Theory of the Earth Volume I Part 8

We have already considered those operations which had been necessary in forming our solid land, a body consisting of materials originally deposited at the bottom of the ocean; we are now to investigate the source from whence had come all those materials, from the collection of which the present land is formed; and from knowing the state in which those materials had existed, previously to their entering the composition of our strata, we shall learn something concerning the natural history of this world, while the present earth was forming in the sea.

We have already observed, that all the strata of the earth are composed either from the calcareous relicts of sea animals, or from the collection of such materials as we find upon our sh.o.r.es. At a gross computation, there may perhaps be a fourth part of our solid land, which is composed from the matter that had belonged to those animals. Now, what a mult.i.tude of living creatures, what a quant.i.ty of animal economy must have been required for producing a body of calcareous matter which is interspersed throughout all the land of the globe, and which certainly forms a very considerable part of that ma.s.s! Therefore, in knowing how those animals had lived, or with what they had been fed, we shall have learned a most interesting part of the natural history of this earth; a part which it is necessary to have ascertained, in order to see the former operations of the globe, while preparing the materials of the present land. But, before entering upon this subject, let us examine the other materials of which our land is formed.

Gravel forms a part of those materials which compose our solid land; but gravel is no other than a collection of the fragments of solid stones worn round, or having their angular form destroyed by agitation in water, and the attrition upon each other, or upon similar hard bodies.

Consequently, in finding ma.s.ses of gravel in the composition of our land, we must conclude, that there had existed a former land, on which there had been transacted certain operations of wind and water, similar to those which are natural to the globe at present, and by which new gravel is continually prepared, as well as old gravel consumed or diminished by attrition upon our sh.o.r.es.

Sand is the material which enters, perhaps in greatest quant.i.ty, the composition of our land. But sand, in general, is no other than small fragments of hard and solid bodies, worn or rounded more or less by attrition; consequently, the same natural history of the earth, which is investigated from the ma.s.ses of gravel, is also applicable to those ma.s.ses of sand which we find forming so large a portion of our present land throughout all the earth[16].

[Note 16: Sand is a term that denotes no particular substance; although by it is commonly meant a siliceous substance, as being by far the most prevalent. Sand is one of the modifications, of size and shape, in a hard body or solid substance, which may be infinitely diversified. The next modification to be distinguished in mineral bodies is that of gravel; and this differs in no respect from sand, except in point of size. Next after gravel, in the order of ascent, come stones; and these bear nearly the same relation to gravel as gravel does to sand. Now, by stones is to be understood the fragments of rocks or solid mineral bodies; and there is a perfect gradation from those stones to sand.

I have already endeavoured to explain the formation of those stony substances; and now I am treating of a certain system of circulation, which is to be found among minerals.

M. de Luc censures me for not giving the origin of sand, of which I form the strata of the earth. He seems to have misunderstood my treatise. I do not pretend, as he does in his theory, to describe the beginning of things; I take things such as I find them at present, and from these I reason with regard to that which must have been. When, from a thing which is well known, we explain another which is less so, we then investigate nature; but when we imagine things without a pattern or example in nature, then, instead of natural history, we write only fable.

M. de Luc, in the letter already mentioned, says, "that sand may be, and I think it is, a substance which has formed _strata_ by _precipitation in a liquid_." This is but an opinion, which may be either true or false. If it be true, it is an operation of the mineral kingdom of which I am ignorant. In all the sand which I have ever examined, I have never seen any that might not be referred to the species of mineral substance from which it had been formed. When this author shall have given us any kind of information with regard to the production of sand _by precipitation in a liquid_, it will then be time enough to think of forming the strata of the earth with that sand.]

Clay is now to be considered as the last of those materials of which our strata are composed; but, in order to understand the nature of this ingredient, something must be premised.

Clay is a mixture of different earths or hard substances, in an impalpable state. Those substances are chiefly the siliceous and aluminous earths. Other earths are occasionally mixed in clays, or perhaps always to be found in some small portion. But this does not affect the general character of clay; it only forms a special variety in the subject. A sensible or considerable portion of calcareous earth, in the composition of clay, const.i.tutes a marl, and a sufficient admixture of sand, a loam.

