HUTTONIAN THEORY. 



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plexnefs of its fubjed:, geology is the joungeft 

 of the fciences. 



It is foreign from the prefent piirpofe, to en- 



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ter on any hiftory of the fy ftems that, fince the 

 grea rife of this branch of fcience, have been invent- 

 elij ed to explain the phenomena of the mineral 



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m. 



It is fnfficient to remark, that thefe 



IS, t fyftems are iifuaily reduced to two clalTes, ac- 

 tog( cording as they refer the origin of terreftrial bo- 

 fouj dies to fire or to water ^ and that, conform- 

 e(C|| ably to this divilion, their followers have of late 



been diftinguiihed by the fanciful names of Fid- 

 canijls and Neptunijis, To the former of thefe 

 Dr HuTTON belongs much more than to the lat- 

 ter • though, as he em.ploys the agency both of 

 fire and of water in his fyilem, he cannot, in 

 llrid propriety, be arranged with either. 



In the fuccind account which I am' now a- 

 bout to give of this fyftem, I fliall confider the 



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na 



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tho; 



but 



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ar3i 

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mineral kingdom as divided into two parts, 

 namely, ftratified and unflratified fabftances. I 

 Ihall treat, firft, of the phenomena peculiar to 

 the ftratified ; next, of thofe peculiar to the un- 

 Urutified ; and, laftly, of the phenomena com- 

 ^f mon to both. Beginning, then, with the firfl, 

 n^' the fubjea naturally divides itfeif into three 

 branches ; viz. the materials^ the conjolldation, 



■ID 



ig' and the/>o///o;2 ofthe ftrata. 



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SECT- 



