﻿Vol. 64.] ANNIVEKSAEY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. Ixxiil 



Stirling Castle, which, though not more remarkable or instructive 

 than those in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh wherewith Hntton 

 and Playfair had made geologists familiar, gave him the opportunity 

 to affirm that 



' no hypothesis is competent to explain geological phenomena at large, which 

 does not admit of the forcible displacement of the strata which accompany 

 them [the trap-rocks], and on which the marks of violence are so evidently 

 impressed.' ^ 



In subsequently presenting to the Society a collection of rock- 

 specimens from a large portion of Scotland, he accompanied it with 

 some miscellaneous remarks, in which he began by objecting to 

 Werner's scheme of rock- classification, that it takes for granted the 

 very matter to be proved.^ 



In the summer of the year 1813 Conybeare and Buckland made 

 their tour together along the coasts of Antrim and Derry, and 

 obtained the material for the preparation of their classic essay 

 on the geology of that part of Ireland. Among their observations 

 they confirmed the Huttonian explanation which Playfair had given 

 of the reputed fossiliferous basalt of Portrush, so long and so loudly 

 claimed by the Neptunists as a proof of the aqueous origin of 

 basalts in general.' 



Among the signs afforded in the pages of the Society's publi- 

 cations that a strong reaction was setting in against the dominant 

 Wernerian doctrines as to the history of the earth's crust, reference 

 may here be made to the excellent and memorable paper by James 

 Parkinson on the strata in the neighbourhood of London, wherein 

 he recognized the broken and displaced condition of the stratified 

 formations of this country, and regarded this condition as proof of 

 the operation of ' some prodigious and mysterious power.' * 



But, though steadily losing ground, Neptunism could stiU be heard 

 from time to time within the walls of the Society, and yet more 

 outside of them, for it continued to be stoutly maintained by Jameson 

 at Edinburgh. It is interesting in this connection to remember 

 that when, after his election to the Woodwardian Professorship 

 in the year 1818, Sedgwick began to study geology, it was from 

 the Wernerian side that he entered upon it. His earliest papers, 

 worthy of a staunch disciple of the school of Ereiberg, were not 



' Trans, ser. 1, vol. ii (1814) p. .308. 



2 Ibid. p. 390. 



3 Ibid. vol. iii (1816) p. 13. 



^ /6/c?. vol. i(1811)p.336. ■ 



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