continued, appears to have languished for fome time, till about the year 1777, when its meetings became more frequent, and, from the uncommon zcal and diflinguifhed abilities of the late Henry Home, Lord Kaimes, at that time elected Prefident of the inftitution, its bufinefs was conducted with renewed ardour and fuccefs.

About the end of the year 1782, in a meeting of the Profeffors of the Univerfity of Edinburgh, many of whom were likewife members of the Philofophical Society, and warmly attached to its interefts, a fcheme was propofed by the Reverend Dr Robertdon, Principal of the Univerfity, for the eftablishment of a New Society on a more extended plan, and after the model of fome of the foreign Academies, which have for their object the cultivation of every branch of science, erudition, and tafte. It appeared an expedient measure to folicit the Royal Patronage to an inftitution of this nature, which promised to be of national importance, and to requeft an eítablishment by charter from the Crown. The plan was approved and adopted; and the Philofophical Society, joining its influence as a body, in feconding the application from the Univerfity, his Majefty was most graciously pleaf ed to incorporate the Royal Society of Edinburgh by Charter.

The first general meeting of the Royal Society of Edinburgh was held, in terms of that Charter, on Monday the 23d day of June 1783, and the Right Hon. Thomas Miller of Barfkimming, Lord Juftice-Clerk, was chofen Prefident of the meeting.

It was then unanimoufly refolved, That all the members of the Philofophical Society of Edinburgh should be affumed as members of the Royal Society: And it was likewife refolved, That the Lords of Council and Seffion, the Barons of Exchequer for Scotland, and a felect number of other gentlemen, fhould be invited to a participation of the Society's labours.

At the fecond general meeting, the Secretary gave in a lift of those noblemen and gentlemen who had accepted of the invitation to became members. He- alfo informed the meeting, that he had been directed by the Vice-prefident and members of the Philofophical Society of Edinburgh, to deliver their minute-book, and all fuch differtations and papers as were in their Secretary's hands, to the Royal Society. The minute-book and papers were accordingly received, and given in charge to the General Secretary.

The compilation of the printed tranfactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, is to be made in the following manner: The papers read at the monthly meetings, and depofited in the hands of the Secretaries of the two claffes, are fubjected to the review of the Committee for Publication, which confifts of the Prefident, VicePrefidents and Council, the General Secretary and Treafurer of the Society; together with the Presidents and Secretaries of the two claffes. This Committee makes a selection of papers, and determines the order in which they are to be publifhed. It is not, however, to be understood, that thofe papers which do not appear in the Tranfactions of the Society are thought unfit for the public eye. Several papers have been communicated with the fole view of furnishing an occafional entertainment to the members; and that end being answered, have been withdrawn by their authors: Effays, obfervations, andcafes, are often read at the meetings of the Society, in order to obtain the opinions of the members on interefting or intricate fubjects: Some papers intended for a future publication have been withdrawn for the prefent by their authors, in order to profit by what has occurred in the converfations which the reading of the papers has fuggefted; and others, of acknowledged merit, the Committee has found it neceffary to referve for a fubfequent yo

lume.

fummits of the mountains towards the general receptacle of that fluid.

The heights of our land are thus levelled with the fhores; our fertile plains are formed from the ruins of the mountains; and thofe travelling materials are ftill purfued by the moving water, and propelled along the inclined furface of the earth. Thefe moveable materials, delivered into the fea, cannot, for a long continuance, reft upon the fhore; for, by the agitation of the winds, the tides and currents, every moveable thing is carried farther and farther along the fhelving bottom of the fea, towards the unfathomable regions of the ocean.

If the vegetable foil is thus conftantly removed from the furface of the land, and if its place is thus to be fuplied from the diffolution of the folid earth, as here reprefented, we may perceive an end to this beautiful machine; an end, arifing from no error in its constitution as a world, but from that deftructibility of its land which is fo neceffary in the fyftem of the globe, in the economy of life and vegetation.

