Geological Facts

CHAPTER XIII.

SCRIPTURE AND GEOLOGY; OR, APPARENT CONTRADICTIONS RECONCILED 255

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

BY S. & G. NICHOLLS.

PAGE BASALTIC COLUMNS, REGIA, MEXICO Frontispiece. SECTION OF THE EARTH’S CRUST 16 DITTO 21 LONDON BASIN 25 SECTION OF DITTO 25 ARTESIAN WELL 27 MINING DISTRICT 41 SECTION OF A MINE 43 TRILOBITE 56 DITTO 57 EYES OF DITTO 58 CRYSTALLIZATION ON CORNISH SLATE 60 BELLEROPHON 61 SILURIAN REMAINS 61 DITTO 62 CORALLINE 62 LAND’S END 66 FISH SCALES 74 FISH TAILS 75 CEPHALASPIS 76 COCCOSTEUS 77 PTERICHTHYS 78 OSTEOLEPIS 79 EXTINCT AND EXISTING FERNS 87 FLORA OF THE CARBONIFEROUS SYSTEM 95 ASTEROPHYLLITE AND SPHENOPTERIS 97 PECOPTERIS, ODONTOPTERIS, AND NEUROPTERIS 98 CALAMITES 100 STIGMARIA FICOIDES 101 MINER AT WORK, AND LAMP 105 CASTS OF RAIN DROPS 111 FOOTPRINTS OF BIRD 113 DITTO 114 FOOTPRINTS OF LABYRINTHODON 116 AMMONITES 130 DITTO AND NAUTILUS 131 DITTO 132 ICHTHYOSAURUS 137 PLESIOSAURUS 140 DIRT-BED, PORTLAND 150 OOLITE CORAL 151 DITTO 152 PEAR ENCRINITES 164 DITTO 165 DITTO, WITH CORAL 166 AMMONITES JASON 166 OOLITE SHELLS 169 DISCOVERING THE PTERODACTYLE 170 THE PHILOSOPHER AND DITTO 171 PTERODACTYLE SKELETON 173 DITTO, RESTORED 174 FAUNA OF THE OOLITIC PERIOD 195 ROYSTON HEATH 206 FOSSIL TEETH (GREENSAND) 209 FOSSILS FROM THE GAULT (FOLKSTONE) 210 DITTO 211 FOSSILS FROM THE CHALK 212 FOSSIL FISH 214 DITTO 215 WALTONIAN AND MANTELLIAN FISHERMEN 223 FOSSILS FROM THE LONDON CLAY 238 WOOD PERFORATED BY THE TEREDINA 241 SEPTARIA 242 FOSSILS FROM RED CRAG 245 MEGATHERIUM 248 MASTODON 250 FOSSIL MAN 251 CLIFF, GUADALOUPE 252 THE GEOLOGIST’S DREAM 254 THE RECONCILIATION 288

GEOLOGY.

CHAPTER I.. Introductory.

INTRODUCTORY.

“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” MOSES.

