SECT. I.--Purpose of this Inquiry.
In the first chapter, I have given a perfect mark by which to judge,
of every consolidated stratum, how far that had been the operation or
effect of water alone, or if it had been that of heat and fusion. This
is the particular veins or divisions of the consolidated stratum,
arising from the contraction of the mass, distended by heat, and
contracted in cooling. It is not an argument of greater or lesser
probability; it is a physical demonstration; but, so far as I see, it
would appear to be for most mineralists an unintelligible proposition.
Time, however, will open the eyes of men; science will some day find
admittance into the cabinet of the curious. I will therefore now give
another proof,--not of the consolidation of mineral bodies by means
of fusion, for there is no mineral body in which that proof is not
found,--but of the inconsistency of aqueous infiltration with the
appearances of bodies, where not only fusion had been employed for the
consolidation, but where the application of heat is necessary, and along
with it the circumstances proper for _distillation_.
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