ADAM SEDGWICK AND WILLIAM BUCKLAND. 
143 
talk of spontaneous generation and transmutation of species they 
seem to me to try . nature by a hypothesis, and not to try their hypo- 
thesis by nature. Where are their facts on which to form an induc- 
tive truth ? I deny their startling condition. " Oh, but," they 
reply, "we have progressive development in geology." Now, I allow, 
as all geologists must do, a kind of progressive development. For 
example, the first fish are below the reptiles, and the first reptiles 
older than man. I say we have successive forms of animal life 
adapted to successive conditions, so far proving design, and not 
derived in natural succession in the ordinary way by generation. But 
if no single fact in actual nature allows us to suppose that the new 
species and orders were produced successively in the natural way, 
how did they begin ? I reply, by a way out of and above common 
known material nature, and this way I call creation. Generation 
and creation are two distinct ideas and must be described by two 
distinct words, unless we wish to introduce utter confusion of thought 
and language. In this view I think you agree with me, for I spoke 
to you on the subject when we met, alas ! ten years since, at Dublin. 
He then proposes a number of questions to Professor Agassiz 
relating to the types of fishes found in several formations, and 
requests his opinion as to the probability of their being successively 
derived one from another, and as to whether the Saurians found in 
more recent formations could have been developed from the Sauroid 
or any other type of fish. 
He concludes by reiterating the hope that Professor Agassiz 
may revisit this country, and signs himself his most faithful and 
most grateful friend. 
In February, 1851, the Council of the Geological Society of 
London awarded to Professor Sedgwick the Wollaston Medal, the 
highest however in their power to bestow, in recognition of the value 
of his original researches in developing the geological structure of the 
British Isles, the Alps, and the Rheinish provinces. Twelve years 
later, in 1863, he received from the Royal Society the Copley Gold 
Medal for his observations and discoveries in the Geology of the 
Palaeozoic Series of Rocks, and more especially for his determination 
of the characters of the Devonian System, by observations on the 