Geology is the history of the crust of this planet. This history we compile, not from old records or moth-eaten state papers, not from antiquarian research or the study of ancient coins, but from actual and painstaking examination of the materials composing this crust. How suitable is this word crust, will be seen at once, when it is considered that its thickness in all probability does not exceed eighty miles, a mere fraction of the distance to the earth’s centre. Of this eighty miles we know pretty accurately the character and arrangement of some seven or eight miles; not that we have ever penetrated so far beneath the surface in a straight line, the deepest mines not exceeding 1800 or 1900 feet; but, by putting together the thicknesses of the various strata, with which we are well acquainted, we reach this conclusion without much hesitation. Professor Whewell has well observed, that “an earth greater or smaller, denser or rarer, than the one on which we live, would require a change in the structure and strength of all the little flowers that hang their heads under our hedges. There is something curious in thus considering the whole mass from pole to pole and from circumference to centre, as employed in keeping a snowdrop in the position most suited to its vegetable health.” When we come to examine this crust, several appearances of a striking character reward our toil. At first, and before we proceed in our investigations more minutely, we find that there are only two varieties of rocks in all the vast arrangements spread out before us. Some rocks we find to be unstratified, and others we find to be stratified: from the absence of all fossils in the former of these, and from their crystalline character, we conclude that these were formed by the action of fire, and therefore we call them Igneous or Plutonic rocks. From the sedimentary character and from the numerous fossils of the stratified rocks, we conclude these to have been formed by the action of water, and we therefore call these Aqueous or Neptunian rocks. Following out these investigations, we meet with other facts equally interesting: we find that the Plutonic or unstratified rocks lie generally at the base of all the others, and that where they come up to the surface and crop out from other rocks, or rise in towering mountain heights above them, this has been the result of igneous action from beneath, and that this elevation has disturbed the surrounding strata from the horizontal position in which we imagine them to have been first arranged. The extent of the Plutonic rocks is immense; in Europe, the Scandinavian mountains, the Alps, the Pyrenees, and the Carpathians; in Asia, the Himalayan, the Caucasian, and the Altai mountains; in Africa, the Atlas mountains and the Cape of Good Hope; in America, nearly the whole of the two continents, and in Australia, its southern part;—all these wide regions of the globe are composed of those igneous or Plutonic rocks to which we give the names of granite, basalt, porphyry, trap, &c. &c. Finding the surrounding strata disturbed by depression, or upheaval in consequence of the giant claims of these older rocks that appear to have risen out of the centre of the earth in a red-hot or semifluid condition, and then suddenly to have cooled down, we begin to examine this upper and sedimentary strata, and here the most delightful and romantic results are obtained. We find no two courses or formations in these sedimentary rocks alike. Rising up from the granite, we meet in the clay strata corals and trilobites, the first fossil forms of ancient life with which we are acquainted: we rise higher still, for our imaginary start is from the bottom of the earth’s crust, and we meet in other rocks fossil fishes of an extraordinary shape, and once, doubtless, possessed of extraordinary functions; higher yet, and touching the coal measures, we come to vast forests of palms and ferns, that by chemical changes and mechanical pressure have been converted into our mineral coal, the vast fields of which constitute the real diamond mines of Great Britain; higher yet, exploring the Lias and Oolitic groups, the huge remains of ancient saurians (animals of the lizard species) fill us with awe and wonder, and make us rejoice that they had no successors in the next strata; higher yet, and we reach the last period of the earth’s history, previous to the introduction of man, and enormous “four-footed beasts,” the mastodon, the megatherium and others, astonish us by their gigantic proportions, and evidently herbivorous habits; and last of all we rise to the surface and breathe freely in company with our fellow man, made in the image of God, to inhabit this world as his palace, and to interpret its mysteries as its priest.

We may probably put these general results into a more popular form,—for we reserve the details to a seriatim examination of each formation,—by the following quotation from a modern and extensively useful writer: “We distinguish four ages of nature, corresponding to the great geological divisions, namely—

“1. The primary or palæozoic age, comprising the Lower Silurian, the Upper Silurian, and the Devonian. During this age there were no air-breathing animals. The fishes were the masters of creation. We may therefore call it the Reign of Fishes.

“2. The secondary age, comprising the carboniferous formation, the trias, the oolitic, and the cretaceous formations. This is the epoch in which air-breathing animals first appear. The reptiles predominate over the other classes, and we may therefore call it the Reign of Reptiles.

“3. The tertiary age, comprising the tertiary formations. During this age, terrestrial mammals of great size abound. This is the Reign of Mammals.

“4. The modern age, characterized by the appearance of the most perfect of created beings. This is the Reign of Man.”

From this brief but necessary outline of “the treasures of the deep” which lie before us we may proceed to make a few preliminary remarks on the moral and theological aspects of this science. Many persons have supposed that the statements of Scripture and the alleged facts of Geology are at variance, and, forgetful that some of the devoutest minds of this and other countries have been equal believers in both, have too summarily dismissed geology from their notice as a study likely to lead to infidelity. To such we would briefly remark, that it is utterly impossible there can be any contradiction between the written volume of Inspiration and the outspread volume of Creation. Both are books written by the same hand, both are works proceeding from the same ever blessed and beneficent Creator. We believe in the plenary inspiration of the Bible, and we believe equally in the plenary inspiration of Nature; both are full of God, for in them both He is all and in all; and he who is the deepest and the most reverent student of both will not be long before he comes to the conclusion that not only is there no disharmony, no discrepancy and no contradiction between them, but that they are both harmonious utterances of the one infinite and ever blessed God.

“In reason’s ear they both rejoice, And utter forth a glorious voice; For ever singing as they shine, ‘The hand that made us is divine.’”

Let us remember that Geology has nothing to do with the history of man, nor with God’s government of man; to the Bible, and only there, do we go for information on these points. Geology gives us the history and the succession of the things and beings that were created and made, we believe, incalculable ages before man was placed on the face of the earth. Possibly at times some new discovery in geology may appear to contradict our long received interpretations of isolated passages in Scripture, in which case the modesty of science compels us to reexamine our data, while our reverence for the word of God teaches us to revise our interpretations. As Dr. Chalmers once remarked, “the writings of Moses do not fix the antiquity of the globe; if they fix anything at all, it is only the antiquity of the species.” We believe that the same God who, in anticipation of the spiritual wants of the human race, graciously promised from the beginning of man’s transgression, that “the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head,” laid up for him “in the bowels of the earth those vast stores of granite, marble, coal, salt, and the various metals, the products of its several revolutions; and thus was an inexhaustible provision made for his necessities, and for the developments of his genius, ages in anticipation of his appearance.”

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