HUTTONIAN THEORY. m 



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footfteps of time, and to perceive, that the works 

 of nature, ufually deemed the moft permanent, 

 are thofe on which the characters of viciflitude 

 are moil deeply imprinted. He fees himfelf in 



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the midil of a vail ruin, where the precipices 

 which rife on all fides with fuch boldnefs and af- 

 peritj, the iliarp peaks of the granite mountains, 

 and the huge fragments that furround their 

 bafes, do but mark fo many epochs in the pro- 

 grefs of decay, and point out the energy of thofe 

 deilrucStive caufes, which even the magnitude 

 and folidity of foch great bodies have been un- 

 able to reiiil. 



109. The refult of a more minute invefliga- 

 tion, is in perfect unifon with this general im- 

 preilion. Whence is it, that the elevation of 

 aj mountains is fo obviouily conneded with the 



hardnefs and indeftruclibility of the rocks which 

 compofe them ? Why is it, that a lofty moun- 

 tain of foft and fecondary rock is no where to 

 be found ; and that fuch chains, as the Pyrenees 

 or the Alps, never coniiil of any but the hardeft 

 ftone, of granite for inilance, or of thofe prima- 

 rary fcrata, which, if we are to credit the pre- 

 ceding theory, have been twice heated in the 

 fires, and twice tempered in the waters, of the 

 mineral regions ? Is it not plain that this arifes, 

 not from any direct connection between the 

 hardnefs of ilones, and their height in the at- 



mofphere. 



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