278 HISTORY OF THE 



influence of light, of aerial matters, and of moisture. To the 

 primitive and transition rocks succeeded the horizontal flcetz 

 formation. A multitude of bodies was now formed, which 

 light elicited from the organizing water. These bodies de- 

 cayed, and left behind them the original materials of carbon 

 and lime, from which still more perfect forms were to spring, 

 until, at length, Ferns, Grasses, and Palms, were produced, 

 which, during the high level of the waters, enjoyed upon the 

 declivities of the mountains, a high and equal temperature. 

 With these forms, creative nature remained contented, till 

 new revolutions of the surface of the earth gave the waters an 

 opportunity of retreating still further, when new formations 

 arose. 



This hypothesis, which is favoured by the Geognosy, de- 

 rives particular support from the concurring testimony of the 

 most ancient inhabitants of the world, respecting universal in- 

 undations and floods ; as also, more especially, from the Per- 

 sian Cosmology, in which Albordsch, the highest primitive 

 mountain, the hill of light, or navel of the earth, plays a 

 principal part, while it is yet surrounded by water. The pri- 

 mitive light produces, upon this mountain, during an ever 

 equal temperature, all living things; (Kanngiesser Alther- 

 thums wissenschaft, s. 8. u. 18. ; Algemeine Encyclopaedic, 

 th. ii. s. 375.) 



404. 



What revolutions the surface of the earth underwent, be- 

 fore it assumed its present state, we know not. But with the 

 period of the alluvial mountains begins the present vegetation 

 of the earth's surface, and those forms which we now see in 

 unvarying perpetuity, have been so for several thousand 

 years, or since the earth assumed its present state, (142.) 



Whether now, as Linnaeus maintained, one example only 

 of every genus of plant existed at the beginning : whether 

 all these single genera were produced by the hand of Nature 

 upon the highest mountain ridge of the earth, along with the 

 single pair from which the human race has proceeded, and 

 with similar individual pairs of all other animals : whether. 



