CHAPTER VIII. 
THE BRIDGEWATER TREATISE ON “GEOLOGY AND 
MINERALOGY CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO 
NATURAL THEOLOGY.” 
“ We can read Bethel on a pile of stones, 
And, seeing where God has been, trust in Him.” 
Lowell, Cathedral. 
I N 1830 Dr. Buckland was requested by the trustees under 
the will of the late Earl of Bridgewater to write one 
of the eight treatises designed in accordance with the will 
to “justify the ways of God to man.” “Geology and 
Mineralogy Considered with Reference to Natural Theo¬ 
logy ” is the title of the book which is best known to the 
public in connection with Dr. Buckland’s name. That some 
portions of this valuable work have grown obsolete by the 
progress of these sciences is a matter of course. But the 
main argument is as powerful as ever, and has been 
accepted by men who, like Professor Owen and Professor 
Phillips, occupy an unassailable position in the scientific 
world ; and so little has it been superseded by any other 
work on the subject that Professor Boyd Dawkins uses it 
as a book of reference at the present day in Owens College, 
Manchester. The Treatise, which was six years in writing 
192 
