rather 

 hy his opposition to catastrophism, and by his doc- 

 trine that geological changes, such as the decay and 

 reproduction of rocks, were going on with the utmost 

 imiformity, being always in progress. This he opposed 

 to the Wernerian view, which believed in the existence 

 of certain " fundamental rocks," which were "triuni])liantly 



' The great merits of James I effect in circles in which everything 

 Hutton, his extensive and original connected with the revolution 



geological .studies, his oi)position to 

 catastrophism, were overlooked 

 through the theoretical discussions 

 and the unfortunate title of his 

 book. Tlie world had grown tired 

 of ' Theories of the Earth ' and the 

 <h"scussi(m of fundamental problems. 

 A spirit of observation had set in ; 

 the Geological Society was formed, 



against Church and State was dis- 

 tasteful. As Huxley has told us, 

 Hutton came before his time. To 

 him belongs the merit of having 

 initiated the line of research and 

 reasoning wliich, through the 

 brilliant labours of Chailes Lyell a 

 generation later, swept away the 

 older geology, and prepared tlie way 



and theories were for the time dis- ; for the genetic study of nature on a 



countenanced. (See vol. i. p. 290, 

 note 1 , of this ' History.' ) The att.jicks 

 a,lso of Kirwan and De Luc, which 

 turned upon the stale argument 

 that Hutt'iii's ideas were opposed to 

 the scriptural records, had tiieir 



large scale. (See the "Historical 

 Sketch" in tlie first volume of 

 Lyell's ' Princi|)les of (^leology,' and 

 Huxley's address on "Geological 

 Reform," ISey.) 



