It is in vain to attempt to measure a quantity which escapes our notice,
and which history cannot ascertain; and we might just as well attempt to
measure the distance of the stars without a parallax, as to calculate
the destruction of the solid land without a measure corresponding to the
whole.
The description which Polybius has given of the Pontus Euxinus, with
the two opposite Bosphori, the Meotis, the Propontis, and the Port of
Byzantium, are as applicable to the present state of things as they were
at the writing of that history. The filling up of the bed of the
Meotis, an event which, to Polybius, appeared not far off, must also be
considered as removed to a very distant period, though the causes still
continue to operate as before.
But there is a thing in which history and the present state of things do
not agree. It is upon the coast of Spain, where Polybius says there was
an island in the mouth of the harbour of New Carthage. At present, in
place of the island, there is only a rock under the surface of the
water. It must be evident, however, that the loss of this small island
affords no proper ground of calculation for the measure or rate of
wasting which could correspond to the coast in general; as neither
the quantity of what is now lost had been measured, nor its quality
ascertained.
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