We have now confidered the globe of this earth as a machine, conftructed upon chymical as well as mechanical principles, by which its different parts are all adapted, in form, in quality, and in quantity, to a certain end; an end attained with certainty or fuccefs; and an end from which we may perceive wisdom, in contemplating the means employed.

But is this world to be confidered thus merely as a machine, to laft no longer than its parts retain their prefent pofition, their proper forms and qualities or may it not be alfo confidered as an organized body? fuch as has a conftitution, in which the neceffary decay of the machine is naturally repaired, in the exertion of thofe productive powers by which it had been formed?

This is the view in which we are now to examine the globe; to fee if

there be, in the conftitution of this world, a reproductive operation, by which a ruined conftitution may be again repaired, and a duration or stability thus procured to the machine, confidered as a world fuftaining plants and animals.

If no fuch reproductive power, or reforming operation, after due inquiry, is to be found in the constitution of this world, we should have reason to conclude, that the fyftem of this earth has either been intentionally made imperfect, or has not been the work of infinite power and wisdom.

In what follows, therefore, we are to examine the construction of the prefent earth, in order to understand the natural operations of time past ; to acquire principles by which we may conclude with regard to the future courfe of things, or judge of those operations by which a world, fo wife ly ordered, goes into decay; and to learn by what means fuch a decayed world may be renovated, or the waste of habitable land upon the globe repaired.

As it is not in human record, but in natural history, that we are to look for the means of ascertaining what has already been, it is here proposed to examine the appearances of the earth, in order to be informed of operations which have been tranfacted in time paft. It is thus that, from principles of natural philofophy, we may arrive at fome knowledge of order and fyftem in the economy of this globe, and may form a rational opinion with regard to the courfe of nature, or to e vents which are in time to happen.

The folid parts of the prefent land appear, in general, to have been compofed of the productions of the fea, and of other materials fimilar to thofe now found upon the fhores. Hence we find reafon to conclude,

ift, That the land on which we reft is not fimple and original, but that it is a composition, and had been formed by the operation of fecond caules,

adly,

2dly, That, before the prefent land was made, there had fubfifted a world compofed of fea and land, in which were tides and currents, with fuch o perations at the bottom of the sea as now take place. And,

Laftly, That, while the prefent land was forming at the bottom of the ocean, the former and maintained plants and animals; at least, the fea was in habited by animals, in a fimilar manner as it is at prefent.

Hence we are led to conclude, that the greater part of our land, if not the whole, had been produced by operations natural to this globe; but that, in order to make this land a permanent body, refifting the operations of the waters, two things had been required; 1, The confolidation of maffes formed by collections of loofe or incoherent materials; adly, The elevation of those confolidated maffes from the bottom of the fea, the place where they were collected, to the stations in which they now remain above the level of the ocean.

Here are two different changes, which may serve mutually to throw fome light upon each other; for, as the fame fubject has been made to undergo both these changes, and as it is from the examination of this fubject that we are to learn the nature of thofe events, the knowledge of the one may lead us to fome understand ing of the other.

Thus the fubject is confidered as naturally divided into two branches, to be feparately examined: First, by what natural operation ftrata of loofe materials had been formed into folid maffes; fecondly, By what power of nature the confolidated ftrata at the bottom of the fea had been transformed into land.

With regard to the first of these, the confolidation of ftrata, there are two ways in which this operation may be conceived to have been performed; first, by means of the solution of bodies in water, and the after concretion of thefe diffolved fubftances, when fe

A

parated from their folvent; fecondly, the fufion of bodies by means of heat, and the fubfequent congelation of those confolidating fubftances.

With regard to the operation of water, it is firft confidered, how far the power of this folvent, acting in the natural fituation of those ftrata, might be fufficient to produce the effect; and here it is found, that water alone, without any other agent, cannot be fuppofed capable of inducing folidity among. the materials of ftrata in that fituation. It is, 2dly, confidered, how far, fuppofing water capable of confolidating the ftrata in that fituation, it might be concluded, from examining natural appearances, that this had been actually the cafe? Here again, having proceeded upon this principle, that water could only consolidate strata with fuch fubftances as it has the power to dif folve, and having found ftrata confolidated with every species of fubstance, it is concluded, that ftrata in general have not been confolidated by means of aqueous folution.

