riii

FKEFACE.

rers. The first general impulse given to thepublic taste for geological investigations inthis country was produced by Professor Playfair ’s luminous and eloquent illustra-tions of the Huttonian theory. The lead-ing feature of this theory, that all rocks orstrata have been formed or consolidatedby central subterranean fire, was ablyand very warmly opposed; and much per-sonal feeling and many adventitious cir-cumstances were associated with the con-test, not highly honourable to philosophy,but well calculated to keep the attentionof the disputants alive to those appearancesin nature which favoured or opposed theirdifferent theories.

The interest excited by the brilliant dis-coveries lately made in chemistry has beenhighly favourable to the progress of geology,by developing new views respecting theobjects in the mineral kingdom, and cre-ating a desire to be acquainted with thesituations in which they occur. Hence a

taste