An indefinite variety of those compositions of clay form a large portion of the present strata, all indurated and consolidated in various degrees; but this great quant.i.ty of siliceous, argillaceous, and other compound substances, in form of earth or impalpable sediment, corresponds perfectly with that quant.i.ty of those same substances which must have been prepared in the formation of so much gravel and sand, by the attrition of those bodies in the moving waters.

Therefore, from the consideration of those materials which compose the present land, we have reason to conclude, that, during the time this land was forming, by the collection of its materials at the bottom of the sea, there had been a former land containing materials similar to those which we find at present in examining the earth. We may also conclude, that there had been operations similar to those which we now find natural to the globe, and necessarily exerted in the actual formation of gravel, sand, and clay. But what we have now chiefly in view to ill.u.s.trate is this, that there had then been in the ocean a system of animated beings, which propagated their species, and which have thus continued their several races to this day.

In order to be convinced of that truth, we have but to examine the strata of our earth, in which we find the remains of animals. In this examination, we not only discover every genus of animal which at present exists in the sea, but probably every species, and perhaps some species with which at present we are not acquainted. There are, indeed, varieties in those species, compared with the present animals which we examine, but no greater varieties than may perhaps be found among the same species in the different quarters of the globe. Therefore, the system of animal life, which had been maintained in the ancient sea, had not been different from that which now subsists, and of which it belongs to naturalists to know the history.

It is the nature of animal life to be ultimately supported from matter of vegetable production. Inflammable matter may be considered as the _pabulum_ of life. This is prepared in the bodies of living plants, particularly in their leaves exposed to the sun and light. This inflammable matter, on the contrary, is consumed in animal bodies, where it produces heat or light, or both. Therefore, however animal matter, or the pabulum of life, may circulate through a series of digesting powers, it is constantly impaired or diminis.h.i.+ng in the course of this economy, and, without the productive power of plants, it would finally be extinguished.[17]

[Note 17: See Dissertations on different subjects of Natural Philosophy, part II.]

The animals of the former world must have been sustained during indefinite successions of ages. The mean quant.i.ty of animal matter, therefore, must have been preserved by vegetable production, and the natural waste of inflammable substance repaired with continual addition; that is to say, the quant.i.ty of inflammable matter necessary to the animal consumption, must have been provided by means of vegetation.

Hence we must conclude, that there had been a world of plants, as well as an ocean replenished with living animals.

We are now, in reasoning from principles, come to a point decisive of the question, and which will either confirm the theory, if it be just, or confute our reasoning, if we have erred. Let us, therefore, open the book of Nature, and read in her records, if there had been a world bearing plants, at the time when this present world was forming at the bottom of the sea.

Here the cabinets of the curious are to be examined; but here some caution is required, in order to distinguish things perfectly different, which sometimes are confounded.

Fossil wood, to naturalists in general, is wood dug up from under ground, without inquiring whether this had been the production of the present earth, or that which had preceded it in the circulation of land and water. The question is important, and the solution of it is, in general, easy. The vegetable productions of the present earth, however deep they may be found buried beneath its surface, and however ancient they may appear, compared with the records of our known times, are new, compared with the solid land on which they grew; and they are only covered with the produce of a vegetable soil, or the alluvion of the present land on which we dwell, and on which they had grown. But the fossil bodies which form the present subject of inquiry, belonged to former land, and are found only in the sea-born strata of our present earth. It is to these alone that we appeal, in order to prove the certainty of former events.

Mineralised wood, therefore, is the object now inquired after; that wood which had been lodged in the bottom of the sea, and there composed part of a stratum, which hitherto we have considered as only formed of the materials proper to the ocean. Now, what a profusion of this species of fossil wood is to be found in the cabinets of collectors, and even in the hands of lapidaries, and such artificers of polished stones! In some places, it would seem to be as common as the agate.

