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diff --git a/42043-0.txt b/42043-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f0cfc31 --- /dev/null +++ b/42043-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4729 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42043 *** + +TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: + +A list of corrections is at the end of the text. Italics are indicated +by _underscores_, bold by =equal signs= and superscripts by '^'. + + + + + _Illogical Geology_ + + _The Weakest Point in_ + + _The Evolution Theory_ + + + [Illustration: Author] + + + BY + + GEORGE McCREADY PRICE + + + EDITOR OF "THE MODERN HERETIC," AND AUTHOR OF "OUTLINES OF + MODERN SCIENCE AND MODERN CHRISTIANITY." + + THE MODERN HERETIC COMPANY + 257 S. HILL STREET, LOS ANGELES, CAL. + + + SINGLE COPIES 25^c + 3 COPIES 60c: 10 COPIES $1.75 + + + + +ILLOGICAL GEOLOGY + +THE WEAKEST POINT IN THE EVOLUTION THEORY + + + + +To the Reader. + + +This _Advance Edition_ has been issued by the Publishers in this cheap +form to enable them to get out several thousand copies for critical +review at comparatively small expense. Succeeding editions will be in +regular book form, and will be sold at the usual rates for bound +volumes. + + "It is a singular and a notable fact, that while most other branches + of science have emancipated themselves from the trammels of + metaphysical reasoning, the science of geology still remains + imprisoned in '_a priori_' theories."--_Sir Henry Howorth: "The + Glacial Nightmare and the Flood." Preface. VII._ + + + _THE MODERN HERETIC COMPANY_ + 257 S. HILL ST., LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA + 1906 + + + + + COPYRIGHT 1906 + BY + GEORGE McCREADY PRICE + LOS ANGELES, CAL. + + + + +PART I + + + + +PREFACE + + +This book is not written especially for geologists or other scientists +as such, though it deals with the question which it discusses from a +purely scientific standpoint, and presupposes a good general knowledge +of the rocks and of current theories. It is addressed rather to that +large class of readers to whom geology is only an incident in larger +problems, and who are not quite wholly satisfied with those explanations +of the universe which are now commonly accepted on the testimony of +biological science. I am free to say that my own conviction of the +higher value and surer truth of other data outside of the biological +sciences have always been given formative power in my own private +opinions, and that in this way I have long held that there =must be +something wrong= with the Evolution Theory, and also that there must be +a surer way of gauging the value of that Theory, even from the +scientific standpoint, than the long devious processes connected with +Darwinism and biology. Some years ago, when compelled to investigate the +subject more fully than I had hitherto done, I discovered, somewhat to +my own surprise, the phenomenal weakness of the geological argument. The +results of that investigation have grown into the present work. + +Though mostly critical and analytic, it is not wholly so. But so far as +it is constructive there is one virtue which can rightly be claimed for +it. It is at least an honest effort to study the foundation facts of +geology from the inductive may be standpoint, and whether or not I have +succeeded in this, it is, so far as I know, the only work published in +the English or any other language which does not treat the science of +geology more or less as a cosmogony. + +That such a statement is possible is, I think, my chief justification in +giving it to the public. It would seem as if the twentieth century could +afford at least one book built up from the present, instead of being +postulated from the past. + + GEORGE McCREADY PRICE. + + 257 South Hill Street, + Los Angeles, California, + June, 1906. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PART I + + I THE ABSTRACT IDEA 11 + II HISTORY OF THE IDEA 14 + III FACT NUMBER ONE 20 + IV FACT NUMBER TWO 24 + V TURNED UPSIDE DOWN 27 + V FACT NUMBER FOUR 31 + VII EXTINCT SPECIES 34 + VIII SKIPPING 42 + + + PART II + + IX GRAVEYARDS 53 + X CHANGE OF CLIMATE 64 + XI DEGENERATION 70 + XII FOSSIL MEN 74 + XIII INDUCTIVE METHODS 81 + APPENDIX 89 + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +A brief outline of the argument which I have used in the following pages +will be in order here. + +Darwinism, as a part, the chief part, of the general Evolution Theory, +rests logically and historically on the succession of life idea as +taught by geology. If there has actually been this succession of life on +the globe, then some form of genetic connection between these successive +types is the intuitive conclusion of every thinking mind. But if there +is no positive evidence that certain types are essentially older than +others, =if this succession of life is not an actual scientific fact=, +then Darwinism or any other form of evolution has no more scientific +value than the vagaries of the old Greeks--in short, from the standpoint +of true inductive science it is a most gigantic hoax, historically +scarce second to the Ptolemaic astronomy. + +In Part One I have examined critically this succession of life theory. +It is improper to speak of my argument as destructive, for there never +was any real constructive argument to be thus destroyed. It is +essentially =an exposure=, and I am willing to =give a thousand dollars= +to any one who will, in the face of the facts here presented, show me +how to prove that one kind of fossil is older than another. + +In Part Two I have attempted to