With regard to the other probable means, heat and fufion, these are found to be perfectly competent for produ cing the end in view, as every kind of fubitance may by heat be rendered soft or brought into fufion, and as ftrata are actually found confolidated with every different fpecies of fubftance.

A more particular difcuffion is then entered into: Here, confolidating fubftances are confidered as being claffed under two different heads, viz. filiceous and fulphureous bodies, with a view to prove, that it could not be by means of aqueous folution that strata had been confolidated with those particular fubftances, but that their confolidation had been accomplished by means of heat and fusion.

Sal Gem, as a substance soluble in water, is next confidered, in order to fhow that this body had been laft in a melted ftate; and this example is confirmed by one of foffile alkali. The cafe of particular feptaria of iron-stone, a 2

26

as well as certain cryftallized cavities in mineral bodies, are then given as examples of a similar fact; and as containing in themselves a demonstration, that all the various mineral fubftances had been concreted and cryftallized immediately from a ftate of fufion.

Having thus proved the actual fufion of the substances with which ftrata had been confolidated, in having fuch fluid bodies introduced among their interstices, the case of strata, confolidated by means of the fimple fufion of their proper materials, is next confidered; and examples are taken from the most general strata of the globe, viz. filiceous and calcareous. Here alfo demonftration is given, that this confolidating operation had been performed by means of fusion.

The fubftance of granite is next confidered; that fubftance which forms thofe great irregular maffes of the earth. Here alfo it is fhown, from a particular example, that this body of granite had also been in the fluid ftate of fufion.

Having come to this general conclufion, that heat and fufion, not a queous folution, had preceded the confolidation of the loofe materials collec ted at the bottom of the fea, thofe confolidated ftrata, in general, are next examined, in order to difcover other appearances, by which the doctrine may be either confirmed or refuted. Here the changes of ftrata, from their natural ftate of continuity, by veins and fiffures, are confidered; and the cleareft evidence is hence deduced, that the ftrata have been confolidated by means of fufion, and not by aqueous folution; for, not only are ftrata in general found interfected with veins and cutters, an appearance inconfiftent with their having been confolidated fimply by previous folution; but, in proportion as ftrata are more or lefs confolidated, they are found with the proper correfponding appearances of veins and fiffures.

With regard to the fecond branch,

in confidering by what power the confolidated ftrata had been transformed into land, or raised above the level of the fea, it is fuppofed that the fame power of extreme heat, by which every different mineral fubitance had been brought into a melted ftate, might be capable of producing an expanfive force, fufficient for elevating the land, from the bottom of the ocean, to the place it now occupies above the furface of the fea. Here we are again referred to nature, in examining how far the ftrata, formed by fucceffive fediments or accumulations depofited at the bottom of the sea, are to be found in that regular state, which would neceffarily take place in their original production; or if, on the other hand, they are actually changed in their natural fitua tion, broken, twifted, and confounded, as might be expected, from the operation of fubterranean heat, and violent expanfion. But, as ftrata are actually found in every degree of frac ture, flexure, and contortion, confiftent with this fuppofition, and with no other, we are led to conclude, that our land had been raised above the furface of the fea, in order to become a habitable world; as well as that it had been confolidated by means of the fame power of fubterranean heat, in order to remain above the level of the fea, and to refift the violent efforts of the ocean.

This theory is next confirmed by the examination of mineral veins, thofe great fiffures of the earth, which contain matter perfectly foreign to the ftrata they traverfe; matter evidently derived from the mineral region, that is, from the place where the active power of fire, and the expanfive force of heat, refide.

Such being confidered as the oper ations of the mineral region, we are hence directed to look for the manifeftation of this power and force in the appearances of nature. It is here we find eruptions of ignited matter from the fcattered volcanoes of the

globe;