CH. xxxix. SIR CHARLES LYELL. 405 



have been poured out by volcanoes, they could not believe 

 that this had been done gradually and only in parts of the 

 world at a time, as the Nile and the Ganges are now carry- 

 ing down earth to the sea, and Vesuvius, Etna, and Hecla 

 are pouring out lava a few feet thick every year. They still 

 imagined that in past ages there must have been mighty 

 convulsions from time to time, vast floods swallowing up 

 plants and animals several times since the world was made, 

 violent earthquakes and outbursts from volcanoes shaking 

 the whole of Europe, forcing up mountains, and breaking 

 open valleys. It seemed to them that in those times when 

 the face of the earth was carved out into mountains and 

 valleys, table lands and deserts, and when the rocks were 

 broken, tilted up, and bent, things must have been very 

 different from what they are now. And so they made im- 

 aginary pictures of how Nature had worked, instead of 

 reasoning from what they could see happening around 

 them. 



Sir Charles lyell teaches that the Bocks of our Earth 

 have been formed by Natural Causes, such as are still 

 going on, 1830. — The man who first broke through these 

 prejudices was our great geologist. Sir Charles Lyell, who 

 has only just now passed away from among us. Charles 

 Lyell was born in Forfarshire, in 1797, the same year that 

 Hutton died. From his earliest childhood he had a great 

 love of Natural History and Science, but as his father 

 wished him to become a barrister, he went to Oxford to 

 follow the usual course. Here he attended the lectures of 

 Dr. Buckland, the great geologist of that day, and this de- 

 cided him to devote his Ufe to the study of geology. He 

 began first by examining the formations round about his 

 own home in Forfarshire, and he soon became convinced, 