build up a true, safe induction in the +candid, unprejudiced spirit of a coroner called upon to hold a _post +mortem_. The abnormal character of most of the fossiliferous deposits, +the sudden world-wide change of climate they record, the marked +degeneration in all organic forms in passing from the older to the +modern world, together with the great outstanding fact that human +beings, with thousands of other living species of animals and plants +have at this great world-crisis left their fossils in the rocks all over +the world, prove beyond a possible doubt that our once magnificently +stocked world met with a tremendous catastrophe some thousands of years +ago, before the dawn of history. As for the =origin= of the living +beings that existed before that event, we can only suppose a =direct +creation=, since modern science knows nothing of the spontaneous +generation of life, or of certain types of life having originated +=before= other types, and thus being able to serve as =the source of +origin= of other alleged succeeding types. + +With the myth of a life succession dissipated once and for ever, the +world stands face to face with creation as the direct act of the +Infinite God. + + + + +CHAPTER I + +THE ABSTRACT IDEA + + +How many of us have ever tried to think out a statement of just how we +would prove that there has been a succession of life on the globe in a +particular order? + +Herbert Spencer did[1] and he did not seem to think the way in which it +is usually attempted a very praiseworthy example of the methods to be +pursued in natural science. + +He starts out with Werner, of Neptunian fame, and shows that the +latter's main idea of the rocks always succeeding one another over the +whole globe like the coats of an onion was "untenable if analyzed," and +"physically absurd," for among other things it is incomprehensible that +these very different kinds of rocks could have been precipitated one +after another by the same "chaotic menstrum." + +But he then proceeds to show that the science is "still swayed by the +crude hypotheses it set out with; so that even now, old doctrines that +are abandoned as untenable in theory, continue in practice to mould the +ideas of geologists, and to foster sundry beliefs that are logically +indefensible." + +Werner had taken for his data the way in which the rocks happened to +occur in "a narrow district of Germany," and had at once jumped to the +conclusion that they must always occur in this relative order over the +entire globe. "Thus on a very incomplete acquaintance with a thousandth +part of the earth's crust, he based a sweeping generalization applying +to the whole of it." + +Werner classified the rocks according to their mineral characters, but +when the fossils were taken as the prime test of age, the "original +nomenclature of periods and formations" kept alive the original idea of +complete envelopes encircling the whole globe one outside each other +like the coats of an onion. So that now, instead of Werner's successive +ages of sandstone making or limestone making, and successive suites of +these rocks, we have successive ages of various types of life, with +successive systems or "groups of formations which everywhere succeed +each other in a given order; and are severally everywhere of the same +age. Though it may not be asserted that these successive systems are +universal, yet it seems to be tacitly assumed that they are so.... +Though, probably, no competent geologist would contend that the European +classification of strata is applicable to the globe as a whole; yet +most, if not all geologists, write as though it were so." + +Spencer then goes on to show how dogmatic and unscientific it is to say +that when the Carboniferous flora, for example, existed in some +localities, this type of life and this only must have enveloped the +world. + +"Now this belief," he says, "that geologic 'systems' are universal, is +quite as untenable as the other. It is just as absurd when considered _a +priori_: and it is equally inconsistent with the facts," for all such +systems of similar life-forms must in olden time have been of merely +"local origin," just as they are now. In other words, we have no +scientific knowledge of a time in the past when there were not +zoological provinces and zones as there are to-day, one type of life +existing in one locality, while another and totally different type +existed somewhere else. + +Then, after quoting from Lyell a strong protest against the old fancy +that only certain types of sandstone and marls were made at certain +epochs, he proceeds: + +"Nevertheless, while in this and numerous passages of like implication, +Sir C. Lyell protests against the bias here illustrated, he seems +himself not completely free from it. Though he utterly rejects the old +hypothesis that all over the earth the same continuous strata lie upon +each other in regular order, like the coats of an onion, he still writes +as though geologic 'systems' do thus succeed each other. A reader of his +'Manual' would certainly suppose him to believe, that the Primary epoch +ended, and the Secondary epoch commenced, all over the world at the same +time.... =Must we not say that though the onion-coat hypothesis is dead, +its spirit is tractable, under a transcendental form, even in the +conclusions of its antagonists.