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crushed together to such an extent that it shall occupy If miles less surface 
than now ; and this is to he continued year by year at a continually accele- 
rated rate, since the further north the land proceeds, the faster will be the 
crushing. I ask, then, what change do we see going on, or can we trace 
historically, which can, in the smallest degree, answer to this crushing of the 
earth’s surface, which is such an essential element in Mr. Hopkins theory ? 
Is there such a phenomenon 1 Now, you will observe there are only two ways 
in which this action can take place. It must be either by a crumpling and 
crumbling of the earth’s crust, throwing it up and down, or it must be by a 
bending of the surface, as to cause it to occupy a smaller horizontal area. 
The first method may be rejected at once as incredible. Concerning the 
second it is to be asked, What amount of bending would be required ? 
Suppose an extreme case, that by this bending the surface formerly hori- 
zontal was thrown into an angle of 45° ; this would only cause a diminution 
of about one-third in the original area occupied, and so, instead of If miles, 
we should require 5 miles of the earth’s surface in our latitude to be yearly 
thrown from a horizontal position into an angle of 45°, to account for the 
change. Now we are certain, from what we know of the amount of rising 
and sinking actually in progress, that there is no such oscillation of the 
earth’s surface— no such bending and doubling of the surface going on at 
the present time, as will account for this perpetual diminution of the surface. 
This is not all, however. In the northern hemisphere, you have this crushing 
of the surface together, but in the southern hemisphere you must have just 
the reverse— a perpetual extension and spreading out. The land in the 
southern hemisphere is supposed to be constantly getting nearer to the 
Equator, and so covering a larger surface than before, which involves, of 
necessity, a cracking and pulling of itself out. Now, solid rock, of the 
depth of several miles, is not easily pulled or stretched out, any more than 
it is not easily bent about or crushed. But even if this could be done if 
the land was so peculiarly ductile as, in fact, it is not, still you have only got 
through half the difficulty ; for I ask next, When the land has got to the 
North Pole, what becomes of it ? Here has been the whole crust of the 
earth, for the last 6,000 years, going to the North Pole. Where is it ? 
It has not formed itself into a great mountain at the North Pole. Where is it ? 
Observe this— it is not merely a crumpling up, or pulling out, year by year, 
of so many miles of the surface, but a pushing away of all the land that was 
there before. Mr. Hopkins refers, indeed, for analogy to the ocean ; but 
what do we find there ? True, there are enormous currents of water passing 
from south to north, but, then, there are also equally enormous return cur- 
rents, and without these return currents the motion could not take place. 
There is no great store of water in the south from whence a supply may be 
sent to the north, neither is there any gigantic vessel or receptacle at the 
north for the water to run into ; the water, to circulate thus, must get back 
again, and it does so. The question is, then, can the land, in like manner, 
get back again ? Mr. Hopkins’s theory plainly requires us to believe that it 
does. He says nothing of any accumulation of land at the North Pole, or 
