lf the geological speculation of Britain,
or, if you will, British popular geology. For it is eminently a British
doctrine, and has even now made comparatively little progress on the
continent of Europe. Nevertheless, it seems to me to be open to serious
criticism upon one of its aspects.

I have shown how unjust was the insinuation that Hutton denied a
beginning to the world. But it would not be unjust to say that he
persistently in practice, shut his eyes to the existence of that prior
and different state of things which, in theory, he admitted; and, in this
aversion to look beyond the veil of stratified rocks, Lyell follows him.

Hutton and Lyell alike agree in their indisposition to carry their
speculations a step beyond the period recorded in the most ancient strata
now open to observation in the crust of the earth. This is, for Hutton,
"the point in which we cannot see any farther"; while Lyell tells us,--

"The astronomer may find good reasons for ascribing the earth's form to
the original fluidity of the mass, in times long antecedent to the first
introduction of living beings into the planet; but the geologist must be
content to regard the earliest monuments which it is his task to
interpret, as belonging to a period when the crust had already acquired
great solidity and thickness, probably as great as it now possesses, and
when volcanic rocks, not essentially differing from those now produced,
were formed from time to time, the intensity of volcanic heat being
neither greater nor less than it is now."[8]

[Footnote 8: _Principles of Geology_, vol. ii. p. 211.]

And again, "As geologists, we learn that it is not only the present
condition of the globe which has been suited to the accommodation of
myriads of living creatures, but that many former states also have been
adapted to the organisation and habits of prior races of beings. The
disposition of the seas, continents and islands, and the climates, have
varied; the species likewise have been changed; and yet they have all
been so modelled, on types analogous to those of existing plants and
animals, as to indicate, throughout, a perfect harmony of design and
unity of purpose. To assume that the evidence of the beginning, or end,
of so vast a scheme lies within the reach of our philosophical inquiries,
or even of our speculations, appears to be inconsistent with a just
estimate of the relations which subsist between the finite powers of man
and the attribut