those which actually exist. Had the earth’s
surface presented only one unvaried mass of
granite or lava; or, had its nucleus been surrounded
by entire concentric coverings of stratified
rocks, like the coats of an onion, a single
stratum only would have been accessible to its
inhabitants; and the varied intermixtures of
limestone, clay, and sandstone, which, under
the actual disposition, are so advantageous to
the fertility, beauty, and habitability, of the
globe, would have had no place.
Again, the inestimably precious treasures of
mineral salt and coal, and of metallic ores, confined
as these latter chiefly are, to the older
series of formations, would, under the supposed
more simple arrangement of the strata, have
been wholly inaccessible; and we should have
been destitute of all these essential elements of
industry and civilization. Under the existing
disposition, all the various combinations of strata
with their valuable contents, whether produced
by the agency of subterranean fire, or by mechanical,
or chemical deposition beneath the water,
have been raised above the sea, to form the
mountains and the plains of the present earth ;
and have still further been laid open to our reach,
by the exposure of each stratum, along the sides
of valleys.
With a view to human uses, the production
of a soil fitted for agriculture,, and the general
TO THE USES OF MAN. 99
dispersion of metals, more especially of that
most important metal iron, were almost essential
conditions of the earth’s habitability by civilized
man.
I would in this, as in all other cases, be unwilling
to press the theory of relation to the
human race, so far as to contend that all the
great geological phenomena we have been considering
were conducted solely and exclusively
with a view to the benefit of man. We may
rather count the advantages he derives from
them as incidental and residuary consequences ;
which, although they may not have formed the
exclusive object of creation, were all foreseen
and comprehended in the plans of the Great
Architect of that Globe, which, in his appointed
time, was destined to become the scene of human
habitation.*
* “ It is true that by applying ourselves to the study of nature,
we daily find more and more uses in things that at first appeared
useless. But some things are of such a kind as not to admit of
being applied to the benefit of man, and others too noble for us
to claim the sole use of them. Man has no farther concern with
this earth than a few fathoms under his fe et: was then the
whole solid globe made only for a foundation to support the
slender shell he treads upon ? Do the magnetic effluvia course
incessantly over land and sea, only to turn here and there a mariner’s
compass? Are those immense bodies, the fixed stars,
hung up for nothing but to twinkle in our eyes by night, or to
find employment for a few astronomers ? Surely he must have
an overweening conceit of mdn’s importance, who can imagine
this stupendous frame of the universe made for him alone.