Thus, great things are not understood without the analysing
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-shores, on the other: It is the intermediate space
between these two, that forms the habitation of plants and animals.
While there is a sea-shore 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 perishing 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.
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