THE PRODROMUS 227 



1. That there is in it no place for buoyancy or gravity. 



2. That the particles are added to surfaces of every kind, 

 since surfaces smooth, rough, plane, curved, and consisting of 

 several planes at different angles of inclination, are found over- 

 spread by the layers. 



3. That movement of the fluid causes them no hindrance. 

 Whether the substance under consideration which flows 



from a solid, be different from that substance which moves the 

 parts of the fluid, or whether something else is to be sought, I 

 leave undecided. 



Different kinds of layers in the same place can be caused 

 either by a difference of the particles which withdraw from the 

 fluid one after the other, as this same fluid is gradually disin- 

 tegrated more and more, or from different fluids carried thither 

 at different times. From this fact it follows that the same 

 arrangement of layers sometimes recurs in the same place, and 

 often evident traces revealing the entrance of new matter re- 

 main^ But all the matter of the layers seems to be a finer sub- 

 "stance emanating from the stones, as will further appear in the 

 following. 



THE STRATA OF THE EARTH 



The strata of the earth are due to the deposits of a fluid : 



I. Because the comminuted matter of the strata could not 



have been reduced to that form unless, having been mixed with 



p. 27. some fluid and then falling from its own weight, it had been 



spread out by the movement of the same superincumbent fluid. 



2. ' Because the larger bodies contained in these same strata 

 obey, for the most part, the la\ys of gravity, not only with re- 

 spect to the position of any substance by itself, but also with 

 respect to the relative position of different bodies to each other. 



3. Because the comminuted matter of the strata has so ad- 

 justed itself to the bodies contained in it that it has not only 

 filled all the smallest cavities of the contained body, but has 

 also expressed the smoothness and lustre of the body in that 

 part of its own surface where it is in contact with the body, 

 although the roughness of the comminuted matter by no means 

 admits of similar smoothness and lustre. 



Sediments, moreover, are formed so long as the contents in 



