185 
EARTH. 
long continuance, reft upon the ffiore ; for, by the agita¬ 
tion of the winds, the tides, and the currents, every move¬ 
able thing is carried farther and farther along the J,helving 
bottom of the fea, toward the unfathomable regions of the ocean." 
I fhall follow the fame order in proving, from facts, the 
contrary of every one of thefe Hyfotkefes. 
i ft. Hyp. A foil is nothing but the materials colie Sled front 
the deJlmBion of folid flrata. —You have yourfelf con¬ 
tradicted that affertion, in acknowledging “ that fand is 
the material which enters, perhaps, in greateft quantity 
the compofition of our land .... throughout all the 
earth.” For it does not appear that you look upon that 
fand as proceeding from the defirufdion of the folid Jirata be¬ 
low it ; or in cafe you did, I am going to prove that it is 
not fo. i ft. That foil is found in frata of various forts, 
laid over one another; they may be alternately mixed or 
unmixed with gravel, more or lefs loamy, and fome times 
of pure clay: which is abfolutely contrary to the idea 
that it is a foil formed there, from the decompofttion of 
hard fubflances. 2d. That foil is fometimes fo thick, that no 
bard fubflance is found in finking deep wells into it. This 
alfo is contrary to the idea of a decompofttion of hard 
fubfances , fuch as are below, for, in the few inftances 
(comparatively to the whole) where a foil proceeds really 
from fuch a deftrudion, the Joltd flrata are found at a 
little depth. 3d. When folid flrata are found under that 
almoft general foil, their nature bears feldom any refem- 
blance to it; which, however, ought to be the cafe, if 
it proceeded from their decompofttion. 4th. There are 
fome inftances of fandy foils proceeding from the decom- 
pofltion of the fame fand-flone which is found below them ; 
and then there is no difference between the foil and the 
Jlone, except in hardnefs ; but in many more cafes, appa¬ 
rently fimilar, notwithftanding a great refemblance be¬ 
tween the fand above, and the fand-flone belo v, there are 
evident proofs that the firft is not a decompofttion of 
the laft. For inftance: fand lying over fand-flone very 
like it, contains often a flinty graves, which is not found 
in th t jlone, nor in any folid Jirata in the whole country. 
Whatever then be the origin of the fand that we find 
laid in Jirata almoft all over the furface of our continents, 
there cannot be any doubt that it came out of the lea 
with them, loofe as it is: and confequently there was no 
need of a deflruSlion of folid Jirata, to produce a firft Joil 
upon them. 
2d. Hyp. . The furface of our continents has been made by 
nature to decay., for the growth of plants.- —Y ou are anxious, 
fir, to produce a foil fit for vegetation, though there was 
difoil ready upon our continents ; and you never mention 
how vegetation began upon the foil you think to have 
been produced afterwards. According to your Theory, 
bard and hot ftrata role from the bottom of the fea, when 
the continents which’exifted before were wafted. But by 
a neceffary confequence of that operation, the fea was to 
be repelled upon the decayed continents. You think 
that they were formed in fuceeftion: but whenever a fet 
of continents rofe from the unfathomable bottom of th 0 fa, 
it could not but drive the water upon thofe that exifted. 
Then the plants and their feeds were to be fubmerged ; 
and if any of thefe laft had come by chance to the fliore, 
they muft have been unfit for vegetation, before the 
fcorching beat of the new continents could be diflipated, 
and a foil produced by the decay of thofe hard Jirata. 
After a iatisfadory explanation of the manner in which 
our continents were abandoned by the fea, one of the 
moft important points in a theory of the earth, is to give a 
clear and diftind account of the beginning of vegetation 
upon them: I find none in yours, but you have it in 
mine. I have explained how the tops of our mountains 
were become, in the former fea, ij.lands or peninfulas, 
which had been covered with vegetation and flocked with 
animals. Thence, when they were become the high 
grounds of our land, proceeded the feeds by which vege¬ 
tables were produced upon the foil, ready to receive them. 
