520 FOSSIL INVERTEBRATED ANIMALS. 



which it has been our fortune to treat. Researches into geo- 

 logy and fossil remains have brought, and are daily bringing, 

 to light a host of interesting facts ; but it must be confessed, 

 even by the most ardent cultivators of these studies, that their 

 results are not, in all respects, alike satisfactory. That the 

 external crust of this globe has undergone several changes and 

 modifications, more or less general, and more or less violent, 

 these researches have proved satisfactorily enough : that these 

 changes must have been successive, in point of time, is more 

 than presumable from the character and state of the fossil 

 remains found in the different formations. But, though we 

 are accustomed to talk of the eras of such formations, we are 

 very far removed, indeed, from anything like the precision of 

 certainty on this point. Without the fossils, nothing could 

 have disproved the position, that all the known strata of the 

 globe had been formed simultaneously ; but even with them, 

 no man can pretend to assign the time in which such and 

 such formations were produced. Therefore, whatever may be 

 asserted, concerning the immense antiquity of this globe, must 

 be considered, if not false, to be at least conjectural. --Not 

 that we are at all inclined to agree with a recent writer on 

 geology, who would comprehend all the revolutions, which are 

 traceable in the crust of this globe, within the short period of 

 sixteen hundred years. The succession of different forms of 

 animal existence, the state of the respective remains, not to 

 mention many other circumstances, strongly militate against 

 this hypothesis ; nor does the worthy maintainer of it lend 

 much assistance to the cause which he advocates by his efforts 

 in its support. 



" Non tali auxilio, nee defensoribus istis 

 Liber eget." 



But when the theorists, on the other side of the question, speak 

 mdefinitely of myriads of ages, which costs nothing, as Cuvier 

 remarks, but a dash of the pen, or, with greater absurdity, pre- 

 tend to assign definite epochas, we cannot but admire the fancy 



