AMERICA THE OLD WORLD. 
3 
supposing that the solid materials of which our 
earth consists were ever in a liquid condition, 
what right have you to infer that this condition 
was caused by the action of heat upon them ? 
I answer, Because it is acting upon them still ; 
because the earth we tread is but a thin crust 
floating on a liquid sea of molten materials ; 
because the agencies that were at work then are 
at work now, and the present is the logical 
sequence of the past. From Artesian wells, from 
mines, from geysers, from hot springs, a mass 
of facts has been collected, proving incontestably 
the heated condition of all substances at a certain 
depth below the earth’s surface ; and if we need 
more positive evidence, we have it in the fiery 
eruptions that even now bear fearful testimony to 
the molten ocean seething within the globe and 
forcing its way out from time to time. The 
modern progress of Geology has led us by suc- 
cessive and perfectly connected steps back to a 
time when what is now only an occasional and 
rare phenomenon was the normal condition of 
our earth ; when those internal fires were en- 
closed in an envelop so thin that it opposed but 
little resistance to their frequent outbreak, and 
they constantly forced themselves through this 
crust, pouring out melted materials that sub- 
sequently cooled and consolidated on its surface. 
So constant were these eruptions, and so slight 
