Ch. III.] 



RAY. 



45 



. 



-; 



■i-o 







taught that earthquakes had become debilitated, and that 

 the Alps, Andes, and other chains, had been lifted np in a few 

 months, he was compelled to assume so rapid a rate of change, 

 that his machinery appeared scarcely less extravagant than 

 that of his most fanciful predecessors. For this reason, 

 perhaps, his whole theory of earthquakes met with undeserved 



neglect. 



celebrated 



Bay, 1692.— One of his contemporaries, the 

 naturalist, Eay, participated in the same desire to explain 

 geological phenomena by reference to causes less hypothetical 

 than those usually resorted to.* In his essay on ' Chaos and 

 Creation,' he proposed a system, agreeing in its outline, and 



Hooke 



various 



il history enabled him 

 original observations. 



Earthquakes, he suggested, 

 might have been the second causes employed at the creation, 



om 



waters together into one place. He mentions, like Hooke, the 

 earthquake of 1646, which had violently shaken the Andes 



some 



made many 



therein. In assigning a cause for the general deluge, he 

 preferred a change in the earth's centre of gravity to the 

 introduction of earthquakes. Some unknown cause, he said, 

 mio-ht have forced the subterranean waters outwards, as was, 

 perhaps, indicated by ' the breaking up of the fountains of the 



great deep/ 



Ray was one of the first of our writers wlio enlarged upon 



the effects of running water upon the land, and of the en- 

 croachment of the sea upon the shores. So important did 



them 



ystem 



more 



submers 



so much matter was carried down by rivers, or undermined in 

 the sea-cliffs. We perceive clearly from his writings, that the 

 gradual decline of our svstem, and its future consummation 



tt 



Kay's Physico-theological Dis- 

 courses were of somewhat later date 

 than Hooke s great work on earthquakes. 

 He speaks of Hooke as one * whom for 



his learning and deep insight into the 

 mysteries of nature he deservedly ho- 

 noured.' — On the Deluge, chap. iv. 



