20 



During the last quarter of the eighteenth century, the belief 

 that fossil remains were deposited by the Deluge sensibly 

 declined, and the dawn of a new era gradually appeared. Let 

 us pause for a moment here, and see what real progress had 

 been made ; what foundation had been laid on which to estab- 

 lish a science of fossil remains. 



The true nature of these objects had now been clearly deter- 

 mined. They were the remains of animals and plants. Most 

 of them certainly were not the relics of the Mosaic Deluge, 

 but had been deposited long before, part in fresh water and 

 part in the sea. Some indicated a mild climate, and some the 

 tropics. That any of these were extinct species, was as yet 

 only suspected. Large collections of fossils had now been 

 made, and valuable catalogues, well illustrated, had been pub- 

 lished. Something was known, too, of the geological position 

 of fossils. Steno, long before, had observed that the lowest 

 rocks were without life. Lehmann had shown that above 

 these primitive rocks, and derived from them, were the sec- 

 ondary strata, full of the records of life ; and above these were 

 alluvial deposits, which he referred to local floods, and the 

 Deluge of Noah. lioiielle, Fuchsel, and Odoardi had shed 

 new light on this subject. "Werner had distinguished the tran- 

 sition rocks, containing fossil remains, between the primitive 

 and the secondary, while everything above the chalk he grouped 

 together, as the " overflowed land." "Werner, as we have seen, 

 had done more than this, if we give him the credit his pupils 

 claim for him. lie had found that the formations he examined 

 contained each its own peculiar fossils, and that from the older 

 to the newer there was a gradual approach to recent forms. 

 "William Smith had worked out the same thing in England, and 

 should equally divide the honor of this important discovery. 



The greatest advance, however, up to this time, was that 

 men now preferred to observe, rather than to believe, and facts 

 were held in greater esteem than vague speculations. "With 

 this preparation for future progress, the second period in the 

 history of Palaeontology, as I have divided it, may appropri- 

 ately be considered at an end. 



