890 



THE WONDERS OF GEOLOGY. Lect. VIII. 



This list might be almost indefinitely extended, for 

 I have omitted numerous strata, in which animal remains 

 largely predominate ; and in the tertiary and modern epochs, 

 every order of animated nature is found to have contributed, 

 more or less largely, to the sedimentary deposits ; the bones 

 of Man appearing only in the most recent accumulations ; 

 and, by the geological causes now in action, not only the 

 remains of the existing orders of animals and vegetables, 

 but also works of human art, are daily added to the solid 

 crust of the globe. 



46. General Inferences. — Restricting ourselves within 

 the bounds of legitimate induction, and forbearing to specu- 

 late on those points which rest on insufficient or questionable 

 data, we may venture to draw some general inferences as to 

 the varying physical conditions of the surface of our planet, 

 and of animal and vegetable life, throughout the immense 

 periods contemplated by geology. 



From the remotest epoch in the earth's history recog- 

 nizable by man, to the present time, we have seen that the 

 mechanical and chemical laws which govern inorganic 

 matter have undergone no change. The wasting away of 

 the solid rocks by water, and the subsequent deposition and 

 consolidation of the detritus in strata, and their metamor- 

 phism by high temperature: — the subsidence of the dry 

 land beneath the sea, and the elevation of areas of the 

 ocean -bed above the waters, and the formation of new islands 

 and continents : — the decomposition of animal and vegetable 

 substances on the surface, and their conversion into stone 

 or coal, under circumstances in which the gaseous prin- 

 ciples were confined ; — the transmutation of mud and sand 

 into rock, and of earthy minerals into crystals: — these 

 physical changes have been constantly going on, under the 

 influence of those fixed and immutable laws, established by 

 Divine Providence for the maintenance and renovation of 

 the material Universe. 



