A guide to geology / [John Phillips].

  • John Phillips
Date:
1835
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A guide to geology / [John Phillips]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    occupied by dry land was formerly covered by the sea. We may next inquire into the agencies by which the land was redeemed from the waves. ELEVATION OF LAND. 44. The strata formed upon the bed of the sea could only be laid dry by one of two processes; either the general level of the sea has been lowered, as Werner imagined, or there have been vertical movements in the bed of the sea. The notion of the gradual lowering of the level of the ocean is one of those imprudent suppositions which the constantly increasing connexion of geology with exact science has nearly banished from our systems. It was adopted with the view of accounting for the often observed fact, that the strata which descend to the greatest depth under the plains, and are certainly the oldest, are also found rising to the greatest height along the flanks of the mountains. The Wernerian hypothesis assumed that the great physical features of the globe, its mountains and plains, were abori- ginal ; it assumed that all the igneous rocks were of aqueous origin; and it w'as to agree with these fun- damental errors that the monstrous notion of the gradual and universal sinking of the w'ater-level, from the summits of the mountains to the shores of the actual sea, was framed. This notion is so contrary to common sense, that it will be instantly rejected by every mind which is not prepared to admit an un- limited variation in the quantity of w'ater upon the globe. 45. No direct collision with natural philosophy