WILL THE MOUNTAINS BE LEVELED! 397 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 



WILL THE MOUNTAINS BE LEVELED? 



LET us now direct our attention to a more specific ex- 

 amination of the circumstances under which the visi- 

 ble activities of our terrestrial abode are carried on. The 

 fact which first and most strongly arrests our attention is 

 the presence of universal and perpetual change. This fact 

 alone demonstrates that the existing terrestrial order had 

 a beginning. Work is in progress before our eyes; we 

 may easily determine what has been accomplished and what 

 remains to be accomplished. Had these changes been in 

 progress from all eternity, every thing which existing forces 

 are capable of effecting would have been consummated an 

 eternity since, and physical stagnation would now be reign- 

 ing. It is equally plain that the work which remains to be 

 accomplished is a finite work, and is destined to be accom- 

 plished in finite duration. 



What is the work with which terrestrial forces are oc- 

 cupied ? What are the labors of oceans, and winds, and 

 rains, and frost, and mountain torrents, and swollen streams, 

 and pent-up fires ? We witness here a grand antagonism 

 of Nature's energies. While on one hand Nature has ex- 

 erted herself to rear the continents, on the other hand a 

 different set of forces has been equally assiduous in beating 

 them down. There was a time when the igneous forces 

 possessed the advantage, and island, and continent, and 

 Alp rose triumphant over the sea. That was the age 

 when the igneous forces were in their youth. Then all 

 their elastic energies were commissioned to rear a dwell- 



