

84 



SMITH'S MAP OF ENGLAND. 



[Ch. IV. 



come 



CUli-lI. U1IO Ut.^K-' W^ — w ^ ^ ~ 



collision with any preconceived opinions. ^ 



According to De Lnc, the first essential distinction to be 



^^ ^ • 1 • 1 "1 n _ 



omena 



of the 



mine 



causes still in action, and which had been produced by 



causes that had ceased to act. 



com 



mass 



must 



action. 



emerged, at no very remote 



on the sudden retreat of the ocean, the waters of which made 

 their way into subterranean caverns. The formation of the 



th 



primor 



other strata containing the remains of organised bodies were 

 deposited, till at last the present sea remained as the residuum 

 of the primordial liquid, and no longer continued to produce 



mineral strata.* 



William Smith, 1790.— While the tenets of the rival schools 



warm 



partisans, the labours of an individual, unassisted by the ad- 



1th 



Ir. William Smith, an English surveyor, published his 

 Tabular View of the British Strata' in 1790, wherein he 



* 1 ^ 



Wes' 



Wen 



formations 

 gh he had not communi 



same views respecting the laws of superposition of stratified 



_ — . <■ -« r» .._ •-v -^» at 



rocks; that he was aware 



that the order of succession of 



different groups was never inverted ; and that they might be 

 identified at very distant points by their peculiar organised 



fossils. , , . 



From the time of the appearance of the < Tabular View, tne 



author laboured to construct a geological map of the whole 



of England ; and with the greatest disinterestedness of mind, 



communicated the results of his investigations to all who 



desired information, giving such publicity to his origin 



views, as to enable his contemporaries almost to compe e 



* Elementary Treatise on Geology. London, 1809. Translated by De > Fite. 







C* 



P 



111 



