2 



GEOLOGY COMPARED TO HISTORY. 



[Ch. I. 



condition of nations is the result of many antecedent changes, 

 some extremely remote, and others recent, some gradual, 

 others sudden and violent ; so the state of the natural world 

 is the result of a long succession of events ; and if we would 

 enlarge our experience of the present economy of nature, 

 we must investigate the effects of her operations in former 



epochs. 



We often discover with surprise, on looking back into the 



chronicles of nations, how the fortune of some battle has in- 

 fluenced the fate of millions of our contemporaries, when it 

 has lono- been forgotten by the mass of the population. With 

 this remote event we may find inseparably connected the 

 geographical boundaries of a great state, the language now 

 spoken by the inhabitants, their peculiar manners, laws, and 

 religious opinions. But far more astonishing and unexpected 

 are the connections brought to light, when we carry back our 

 researches into the history of nature. The form of a coast, 

 the configuration of the interior of a country, the existence 



and extent 



mountains 



traced to the former prevalence of earthquakes and volcanos 

 in regions which have long been undisturbed. To these 

 remote convulsions the present fertility of some districts, the 

 sterile character of others, the elevation of land above the 



referred. 



peculiarities 

 many 



of the surface may often be ascribed to the operation, at a 

 remote era, of slow and tranquil causes— to the gradual depo- 

 sition of sediment in a lake or in the ocean, or to the proline 

 increase of testacea and corals. 



To 



exam 



subterranean deposits of coal, consisting of vegetable matter, 

 which formerly grew like peat, in swamps, or was drifted juito 



seas and lakes. 



*ea« «uiu — These seas and lakes have since been filled 

 up, the lands whereon the forests grew have been submerged 

 and covered with new strata, the rivers and currents wnic* 

 floated the vegetable masses can no longer be traced, and .tm 

 plants belonged to species which for ages have passed away 



from the surface of our planet. 



Yet the commercial prospe- 



irom ine suriaw ui um ^^ ^. - m -.jy 



rity, and numerical strength of a nation, may now be mainly 







. 





I- 







