PREFACE 
IX 
volcanoes, were really chemical precipitates from a primeval universal ocean. 
Yet he had actually before him in Saxony examples of basalt hills which 
entirely disprove his assertions. 
Fortunately for the progress of natural knowledge, Werner disliked the 
manual labour of penmanship. Consequently he wrote little. But his wide 
range of acquirement, not in mineralogy only, his precision of statement, his 
absolute certainty about the truth of his own opinions, and his hardly 
disguised contempt for opinions that differed from them, combined with his 
enthusiasm, eloquence and personal charm, fired his pupils with emulation 
of his zeal and turned them into veritable propagandists. Misled as to the 
structure of the country in which their master taught, and undisciplined to 
investigate nature with an impartial mind, they travelled into other lands 
for the purpose of applying there the artificial system which they had learnt 
at Freiberg. The methodical but cumbrous terminology in which Werner 
had trained them was translated by them into their own languages, where it 
looked still more uncouth than in its native G-erman. Besides imbibing 
their teacher’s system, they acquired and even improved upon his somewhat 
disdainful manner towards all conclusions different from those of the Saxon 
Mining School. 
Such was the spirit in which the pupils of Werner proceeded to set the 
“ geognosy ” of Europe to rights. The views, announced by Desmarest, that 
various rocks, far removed from any active volcano, were yet of volcanic origin, 
had been slowly gaining ground when the militant students from Saxony 
spread themselves over the Continent. These views, however, being irrecon- 
cilable with the tenets enunciated from the Freiberg Chair, were now either 
Ignored or contemptuously rejected. AVerner’s disciples loved to call themselves 
Fy their teacher’s term “geognosts,” and claimed that they confined them- 
selves to the strict investigation of fact with regard to the structure of the 
earth, in apparent unconsciousness that their terminology and methods were 
founded on baseless assumptions and almost puerile hypotheses. 
AVith such elements ready for controversy, it was no wonder that before 
long a battle arose over the origin of basalt and the part played by volcanoes 
in the past history of the globe. The disciples of Werner, champions of a 
Universal ocean and the deposition of everything from water, were dubbed 
l^eptunists, while their opponents, equally stubborn in defence of the potency 
of volcanic fire, were known as Aiulcanists or Plutonists. For more than a 
generation this futile warfare was waged with extraordinary bitterness — 
dogmatism and authority doing their best to stop the progress of impartial 
observation and honest opinion. 
One of the most notable incidents in the campaign is to be found in the 
"Way in which the tide of battle was at last turned against the AYeruerians. 
VOL. I j 