I shall only mention a specimen in my own collection. It is wood petrified with calcareous earth, and mineralised with pyrites. This specimen of wood contains in itself, even without the stratum of stone in which it is embedded, the most perfect record of its genealogy.

It had been eaten or perforated by those sea worms which destroy the bottoms of our s.h.i.+ps. There is the clearest evidence of this truth.

Therefore, this wood had grown upon land which flood above the level of sea, while the present land was only forming at the bottom of the ocean.

Wood is the most substantial part of plants, as sh.e.l.ls are the more permanent part of marine animals. It is not, however, the woody part alone of the ancient vegetable world that is transmitted to us in the record of our mineral pages. We have the type of many species of foliage, and even of the most delicate flower; for, in this way, naturalists have determined, according to the Linnaean system, the species, or at least the genus, of the plant. Thus, the existence of a vegetable system at the period now in contemplation, so far from being doubtful, is a matter of physical demonstration.

The profusion of this vegetable matter, delivered into the ocean, which then generated land, is also evidenced in the amazing quant.i.ties of mineral coal which is to be found in perhaps every region of the earth.

Nothing can be more certain, than that all the coaly or bituminous strata have had their origin from the substance of vegetable bodies that grew upon the land. Those strata, tho', in general, perfectly consolidated, often separate horizontally in certain places; and there we find the fibrous or vascular structure of the vegetable bodies.

Consequently, there is no doubt of fossil coal being a substance of vegetable production, however animal substances also may have contributed in forming this collection of oleaginous or inflammable matter.

Having thus ascertained the state of a former earth, in which plants and animals had lived, as well as the gradual production of the present earth, composed from the materials of a former world, it must be evident, that here are two operations which are necessarily consecutive.

The formation of the present earth necessarily involves the destruction of continents in the ancient world; and, by pursuing in our mind the natural operations of a former earth, we clearly see the origin of that land, by the fertility of which, we, and all the animated bodies of the sea, are fed. It is in like manner, that, contemplating the present operations of the globe, we may perceive the actual existence of those productive causes, which are now laying the foundation of land in the unfathomable regions of the sea, and which will, in time, give birth to future continents.

But though, in generalising the operations of nature, we have arrived at those great events, which, at first sight, may fill the mind with wonder and with doubt, we are not to suppose, that there is any violent exertion of power, such as is required in order to produce a great event in little time; in nature, we find no deficiency in respect of time, nor any limitation with regard to power. But time is not made to flow in vain; nor does there ever appear the exertion of superfluous power, or the manifestation of design, not calculated in wisdom to effect some general end.

The events now under consideration may be examined with a view to see this truth; for it may be inquired, Why destroy one continent in order to erect another? The answer is plain; Nature does not destroy a continent from having wearied of a subject which had given pleasure, or changed her purpose, whether for a better or a worse; neither does she erect a continent of land among the clouds, to show her power, or to amaze the vulgar man; Nature has contrived the productions of vegetable bodies, and the sustenance of animal life, to depend upon the gradual but sure destruction of a continent; that is to say, these two operations necessarily go hand in hand. But with such wisdom has nature ordered things in the economy of this world, that the destruction of one continent is not brought about without the renovation of the earth in the production of another; and the animal and vegetable bodies, for which the world above the surface of the sea is leveled with its bottom, are among the means employed in those operations, as well as the sustenance of those living beings is the proper end in view.

Thus, in understanding the proper const.i.tution of the present earth, we are led to know the source from whence had come all the materials which nature had employed in the construction of the world which appears; a world contrived in consummate wisdom for the growth and habitation of a great diversity of plants and animals; and a world peculiarly adapted to the purposes of man, who inhabits all its climates, who measures its extent, and determines its productions at his pleasure.

The whole of a great object or event fills us with wonder and astonishment, when all the particulars, in the succession of which the whole had been produced, may be considered without the least emotion.

When, for example, we behold the pyramids of Egypt, our mind is agitated with a crowd of ideas that highly entertains the person who understands the subject; but the carrying a heavy stone up to the top of a hill or mountain would give that person little pleasure or concern. We wonder at the whole operation of the pyramid, but not at any one particular part.

