They are constantly talking of operations which could only
take place in the cavities of the earth above the level of the sea, and
where the influence of the atmosphere were felt; and yet this is the
very place which we have it in our power to examine, and where, besides
the stalactite, and one or two more of the same kind, or formed on the
same principle, they have never been able to discover one of the many
which, according to their theory, ought always to be in action or
effect. So far from knowing that general consolidating operation, which
they suppose to be exerted in filling up the veins and cavities of the
earth by means of the infiltrating water of the surface, they do not
seem fully to understand the only operation of this kind which they see.
The concretion of calcareous matter upon the surface of the earth is
perhaps the only example upon which their theory is founded; and
yet nothing can be more against it than the general history of this
transaction.
Calcareous matter, the great _vinculum_ of many mineral bodies, is in
a perpetual state of dissolution and decay, in every place where the
influences of air and water may pervade.
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