SYSTEMATIC DESCRIPTIVE GEOLOGY. 5(51 



^-; a work of vast labour and profound know- 

 ledge, which has opened wide the doors of this part 

 of geology. I do not here attempt even to mention 

 the labours of the many other eminent contributors 

 to Palaeontology ; as Brocchi, Des Hayes, Sowerby, 

 Goldfuss, Agassiz, who have employed themselves 

 on animals, and Schlottheim, Brongniart, Hutton, 

 Lindley, on plants (z). 



When it had thus been established, that the 

 strata of the earth are characterized by innumerable 

 remains of the organized beings which formerly 

 inhabited it, and that anatomical and physiological 

 considerations must be carefully and skilfully ap- 

 plied in order rightly to interpret these characters, 

 the geologist and the palaeontologist obviously had, 

 brought before them, many very wide and striking 

 questions. Of these we may give some instances ; 

 but, in the first place, we may add a few words con- 

 cerning those eminent philosophers to whom the 

 science owed the basis on which succeeding specu- 

 lations were to be built. 



Sect. 5. Intellectual Characters of the Founders 

 of Systematic Descriptive Geology. 



IT would be in accordance with the course we 

 have pursued in treating of other subjects, that we 

 should attempt to point out, in the founders of the 



32 The first edition appeared in 1812, consisting principally 

 of the Memoirs to which reference has already been made. 

 VOL. III. O 



