relieve the internal struggles of the fearful mass within.

Those who live in the neighborhood of volcanoes can scarcely doubt the existence of the molten mass within, when they feel the trembling and rolling of the earth, as if lying on the billows of an ocean, at the same time throwing out immense masses of matter in a state of fusion. The terrific eruptions of Mount Etna, Vesuvius, Skaptar Jocul, Sumbawa, and Kirauea the huge masses thrown out of the craters in a melted state-prove an ocean of liquid materials below, to supply the vast emissions.

In 1783, there was a vast eruption of Skaptar Jocul, the most tremendous in the annals of Iceland, where it is situated.

The quantity of matter thrown out was great. The lava flowed down into the river Skaptar, and dried it up. The channel of the river was between high rocks, in some places

from four to six hundred feet high, and about two hundred feet wide. Not only did the lava fill this great hollow, but it overflowed the adjacent fields to a great distance. It passed on to a great lake, and filled its basin. The current then proceeded, and reaching some ancient

lava full of caverns, penetrated them in some parts, and in other places blew up the rock. The lava continued to flow from the 11th of June until September, spreading widely and filling large gorges. The quantity of melted matter was enormous. There were two branches which flowed in very nearly opposite directions, the one fifty miles long and the other forty. The one was from twelve to fifteen miles wide, and the other seven. The depth was from 100 to 600 feet.

In the year 79, on the 24th of August, there was an eruption of Mount Vesuvius, which threw out such an immense body of melted materials as to overwhelm the two great and populous cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Similar eruptions of Etna have had similar effects.

The amount of melted matter thrown out of Mount Vesuvius in 1737, was estimated at 11,839,168 cubic yards; in 1794, 22,435,520 cubic yards. In 1660, the lava thrown out by Mount Etna was supposed to be twenty times greater than the whole mountain.

The eruptions of volcanoes have produced at an early period, granite, greenstone, por

phyry, syenite, and done the work of breaking and bending rocks.

It is not too much, therefore, to say the whole mass was once a boiling fluid, hardened by time. and chemical action, under the wise direction and superintendence of God; since, in all these operations, we have clear proof of method and design, exhibited in the uniform laws of matter and motion, regulating the chemical and mechanical forces producing these results, and each movement tending to the production of the earth in its present form, and preparing it for the abode of animals, and above all, man. In the careful examination of these rocks, we find no remains of vegetable or animal life; nor do we expect to find any. The great heat, fluid metals, metaloids, the bases of earths, and alkalies, give no reason to look for sensible existence; and of these fluid masses the primitive rocks appear formed. These rocks, broken by some convulsion of nature into irregular masses, thrown into various forms, left cavities for the reception of seas and oceans. In this state there is no evidence of life. There was a great waste; rocks and water, volcanoes, violent winds, and floods-presenting a scene

of apparent disorder, but really a gradual work of arrangement, going on, and the formation of new rocks and soil commencing. Yet, in this state no animal could live. There could be no comfort, no safety. The fiat of creation had been issued, yet no being endowed with life was there. Here we have the proof of the important fact that vegetables and animals were unknown at one period of great length in the history of the globe, a period antecedent to life of every kind. How long this period was who can tell? Was it a million, a billion, or trillion of years? It may have been either; yet it everywhere exhibits design, and a firm, fixed end.

On this solid foundation rest many rocks of a different character. These are slate, shale, slaty sandstone, limestone, and conglomerate rock; showing, by the immense quantities of organic remains they contain, that these remains were deposited in mud and sand, at the bottom of great bodies of water. These were formed by the detritus of former rocks, disintegrated by wind, rain, heat, and drought; and driven into the neighboring waters, and passed into their present forms by some power acting upwards, such as steam, and the pres

sure of very deep water and the air above

giving to the mass its present form, perhaps to be hardened by time. These rocks to be again disintegrated, in many instances, to form soils, to produce vegetables, and support animal life.

Some of these early transition periods appear to have abounded in immense forests, which were torn down by great floods, and driven into great masses, perhaps at the bottom of seas, mixed with mud, now forming slate, and shale, and coal; and organized remains appear in vast quantities. Limestone and shale exhibit immense quantities of organized bodies, all fitted to live in water.

Limestone, the precipitate of an immense salt sea, is filled with the remains of organized bodies, generally resembling the inhabitants of the present ocean. Cement, the precipitate of immense fresh water lakes, highly impregnated with flinty matter, sometimes, called fresh water limestone, abounds equally with the remains of organized bodies, often resembling in genera the inhabitants of lakes, and other bodies of fresh water.

As we pass upwards we find animals in the later periods, aquatic, amphibious, and terrestrial, strikingly resembling animals now living,