' ' The ruins of an older world are visible in the present structure 

 of our planet; and the strata which now compose our continents 

 have been once beneath the sea, and were formed out of the waste 

 of pre-existing continents. The same forces are still destroying, 

 by chemical decomposition or mechanical violence, even the hardest 

 rocks, and transporting the materials to the sea, where they are 

 spread out, and form strata analogous to those of more ancient 

 date. ' ' — HuTTON". 



