GEOLOGY AUXILIARY TO THEOLOGY. 441 



blime subject of physical inquiry which can occupy the mind 

 of Man, and by far the most interesting, from the personal 

 concern we have in it, is the history of the formation and 

 structure of the Planet on which we dwell, of the many and 

 wonderful revolutions through which it has passed, of the vast 

 and various changes in organic life that have followed one an- 

 other upon its surface, and of its multifarious adaptations to 

 the support of its present inhabitants, and to the physical and 

 moral condition of the Human race. 



These and kindred branches of inquiry, co-extensive with 

 the very matter of the globe itself, form the proper subject 

 of Geology, duly and curiously pursued, as a legitimate 

 branch of inductive science : the history of the Mineral 

 kingdom is exclusively its own ; and of the other two great 

 departments of Nature, which form the Vegetable and 

 Animal kingdoms, the foundations were laid in ages, whose 

 records are entombed in the interior of the Earth, and art^ 

 recovered only by the labours of the Geologist, who in the 

 petrified organic remains of former conditions of our Planet, 

 deciphers documents of the Wisdom in which the world was 

 created. 



Shall it any longer then be said, that a science, which un- 

 folds such abundant evidence of the Being and Attributes of 

 God, can reasonably be viewed in any other light than as 

 the efficient Auxiliary and Handmaid of Religion ? Some 

 few there still may be, whom timidity or prejudice or want 

 of opportunity allow not to examine its evidence ; who arc 

 alarmed by the novelty, or surprised by the extent and mag- 

 nitude of the views which Geologv forces on their attention, 

 and who would rather have kept closed the volume of wit- 

 ness, which has been sealed up for ages beneath the surface 

 of the earth, than impose on the student in natural Theology 

 the duty of studying its contents ; a duty, in which for lack 

 of experience they may anticipate a hazardous or a laborious 

 task, but which by those engaged in it is found to afford a 

 rational and righteous, and delightful exercise of their highest 



