[c 



Jl 



"^bo 



^^{> 



Jiftte 



^ 







o«. 



Uf 



Of 



4^f^^. 



o( 



'""'^^ if k 



'^ of inor- 



t 



its, tnere is 

 ^ free, i 



ma 



nSi I'f suel 



•^f lime i 



m 



ines. or^to 

 ,:\tosliOTr 



F 



^ for a mo- 



itb tlie sea, 



,,inl reefs. 



tie 



cities 

 ;tlie 



L 



rreater P 



art 



of soliiti^" 



• do^ 



from 

 vast 



oftiif 





a#J 



fl-:l 



:iter? 



Is of 



tlif 





J 



4 



1 



Ch. XLIX.l 



LIME WHENCE DERIVED. 



GU 



m 



c 



1 



the bed of the ocean^ or from rivers fed by calcareous 

 springs^ or impregnated with lime derived from disintegrate 

 rocks, both volcanic and hypogene. If this be admitted^ the 

 greater proportion of limestone in the more modern forma- 

 tions as compared to the most ancient, will be explained, for 

 springs in general hold no argillaceous, and but a small 

 quantity of siliceous matter in solution, but they are con- 

 tinually subtracting calcareous matter from the inferior 

 rocks. The constant transfer, therefore, of carbonate of lime 

 from the lower or older portions of the earth's crust to the 

 surface, must cause at all periods, and throughout an inde- 

 finite succession of geological epochs, a preponderance of 



matter 



formations. 



CONCLUDING REMARKS. 



In the concluding chapters of the First Book, I examined in 

 detail a great variety of arguments which have been adduced 

 to prove the distinctness of the state of the earth's crust at 

 remote and recent epochs. Among other sujoposed proofs of 

 this distinctness, the dearth of calcareous matter, in the 

 ancient rocks above adverted to, might have been considered. 

 But it would have been endless to attem^^t to reply to all 

 the objections urged against those who would represent the 

 course of nature at the earliest periods as resembling in all 

 essential circumstances the state of things now established. 

 We have seen that a strong desire has been manifested to 

 discover in the ancient rocks the signs of an epoch when 

 the planet was uninhabited, and when its surface was in a 

 chaotic condition and uninhabitable. The opposite oj^inion, 

 indeed, that the oldest of the rocks now visible may be the 

 last monuments of an antecedent era in which livinsr beina^s 

 may already have peopled the land and water, has been de- 

 clared to be equivalent to the assumption that there never 

 was a beginning to the j3resent order of things. 



R. n 2 



