fess we cannot perceive, and to which we shall have occasion to recur. That such effects are not confined to the lower regions of the earth's surface, is proved, decidedly, 1st, By the forms of the highest mountains, which are universally modified in the same way as the lowest hills of the globe; the highest valleys also containing diluvial gravel like what occurs below. 2dly, By the existence of great masses of rock, transported across valleys from the most elevated points; as from Mont Blanc, the highest point of Europe, to the Jura. 3dly, By the discovery of the remains of animals in the diluvium of the highest regions; as of the mastodon, and fossil species of elephant in the lofty plains of Quito and Mexico; the former at the height of 7,800 feet above the sea;-and still more remarkably, by a recent discovery of fossil bones in the Himalaya mountains. These last remains, which are now in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons in London, were procured by Captain W. S. Webb, from the Chinese Tartars of Daba; who assured him that they were found in the north face of the snowy ridge of Kylas, in lat. 32°, at a spot which he calculated to be not less than 16,000 feet high. They are only obtained from the masses that fall with the avalanches, from the regions of perpetual snow; and are therefore supposed by the natives to have fallen from the clouds, and to be the bones of genii. They belong to a small species of horse, and a species of deer. Their medullary cavities and cancelli are filled with white crystalline carbonate of lime, and their matrix is a grey calcareous sand, interspersed with small concretions of carbonate of lime. The occurrence of these bones,' adds the author, at such an enormous elevation, in the regions of eternal snow, and consequently in a spot now unfrequented ' by such animals as the horse and deer, can, I think, be explained only by supposing them to be of antediluvian origin, and that the carcasses of the animals were drifted to their present place, and lodged in sand, by the diluvial waters.' pp. 222, 223. * The effects of water upon the solid strata of the globe have been the subject of much geological debate; but it is now almost universally admitted, that valleys have been excavated by causes no longer in action, contrary to the opinion of Dr Hutton and Mr Playfair, who maintained that they were formed by the long continued erosion of the streams which actually run through them. This question had been long since placed in a * The bones of a species of bear have also it seems been found, upon the same spot. Qy. Rev. No. 57. pp. 155, 156. very convincing light by Hutchinson and his disciple Catcott; * who have shown, that the surface at present furrowed by valleys, must have been in many cases continuous; and this, in innumerable instances, where streams do not exist at all, (as every chalk down clearly shows), or where the existing streams are quite inadequate to the effect. Thus, in a series such as is here represented, the portions of the beds, a, b and c, at present detached from each other, must once have been continuous; d, has only been partially cut through; and e, has been left untouched, merely because the excavation did not cut deep enough. The coast of Dorset and Devon exhibits a case of this kind very beautifully; and with the greater distinctness, because the beds, which are there intersected, by valleys nearly at right angles to the coast, are so different from each other, and so unlike in appearance (chalk, green sand, oolite, lias, and red marl), that there is no difficulty in tracing them, and no doubt as to their former connexion. The author's paper on this part of the coast, which he has subjoined in an Appendix, is accompanied by a map and explanatory views, and illustrates very clearly this important step in his argument. This very elaborate inquiry is closed by a summary of the arguments, by which Mr Buckland conceives that he has established the concurrence of a transient deluge, affecting universally, simultaneously, and at no very distant period, the entire surface of our planet.' (p. 146.) And the following appears to us to be the chain of proofs. 1st, The universal diffusion of diluvial gravel and water-worn fragments proves, that at some time or other, an inundation has taken place in all countries. * Some ingenious observations on the vallies of chalk, are to be found in A Dissertation upon the Surface of the Earth, as delineated in a Specimen of a Philosophical Chorographical Chart of East Kent, &c. By Christopher Packe, M. D. 1737. + From the Geol. Trans. 2d Series, Vol. i. p. 95. The remaining geological relations of the beds in question have been described by Mr Delabeche. Ibid. p. 40. 2d, The frequent occurrence of portions of rocks, at great distances from the masses whence they must have been detached, shows that this inundation must have acted, at the same time, upon very large portions of the surface. The wide diffusion of similar organic remains, and the traces of the action of great currents in the same direction, tend also to establish this fact. 3d, The general resemblance of all diluvial accumulations; and the similarity in the forms of mountains and valleys, throughout the globe, show that these extensive inundations were also every where of uniform character. 4th, The identity of extinct organic remains, in various quarters, and the circumstances under which they are found, show, that the species of animals no longer exitsing were extinguished by such an inundation; and that it probably was sudden and transitory. Lastly, The fact, that the tops of the highest mountains were inundated, is proof that the deluge was not only universal but simultaneous, since the sinking of the land beneath the sea is disproved by the identity, which has been shown to exist, of the present, with the antediluvian surface of the globe. In considering the force of this reasoning, it is hardly necessary to premise, that to doubt the validity of the physical proof, by which any portion of history is supposed to be confirmed, is a very different thing from asserting that the history itself is false, since the facts narrated may be preternatural, and consequently beyond the reach of physical support;-our interpretation of the narrative may be erroneous;-or the proofs may be insufficient, from the deficiency of our information. We are