72 EFFECTS of HEJT 



of the utmoft importance and accuracy were made in Aftrono- 

 my and Natural Philofophy, the fyftems produced by the Geo- 

 logifts were fo fanciful and puerile, as fcarcely to deferve a 

 ferious refutation. 



One principal caufe of this failure, feems to have lain in the 

 very imperfect ftate of Chemiftry, which has only of late years 

 begun to deferve the name of a fcience. While Chemiftry was 

 in its infancy, it was impoffible that Geology mould make any 

 progrefs ; fmce feveral of the molt important circumftances to 

 be accounted for by this latter fcience, are admitted on all 

 hands to depend upon principles of the former. The confoli- 

 dation of loofe fand into ftrata of folid rock ; the cryftalline 

 arrangement of fubftances accompanying thofe ftrata, and 

 blended with them in various modes, are circumftances of a 

 chemical nature, which all thofe who have attempted to frame 

 theories of the earth have endeavoured by chemical reafon- 

 ings to reconcile to their hypothefes. 



Fire and Water, the only agents in nature by which ftony 

 fubftances are produced, under our obfervation, were employ- 

 ed by contending feds of geologifts, to explain all the phe- 

 nomena of the mineral kingdom. 



But the known properties of 'Water, are quite repugnant to 

 the belief of its univerfal influence, fince a very great propor- 

 tion of the fubftances under confideration are infoluble, or near- 

 ly fo, in that fluid ', and fince, if they were all extremely fo- 

 luble, the quantity of water which is known to exift, or that 

 could poflibly exift in our planet, would be far too fmall to ac- 

 complifh the office affigned to it in the Neptunian theory *. On 

 the other hand, the known properties of Fire are no lefs inade- 

 quate to the purpofe ; for, various fubftances which frequently 

 occur in the mineral kingdom, feem, by their prefence, to pre- 

 clude 



* lllujlrations of the Huttonian "Theory, by MrProfefforPLAYFAlR, 430. 