The raising up of a continent of land from the bottom of the sea, is an idea that is too great to be conceived easily in all the parts of its operations, many of which are perhaps unknown to us; and, without being properly understood, so great an idea may appear like a thing that is imaginary. In like manner, the co-relative, or corresponding operation, the destruction of the land, is an idea that does not easily enter into the mind of man in its totality, although he is daily witness to part of the operation. We never see a river in a flood, but we must acknowledge the carrying away of part of our land, to be sunk at the bottom of the sea; we never see a storm upon the coast, but we are informed of a hostile attack of the sea upon our country; attacks which must, in time, wear away the bulwarks of our soil, and sap the foundations of our dwellings. Thus, great things are not understood without the a.n.a.lysing of many operations, and the combination of time with many events happening in succession.

Let us now consider what is to be the subject of examination, and where it is that we are to observe those operations which must determine either the stability or the instability of this land on which we live.

Our land has two extremities; the tops of the mountains, on the one hand, and the sea-sh.o.r.es, on the other: It is the intermediate s.p.a.ce between these two, that forms the habitation of plants and animals.

While there is a sea-sh.o.r.e and a higher ground there is that which is required in the system of the world: Take these away, and there would remain an aqueous globe, in which the world would perish. But, in the natural operations of the world, the land is peris.h.i.+ng continually; and this is that which now we want to understand.

Upon the one extremity of our land, there is no increase, or there is no accession of any mineral substance. That place is the mountain-top, on which nothing is observed but continual decay. The fragments of the mountain are removed in a gradual succession from the highest station to the lowest. Being arrived at the sh.o.r.e, and having entered the dominion of the waves, in which they find perpetual agitation, these hard fragments, which had eluded the resolving powers natural to the surface of the earth, are incapable of resisting the powers here employed for the destruction of the land. By the attrition of one hard body upon another, the moving stones and rocky sh.o.r.e, are mutually impaired. And that solid ma.s.s, which of itself had potential liability against the violence of the waves, affords the instruments of its own destruction, and thus gives occasion to its actual instability.

In order to understand the system of the heavens, it is necessary to connect together periods of measured time, and the distinguished places of revolving bodies. It is thus that system may be observed, or wisdom, in the proper adapting of powers to an intention. In like manner, we cannot understand the system of the globe, without seeing that progress of things which is brought about in time, thus measuring the natural operations of the earth with those of the heavens. This is properly the business of the present undertaking.

Our object is to know the time which had elapsed since the foundation of the present continent had been laid at the bottom of the ocean, to the present moment in which we speculate on these operations. The s.p.a.ce is long; the data for the calculations are, perhaps, deficient: No matter; so far as we know our error, or the deficiency in our operation, we proceed in science, and shall conclude in reason. It is not given to man to know what things are truly in themselves, but only what those things are in his thought. We seek not to know the precise measure of any thing; we only understand the limits of a thing, in knowing what it is not, either on the one side or the other.

We are investigating the age of the present earth, from the beginning of that body which was in the bottom of the sea, to the perfection of its nature, which we consider as in the moment of our existence; and we have necessarily another aera, which is collateral, or correspondent, in the progress of those natural events. This is the time required, in the natural operations of this globe, for the destruction of a former earth; an earth equally perfect with the present and an earth equally productive of growing plants and living animals. Now, it must appear, that, if we had a measure for the one of those corresponding operations, we would have an equal knowledge of the other.

The formation of a future earth being in the bottom of the ocean, at depths unfathomable to man, and in regions far beyond the reach of his observation, here is a part of the process which cannot be taken as a principle in forming an estimate of the whole. But, in the destruction of the present earth, we have a process that is performed within the limits of our observation; therefore, in knowing the measure of this operation, we shall find the means of calculating what had pa.s.sed on a former occasion, as well as what will happen in the composition of a future earth. Let us, therefore, now attempt to make this estimate of time and labour.

