DAVIS : PEO. PHILLIPS. 
7 
present always occuj)y the same relative position. II. That the 
strata have been deposited at successive periods beneath water; and 
that the fossils found in them were the remains of organisms that 
lived in those waters, and were afterwards imbedded in the sand or 
mud and became fossil. III. That particular species of organic 
remains are limited to particular strata. 
It is difficult at this day to realize the great importance of 
these discoveries. Before " Strata Smith," as he came to be 
familiarly known, had discovered by his painstaking and self-abne- 
gating researches, that there was order and regularity in the 
arrangement of the strata composing the earth's surface, every 
phenomenon, whethei" with respect to the rocks or their fossil con- 
tents, was attributed to the action of the deluge. Scientific men of 
that day, as now, differed in matters of detail, but as regards the 
primary proposition, there were few instances where minds of 
strong calibre resisted the superstitious influence of the age, and 
made as in the instance of Buffon, even a few steps towards the 
great truth realized by William Smith. Practical miners and 
quarrymen certainly saw that there was an alternation of strata 
in the rocks through which they pierced, but that they were per- 
sistent over large areas, or that the strata were arranged in a 
regular consecutive order, were circumstances of which they had 
no conception. The work of Smith demonstrated all this, and laid 
a true basis for a correct knowledge of the principles which under- 
lie all geological facts. He traced the extension of the oolites and 
lias from the Midland Counties into Yorkshire. The older rocks 
of the Welsh Mountains were found to be similar to those of 
Westmoreland and Scotland. The relations of the various coal 
fields, of the old red of Scotland and of Devonshire, and all 
the intermediate beds, were mapped and defined. In the short 
space of one man's life he mapped the whole of England, and pub- 
lished twenty-six county maps beside : forming a striking contrast 
to the amount of work done by the Geological Survey of the 
present day. The manufacturing and mining districts of the 