anxious to guard against misunderstanding upon this point, because, although our own belief in the truth of Revelation rests upon grounds too firm to be shaken by any failure of coincidence between the results of physical inquiry and sacred history, we should be sorry, upon a subject of such great importance, to offend even the prejudices of any person from whom we may differ in opinion. That there has been a deluge, affecting universally all parts of the earth's surface, and producing every where the same or similar effects, no person who has duly examined the evidence can deny. If any doubt remained upon this subject, it must be dispelled by the luminous and decisive statements brought together in the present publication. The only question is, whether that great event, as the author likewise asserts, is proved, by physical evidence, to have been recent, transient, and simultaneous; and upon these points, we must be permitted to say, that the facts appear to us to afford but imperfect evidence as to the date, and still less as to the duration,* of the submersion. We shall, however, confine ourselves at present to the most important of these propositions, and consider simply, whether the proofs of simultaneous submersion are such, and so exclusive, as would satisfy, upon a similar question in any other department of natural philosophy, any candid and intelligent inquirer, unacquainted with other testimony. For to speak of the support to the Sacred narrative afforded by extrinsic inquiry, if the narrative itself be made to form a part of the evidence, is a mode of reasoning that appears to us to be altoge ther inadmissible. We are aware that, in the present case, it is by no means necessary to account for the phenomena under consideration; and that an universal inundation of the globe, under any form, whether simultaneous or successive, is so remote from any thing like experience, and so vast in relation to our limited conceptions, that our reasoning in regard to it must, after all, be extremely unsatisfactory. But where, of two modes of effecting the same event, one involves great difficulty, from which the other is free, that surely is to be considered as physically the more probable which is not so encumbered, unless the proof to the contrary be strictly and exclusively decisive. Now, the hypothesis of simultaneous universality is obviously exposed to the 'trite, but most substantial objection, that it involves the necessity, not only of providing such a vast body of water, as no merely physical agent that we know of can supply, but of removing it after it has been so provided. And the proofs of simultaneousness, as a matter of fact, are certainly not of the exclusive character required. If the identity of the present and the antediluvian continents were fully established, it would go far to exclude the hypothesis which explains the submersion of the highest sum *The very existence of the diluvian Gravel in such immense quantities, is difficult to reconcile with the supposition of a transient, and especially a tranquil submersion. Even if it were supposed to have been already prepared in bays of the sea, its removal to distant heights seems necessarily to imply a very violent action. But the cases already mentioned, of its plain derivation from adjacent, though distant eminences, and of its consequent formation during the time of their being under water, seem quite irreconcileable with the notion of a short or transitory visitation-since no little time and motion would plainly be required to wear down fragments of quartz, granite, and other hard rocks, into smooth and rounded pebbles. mits by the sinking of the land; since it is not probable, (though not absolutely impossible), that if the land had sunk beneath the sea, it would have risen again to its former po-, sition; and this identity would sufficiently refute the opi nion entertained by Cuvier, Deluc, and other eminent na-, turalists, that the antediluvian ocean changed places with the land. But there are still other forms of successive inundation, which do not seem to have entered into the author's view, and which are not physically excluded by any of his arguments. A great convulsion, for example, acting upon the waters of the globe, may have produced, by a wave, if the term be applica ble to so vast a commotion, or a succession of waves, that general destruction, by which the deluge, as a geological event, was characterized. How such a convulsion might have been immediately effected, whether by volcanic agency, or in what other manner, is immaterial to the question, if the hypothesis be sufficient to account for the phenomena, and be not excluded by other considerations. Nor do the remaining steps of the arguments above enumerated, imply the necessity of simultaneous universality. Diluvial gravel would have equally arisen from the successive inundation of large portions of the earth. The similarity of mountains and valleys in all quarters of the globe, would likewise equally result from any such extensive action of water; the materials acted upon being every where the same: and if the phenomena connected with organic remains are at tentively considered, they certainly furnish no exclusive proof upon this question. The destruction of animals would be the necessary result of universal and sudden inundation in whatever form; and if the remains of the same extinct species were found in every quarter of the globe, which has not yet been shown, though this would indicate a very extraordinary state of the antediluvian population,-it would not prove that the destruction of these species was simultaneous. It would on ly follow, in strict reasoning, either that these remains were of animals, which had lived in every quarter of the globe; or, if confined to one region, that they were transported by the deluge from thence to all the rest. In the former case, the universal occurrence of the same remains would be no more h proof of simultaneous inundation, than the universal occurrence of diluvial gravel; both would be the natural effect of inundations, acting upon the same materials, but clearly neither in itself a demonstration of universal coincidence as to time. If, on the other hand, the fossil remains of the same extinct species be found universally,-without proof that the animals had actually inhabited every quarter of the globe; it would follow, |