Address before the Association of American Geologists. 273 



ence of some hitherto unknown race ! The farther back the 

 new record carries him, the deeper is his interest and enthusiasm. 

 Such developements of lost races and lost ages in the world's 

 history, are continually rewarding the labors of the geologist ; — 

 and in point of antiquity, I had almost said, that the most ancient 

 event in chronology, the six days' work of creation, is the most 

 recent in geology. From that beginning of registered time, we 

 wander back through cycles of duration, which we can measure 

 only by a succession of events, and not by chronological dates, 

 except to be assured that they are inconceivably long ; — and yet, 

 the relics of those early periods are as fresh as if entombed yester- 

 day. The fossil reptile, or fish, or shell, — nay, even their most 

 delicate parts, are as perfect as when alive ; although tens, and 

 perhaps hundreds of thousands of years have rolled away since 

 they died. We see their footmarks following one another in reg- 

 ular succession, as distinct as those of living animals upon the 

 snow and the mud ; and even the pattering of a shower, that fell 

 thousands of ages ago, is as fresh before us, as if every drop had 

 been instantly petrified. In short, there passes before us a series 

 of distinct creations of organic beings, adapted to the varying 

 condition of our planet ; each successive group becoming more 

 and more perfect, until every thing in nature was prepared for the 

 existing races, with man as the crown of all. 



Such developements as these are no longer to be regarded as 

 the dreams of disordered fancy, but as the sober and legitimate 

 deductions of science. And what large and refreshing views do 

 they present of the plans and the benevolence of the Deity ! 

 They open back a vista as far and as wide into the arcana of time, 

 as astronomy discloses into the arcana of space. They show 

 us that the brief space of man's existence on the globe, is but 

 one of the units of a vast series of cycles that have passed already 

 away; — and the time is at hand, when geology, equally with 

 astronomy, will be celebrated for its power of liberalizing the 

 mind and fiUing it with noble conceptions of the universe and its 

 Infinite Author. Surely, in such ennobling thoughts, the geolo- 

 gist finds a rich reward for all his toils. 



I know indeed, that our science has been regarded as coming 

 into collision with that sacred volume, to which, as Christians, 

 we are bound to bow as the invariable standard of religious truth. 

 Geologists, too, have been represented, and I must say without 



Vol. xLi, No. 2.— July-Scpt. 1641. 35 