The highest mountain may be levelled with the plain from whence it springs, without the loss of real territory in the land; but when the ocean makes encroachment on the basis of our earth, the mountain, unsupported, tumbles with its weight; and with the accession of hard bodies, moveable with the agitation of the waves, gives to the sea the power of undermining farther and farther into the solid basis of our land. This is the operation which is to be measured; this is the mean proportional by which we are to estimate the age of worlds that have terminated, and the duration of those that are but beginning.

But how shall we measure the decrease of our land? Every revolution of the globe wears away some part of some rock upon some coast; but the quant.i.ty of that decrease, in that measured time, is not a measurable thing. Instead of a revolution of the globe, let us take an age. The age of man does no more in this estimate than a single year. He sees, that the natural course of things is to wear away the coast, with the attrition of the sand and stones upon the sh.o.r.e; but he cannot find a measure for this quant.i.ty which shall correspond to time, in order to form an estimate of the rate of this decrease.

But man is not confined to what he sees; he has the experience of former men. Let us then go to the Romans and the Greeks in search of a measure of our coasts, which we may compare with the present state of things.

Here, again, we are disappointed; their descriptions of the sh.o.r.es of Greece and of Italy, and their works upon the coast, either give no measure of a decrease, or are not accurate enough for such a purpose.

It is in vain to attempt to measure a quant.i.ty which escapes our notice, and which history cannot ascertain; and we might just as well attempt to measure the distance of the stars without a parallax, as to calculate the destruction of the solid land without a measure corresponding to the whole.

The description which Polybius has given of the Pontus Euxinus, with the two opposite Bosphori, the Meotis, the Propontis, and the Port of Byzantium, are as applicable to the present state of things as they were at the writing of that history. The filling up of the bed of the Meotis, an event which, to Polybius, appeared not far off, must also be considered as removed to a very distant period, though the causes still continue to operate as before.

But there is a thing in which history and the present state of things do not agree. It is upon the coast of Spain, where Polybius says there was an island in the mouth of the harbour of New Carthage. At present, in place of the island, there is only a rock under the surface of the water. It must be evident, however, that the loss of this small island affords no proper ground of calculation for the measure or rate of wasting which could correspond to the coast in general; as neither the quant.i.ty of what is now lost had been measured, nor its quality ascertained.

Let us examine places much more exposed to the fury of the waves and currents than the coast of Carthagena, the narrow fretum, for example, between Italy and Sicily. It does not appear, that this pa.s.sage is sensibly wider than when the Romans first had known it. The Isthmus of Corinth is also apparently the same at present as it had been two or three thousand years ago. Scilla and Charibdis remain now, as they had been in ancient times, rocks hazardous for coasting vessels which had to pa.s.s that strait.

It is not meant by this to say, these rocks have not been wasted by the sea, and worn by the attrition of moving bodies, during that s.p.a.ce of time; were this true, and that those rocks, the bulwarks of the land upon those coasts, had not been at all impaired from that period, they might remain for ever, and thus the system of interchanging the place of sea and land upon this globe might be frustrated. It is only meant to affirm, that the quant.i.ty which those rocks, or that coast, have diminished from the period of our history, has either been too small a thing for human observation, or, which is more probable, that no accurate measurement of the subject, by which this quant.i.ty of decrease might have been ascertained, had been taken and recorded. It must be also evident, that a very small operation of an earthquake would be sufficient to render every means of information, in this manner of mensuration, unsatisfactory or precarious.

Pliny says Italy was distant from Sicily a mile and a half; but we cannot suppose that this measure was taken any otherwise than by computation, and such a measure is but little calculated to afford us the just means of a comparison with the present distance. He also says, indeed, that Sicily had been once joined with Italy. His words are: "Quondam Brutio agro cohaerens, mox interfuso mari avulsa.[18]" But all that we can conclude from this history of Pliny is, that, in all times, to people considering the appearances of those two approached coasts, it had seemed probable, that the sea formed a pa.s.sage between the two countries which had been once united; in like manner as is still more immediately perceived, in that smaller disjunction which is made between the island of Anglesey and the continent of Wales.