By those who do not choose to understand it; by those, who, like Falstaff, are "troubled with the "disease of not listening, the malady of not marking." Such were, his contemporary atheists and materialists of the middle of the last century. But, was he therefore to compliment those perverters equally of morals and of physics, by excluding from physical science all mention of creation? Was he aware, that in excluding the word, he at the same time excluded the idea associated with the word; and, together with the idea, the principle involved in the idea? the exclusion of which, is the very

excited, by his affectionate attachment to the memory of this great departed naturalist, to endeavour to counteract the citation of this passage; by alleging, that the words" sur lesquelles on ne s'entend pas," should rather have been translated-" on the sense of which people are not agreed." I am willing to accept this vindicator's translation, by which De Luc is made to say; "I will not say created, because, in physics, I ought not to " employ expressions on the sense of which people are not agreed." I do not perceive, what is gained by this change. For, what is the expression, on the sense of which people are not agreed? It is, the simple expression -" created;" and it is through consideration for some disagreeing party, that he is not to employ, and therefore, that he is to exclude, that expression from his physical inquiries into the first formation of mineral substances. The vindicator asks: "Can De Luc be suspected of having wished to "exclude the idea of creation?" This question is superfluously asked; because, the point under immediate consideration is not an idea, but, an expression; and because, he well knows, that De Luc could not be suspected of having entertained such a wish. But, on the other hand, no one can deny, that, in point of fact, he here consents to exclude the expression; and consequently, he must exclude the idea associated with the expression, in treating of physical causes and effects with his infidel contemporaries; and it is this reprehensible concession to the pseudo-philosophy of his day, (which Newton sublimely scorned to concede to that of his own age,) on which I here animadvert.

parent-cause of all materialism and of all atheism? Newton was well aware of this; and, therefore, although assuredly he knew the laws of physical inquiry at the least as well as the best mineral geognost, he did not exclude the word, but entertained it; and proclaimed it, as sufficiently intelligible to every unsophisticated understanding, and as the sine quâ non of truth in treating of material first formations. His logic found, that God is the first physical principle in physics, as he is the first moral principle in morals; and, that there is no arguing truly in either branch of philosophy, without the application of that first, common, and universal principle." De DEO ex phænomenis disserere ad

philosophiam Naturalem pertinet1.—It pertains to "Natural philosophy," said he, "to reason from phenomena to GOD.'

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Had the mineral geology, therefore, carried its analysis as far back as Newton, it would have concluded to that first physical principle for all first physical formations; and, if it had done so, its ge

1 Schol. General. Princip. Math. lib. iii. "Newton," observed Mr. Professor Buckland, in his Inaugural Lecture printed in 1820, 66 was per"haps the first who carried his eye over this extensive and almost "unbounded prospect. As any investigation of Natural Philosophy "which shall not terminate in the Great First Cause will be justly "deemed unsatisfactory, I feel no apology to be necessary for opening "these Lectures with an illustration of the religious application of Geolo"gical Science. ' Hæc,' says the immortal Newton, Hæc de DEO; de quo

utique ex phænomenis disserere ad Philosophiam Naturalem pertinet.”Vindic. Geol. p. 11. It seems to be a blessing almost peculiar to this country, which gave birth to a Bacon and a Newton, that no apology to science is deemed necessary for a religious application of Geology.

neral induction would have been the same as Newton's but, by stopping its analysis short of the term to which Newton extended his, its induction became "the less general, and therefore the "less strong by how much it was the less general;" and thus, it necessarily fell into contradiction to him, as we have seen.

CHAPTER VI.

BUT, there must have been some cause, which determined the mineral geology thus to check its analytical progress at the term of mineral matter; and to return at once, from that point, to the exercise of its synthetical operation.

That cause, was the fascination of physical impressions, or, what it denominates phenomena. For, being habitually conversant with mineral substances, and powerfully attracted by the admirable characters and varieties which they revealed; the appearances of these acquired so dominant an authority in its imagination, as to confine it within their sphere, and to render every other object in nature secondary in its estimation, and comparatively unregarded. And, being unequally instructed in other branches of knowledge, and therefore partial to that particular branch with which it felt itself most familiar; it was led to regard that one branch, which in fact extends itself over the entire mineral surface of our planet, as alone sufficient to supply all the principles requisite for resolving the problem which it proposed to itself. Mineral phenomena, were therefore assumed by the mineral geology to be all-sufficient for determining the great question, of the MODE of the primitive formation of mineral substances; and, in this

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common principle, of the all-sufficiency of phenomena, both the neptunian and the plutonian or vulcanian systems, entirely unite and coincide.

Yet, there were other orders or classes of matter pertaining to this earth, whose first formations presented subjects for inquiry of equal importance; and, which could not be separated from the former, in the question of the MODE of first formation, without a dereliction of the first principles of the philosophy of Bacon and Newton, and, indeed, the first principles of common sense: these were, the classes of animal and vegetable matter. Newton's rules of philosophising require, that we should refer to the same common cause, all existences which share the same common properties; and, the three kingdoms of matter, share equally the same common properties of matter. But, besides sharing the same common properties of matter, they demonstrate a community of system; each existing with relation to the others, and having the reason of its own existence in that relation. Thus, the body of the earth, exists with relation to the vegetation which it is to fructify, and to the animals which it is to support: the two latter, exist with relation to the earth, without which they could neither be nourished nor supported. “That identity of design (says Mr. Pr. Buckland,) which has regulated the organisation of animals and vegetables, and established in each link of the "boundless chain of living beings a system of delicately proportioned laws of co-existence per

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