=" + +Spencer then examines at considerable length the kindred idea that the +same or similar species "lived in all parts of the earth at the same +time." "This theory," he says, "is scarcely more tenable than the +other." + +He then shows how in some localities there are now forming coral +deposits, in some places chalk, and in others beds of Molluscs; while in +still other places entirely different forms of life are existing. In +fact, each zone or depth of the ocean has its particular type of life, +just as successive altitudes do on the sides of a mountain; and it is a +dogmatic and arbitrary assumption to say that such conditions have not +existed in the past. + +"On our own coasts, the marine remains found a few miles from shore, in +banks where fish congregate, are different from those found close to the +shore, where only littoral species flourish. A large proportion of +aquatic creatures have structures that do not admit of fossilization; +while of the rest, the great majority are destroyed, when dead, by the +various kinds of scavengers that creep among the rocks and weeds. So +that no one deposit near our shores can contain anything like a true +representation of the fauna of the surrounding sea; much less of the +co-existing faunas of other seas in the same latitude; and still less of +the faunas of seas in distant latitudes. Were it not that the assertion +seems needful, it would be almost absurd to say that the organic remains +now being buried in the Dogger Bank can tell us next to nothing about +the fish, crustaceans, mollusks, and corals that are now being buried in +the Bay of Bengal." + +This author evidently found it difficult to keep within the bounds of +parliamentary language when speaking of the absurd and vicious reasoning +at the very basis of the whole current geological theory; for, unlike +the other physical sciences, the great leading ideas of geology are not +generalisations framed from the whole series or group of observed facts, +but are really abstract statements supposed to be reasonable in +themselves, or at the most =very hasty conclusions based on wholly +insufficient data=, like that of Werner in his "narrow district of +Germany." Sir Henry Howorth[2] has well expressed the urgent need that +there is of a complete reconstruction of geological theory: + + "It is a singular and a notable fact, that while most other branches + of science have emancipated themselves from the trammels of + metaphysical reasoning, the science of geology still remains + imprisoned in _a priori_ theories." + +But Huxley[3] also has left us some remarks along the same line which +are almost equally helpful in showing the essential absurdity of the +assumption that when one type of life was living and being buried in one +locality another and very diverse type could not have been doing the +same things in other distant localities. + +This is how he expresses it: + +"All competent authorities will probably assent to the proposition that +physical geology does not enable us in any way to reply to this +question--Were the British Cretaceous rocks deposited at the same time +as those of India, or were they a million of years younger, or a million +of years older?" + +This phase of the idea, however, is not so bad, for the human mind +refuses to believe that distant and disconnected groups of similar forms +were not connected in time and genetic relationship. It is really the +reverse of this proposition that contains the most essential absurdity, +and this is the very phase that is most essential to the whole +succession of life idea. Huxley, indeed, seems to have caught a glimpse +of this truth, for he says: + +"A Devonian fauna and flora in the British Islands =may= have been +contemporaneous with Silurian life in North America, and with a +Carboniferous fauna and flora in Africa. =Geographical provinces and +zones may have been as distinctly marked in the Palaeozoic epoch as at +present.=" + +Certainly; but if this be true, it is equally certain that the +Carboniferous flora of Pennsylvania may have been contemporaneous alike +with the Cretaceous flora of British Columbia and the Tertiary flora of +Germany and Australia. But in that case what becomes of this succession +of life which for nearly a century has been the pole star of all the +other biological sciences--I might almost say of the historical and +theological as well? + +Must it not be admitted that in any system of clear thinking this whole +idea of there having really been a succession of life on the globe is +not only =not proved= by scientific methods, but that it is essentially +unprovable and absurd? + +Huxley, in point of fact, admits this, though he goes right on with his +scheme of evolution, just as if he never thought of the logical +consequences involved. His words are: + +"In the present condition of our knowledge and of our methods (_sic_) +one verdict--'=not proven and not provable='--must be recorded against +all grand hypotheses of the palaeontologist respecting the general +succession of life on the globe." + +In view of these startling facts, is it not amazing to see the +supernatural knowledge of the past continually and quietly assumed in +every geological vision of the earth's history? + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] "Illogical Geology; Illustrations of Universal Progress," pp. + 329-380; D. Appleton & Co., 1890. + +[2] "The Glacial Nightmare and the Flood," Preface VII. + +[3] "Discourses Biol. and Geol.," pp. 279-288. