13^ 



ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE' 



gefted by SaulTure *, and fince become a fav' 



onr 



ite fyilem with feveral mineralogifts, appears to 

 me in the higheft degree unfatisfadory and il- 

 lufive. The purpofe for which cryftallization 

 is here introduced, is not to give a fpecific 

 figure to a particular fubftance, but to arrange 

 the fubftances which it has formed and figu- 

 red, according to certain rules ; a work which 

 we know not how it is to perform, and in 

 which we have no experience of its power. 

 Accordingly, this principle does not account, 

 in any way whatever, for the circumllances 

 which attend the inflexion of the Itrata, for 

 the limple curvature which they affedt, nor for 

 that parallelifm of their layers, which, in all 

 •their bendings, is fo accurately preferved. It 

 does, indeed, fo little ferve to explain thefe 

 fa6ls, that, were the appearances completely 

 reverfed : did the ft rata alTume the moft com- 



/ 



plex, inftead of the moft fimple curvature ; 

 inftead of equidiftant, were they converging, 

 or alternately receding and approaching to one 

 another; the theory of cryftallization might 

 be equally applied to them. The ftate of the 



W 



phenomena is a matter of perfedl indifference 

 to fuch a theory as this : all things are explain- 

 ed by it with the fame facility ; the ftraight and 



tb 



e 



/ 



* Voyages aux Alpes, torn, i, § 475 



/ 



