INTRODUCTION. 31 



on the 1 8th November 2349 B.C., a great comet stood above 

 the Equator, its tail came into contact for some hours with the 

 earth, shook out waterspouts, and simultaneously the subter- 

 ranean waters escaped and inundated the earth's surface. The 

 Flood destroyed plants, animals, and human beings. 



The famous zoologist, John Ray, in his Three Physico- \ 

 theological Discourses (London, 1693), took much the same \ 

 standpoint as Woodward. He accentuated, however, the great * 

 importance of running water as an agent of surface erosion, 

 and explained the wide continental flats and deserts as a result 

 of the occasional escape of subterranean waters and the occur- 

 rence of gigantic floods. 



Johann Jacob Scheuchzer, the Zurich professor, turned his 

 attention to geological, geographical, zoological, and botanical 

 pursuits during his frequent travels, and was an ardent fossil and 

 mineral collector. A few geological sections which he made 

 in the neighbourhood of Lake Lucerne were the first attempts 

 in the literature to reproduce bent strata and other features of 

 mountain structure by means of accurate sectional drawing. 

 But his works afforded as little insight into the mineralogical 

 composition and stratigraphy of the rocks, and the distribution 

 of fossils, as those of his predecessors and contemporaries. 



Italy, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, possessed 

 two geologists, Antonio Vallisnieri and Lazzaro Moro, who 

 sought to counteract the tendency of their time towards the 

 theoretical construction of an earth history. Vallisnieri (1661- 

 1730), who held the post of Professor of Medicine at Padua, 

 was an enthusiastic fossil-collector, and entered strong pro- 

 test against the idea that the Flood was accountable for the 

 annihilation of all pre-existing organisms. His writings point 

 out that marine deposits are widely distributed in Italy at both 

 sides of the Apennines, and are also present in Switzerland, 

 Germany, England, Holland, and other lands, and Vallisnieri 

 therefore argues that those deposits prove incontestably the 

 former presence of the sea over these localities. He favours 

 Strabo's doctrine, and explains how different areas of the 

 earth's surface may have frequently undergone relative changes 

 of level, how portions which are now dry land may formerly 

 have been under sea-water. He further explains the presence 

 of marine fossils in these deposits, on the natural assumption 

 that the inhabitants of the sea as they died fell to the bottom, 

 and were there incorporated in the deposits. Vallisnieri 