The feeds of modes, ferns, gramina, heath, and many 
VOL. VI. No. 341. 
other fmall plants, were carried every where by winds; 
and thofe were the vegetables that firft covered the ori¬ 
ginal Joil all over the continents. Many trees and other 
vegetables have winged feeds', by which form, though 
heavier, they were alfo carried by winds : from them 
proceeded the firft forejls, and a variety of dominant ve¬ 
getables, according to the foil. Birds and other vehicles 
iropagated other forts of plants. From that theory, we 
lave upon the new continents a foil covered with vegeta¬ 
tion ; while the hypothefis of our land bavins’been made 
by nature to decay for the growth of plants, explains nothing 
in that refped. 
3d. Hyp. A Soil is necejfarily wajhed away. —-This is 
completely contradicted by a general fad. An immenfe 
part of our continents, ftill in the hands of nature, is left 
to its fpontaneous produds. I have feen vaft extents of 
thofe grounds, and received informations of many more 
of Europe and Alia ; and the following is their general 
Hate : In every part where the winds have not difturbed 
vegetation, or moifture forwarded it to peat, thofe grounds 
are covered witli a ftratum of vegetable earth, produced 
from the remains of decayed vegetables. That Jbatum is 
as diftind from the original foil, as oil-paint from cloth, 
wood, or metal, over which it is laid : it is compofed 
upon every foil, of a black powdery fubfhmce, mixed 
with roots, under which are found fands of all forts, 
either pure, or mixed with gravel, loam, and even hard 
rock very little impaired. This is an evident proof that 
the foil is not wajhed away, for, if it had been the cafe, 
in refped of thofe grounds, the vegetable earth had not 
gathered over them. 
Perhaps you thought only of culture, and fo accufed 
man of the deflrudion of his own dwelling: but I can 
vindicate him, both by the nature of the procefs, and by 
the fad. In refped of the procefs, it is one of my ob- 
jeds to fliew the care taken by the hulbandman, to col¬ 
led in ditches w’hat comes out of his fields by rain, and 
to lay over it as manure, what he does not eat of his crop, 
with the produd of the unmoved furface of his grafs fields, 
and of the neighbouring uncultivated grounds. This ex¬ 
tends to all forts of cultivated lands; but here I fpeak 
only of the plains: and as a proof of the efficacy of thofe 
procelfes, I may quote alfo a general fad. All the un¬ 
cultivated lands I have obfei ved, are more or lefs inter¬ 
mixed with cultivated ones, and fome from a time imme¬ 
morial ; and l have never found (without fome particu¬ 
lar reafon) the level of the laft, lower than that of the 
firft ; on the contrary, I have found it often higher. Con¬ 
fequently, the original foil of the plains and of rounded 
hills, has not been, and is not to be, walhed away. 
4th. Hyp. The heights of our land are levelled with the 
Jhore, by the continual circulation of water , running from the 
fummits of mountains towards the fea. —The examination 
of this hypothefis will take in again the whole of your 
fpeculations ; for it will lead us to the fea, in purfuit of 
the rivers, loaded with the depredations of all the moving 
waters upon our land. But as precipitation only can 
have been the caufe of fome natural philofophers mif- 
taking the nature of the operations which take place on 
the furface of our globe, we muft follow them ftep by 
ftep. At the beginning of our continents, they had a 
quantity of fteep grounds ; and Jlreams began to flow in 
every part of their furface. But this is too large a field 
to be traced in all its particulars; therefore I (hall pro¬ 
ceed at once to the tops of the Alps, and thence follow 
the courfe of 'natural caufes down to the fea. That part 
of the inveftigation will fupply the whole ; for what I 
fhall eftablilh upon that great fcale, will be applicable 
to the fame proceffes on fmaller ones. I fhall not, how¬ 
ever, here ftop at thofe high parts of the central ridge of 
the Alps, where ice covers the ruins cf tumbling rocks ; 
it being fufficient for our prefent purpofe to obferve, 
that no frag?nent of thofe rocks can come out of then- 
high region, but by coming to mix with thofe of the 
lower ones, of which I ihall follow the courfe. Our pre- 
3 B fenfc 
