406 CONSISTENCY OF GEOLOGY WITH SACRED HISTORY. 



they form mighty strata, which have been tilted out of the horizontal 

 position, into an inclination of 15 or 20 degrees from the horizon. 



The Cattskills, are conspicuous monuments of geological revolu- 

 tions. Not only at the base, but at the summit, from two to four 

 thousand feet above the level of the Hudson river, we find these 

 mountains composed extensively of fragmentary rocks, rounded and 

 angular, and their rude piles inform us, that the materials of which 

 they are built were once loose and rolling about, in the waves of an 

 early ocean, encountering friction and violence in their various modes 

 of action, and we see not how to avoid the conclusion that these moun- 

 tains, after consolidation, have been raised from the depths of the sea. 



Origin. 



If we enquire whence arose the mighty masses of ruins of every 

 shape and variety, composing not merely accidental fragments, or 

 here or there a stratum or a hill, but covering myriads of square 

 miles, which are sometimes the basis of countries, and rise occasion- 

 ally even into high mountains, we must look for an adequate cause. 



Such are the effects and proofs of crystallization, as exhibited in 

 the early primitive rocks, that the contrast afforded by the fragmentary 

 rocks, must appear very striking ; and connected with their relative 

 position, can leave no doubt on the mind, that they arose from a sub- 

 sequent and totally different state of things. 



What were the causes that broke up portions of the primitive rocks 

 and left their ruins the sport of the waves, destined in the progress of 

 time, to be cemented again into firm masses ? 



Besides the wearing effects of the weather and the seasons, powers 

 still constantly in action, and of the vicissitudes of temperature, we 

 can add the convulsions of earthquake, tempest, flood and fire, by 

 which our planet is still occasionally agitated. Beyond these, facts do 

 not enable us to go, but the causes that have been named would in the 

 course of ages, perform the work, great as the results may now ap- 

 pear. 



The breaking up of primitive and other rocks by violent convul- 

 sions, and the transportation of their ruins, often to distant places : 

 the frequently rounded form of the fragments, presenting pebbles of 

 every size, from that of a pea, to that of a hen's egg, — a human head,, 

 or a barrel, — quartz being not unfrequently the material ; the recon- 

 solidation of these masses into firm rocks, — their stratification at first 

 horizontal and then rising, at various angles of inclination ; the alter- 

 nation of such strata with slate and coal and other deposits, their ex- 