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +HISTORY OF THE IDEA + + +Among the few stray principles that the future will probably be able to +save from the wreck of Spencer's philosophy, is the advisability of +looking into =the genealogy of an idea=. What has been its surroundings? +What is its family history? Does it come of good stock, or is its family +low and not very respectable? + +This is especially true in the case of a scientific idea, which above +all others needs to have a clean bill of health and a good family +record. But, unfortunately, the idea we are here considering has a bad +record, very bad in fact; for the whole family of Cosmogonies, of which +this notion is the only surviving representative, were supposed to have +been banished from the land of science long ago, and were all reported +dead. Some of them had to be executed by popular ridicule, but most of +them died natural deaths, the result of inherited taint, in the latter +part of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It is perfectly +astonishing how any of the family could have survived over into the +twentieth century, in the face of such an antecedent record. + +For one of the chief traits of the family as a whole is that of mental +disorder of various stages and degrees. Some of them were raving crazy; +others were mild and comparatively harmless, except that their drivel +had such a disturbing effect on scientific investigations that they had +to be put out of the way. It seems such a pity that when this last +fellow, early in life, was up before Doctors Huxley and Spencer for +examination, he was not locked up or put in limbo forthwith. This is +especially unfortunate, because this survivor of an otherwise extinct +race has since then produced a large family, some of which it is true +have already expired, while the eldest son, Darwinism, was reported in +1901 to be "at its last gasp,"[4] and was even said last year to have +had its "tombstone inscription" written by von Hartmann of Germany. But +the succession of life idea itself, the father of all this brood, is +still certified by those in authority to be healthy and _compos mentis_. + +The Cosmogony Family is a very ancient one, running back to the time of +Plato and Thales of Miletus. Indeed the cuneiform inscriptions of +Babylonia seem to indicate that a tribe with very similar +characteristics existed several millenniums before the Christian era. +But discarding all these, the first men that we need to mention are +perhaps Burnet and Whiston, who knew no other way of arriving at +geological truth than to spin a yarn about how the world was made. +Woodward seems to have had a little better sense, and is named along +with Hooke and John Ray as one of the real founders of the science. + +Unfortunately the brood of Cosmogonists was not dead, for Moro and De +Maillet were at this same period spinning their fantastic theories about +the origin of things; or as Zittel puts it, "accepted the risks of +error, and set about explaining the past and present =from the +subjective standpoint=."[5] This tendency we will find to be a birthmark +in the family, and will serve to invariably identify any of them +wherever found. We must remember this, and apply the test to the modern +survivors. + +Buffon seems to have been really the founder of the family in the modern +form. He is credited with the sarcastic remark that "geologists must +feel like the ancient Roman augurs who could not meet each other without +laughing;" though in view of his fantastic scheme of seven "epochs," in +which he endeavors to portray "the beginning, the past, and the future +(_sic_) of our planet,"[6] one is reminded of the common symptom which +manifests itself in thinking all the rest of the world crazy. + +The "Heroic Age of Geology" succeeded this period, and was characterized +largely by a determination to discard speculation, and to seek to build +up a true science of actual fact and truth. + +We have already seen from Spencer's remarks that A. G. Werner, who was, +however, one of the leaders in Germany at this time, was very far from +following true inductive methods. And the following language of Sir +Arch. Geikie shows that in him the family characteristics were decidedly +prominent: + +"But never in the history of science did a stranger hallucination arise +than that of Werner and his school, when they supposed themselves to +discard theory and build on a foundation of accurately-ascertained fact. +Never was a system devised in which theory was more rampant; theory, +too, unsupported by observation, and, as we now know, utterly erroneous. +From beginning to end of Werner's method and its applications, +assumptions were made for which there was no ground, and these +assumptions were treated as demonstrable facts. =The very point to be +proved was taken for granted=, and the geognosts, who boasted of their +avoidance of speculation, were in reality among the most hopelessly +speculative of all the generations that had tried to solve the problem +of the theory of the earth."[7] + +In fact this author says that: + +"The Wernerians were as certain of the origin and sequence of the rocks +as if they had been present at the formation of the earth's crust." (pp. +288-9.) + +Here we see the family characteristics very strongly developed. + +In speaking of Werner's five successive "suites" or onion-coats in which +he wrapped his embryo world, Zittel complains: + +"Unfortunately, Werner's field observations were =limited to a small +district=, the Erz mountains and the neighboring parts of Saxony and +Bohemia. And his chronological scheme of formations was founded upon the +mode of occurrence of the rocks within these narrow confines." (p. 59.) + +And yet, as we have seen, it is precisely such a charge as this that +Spencer and Huxley bring against the modern phase of the doctrine of +successive ages based on the succession of life idea. Werner, from +observations "limited to a small district," constructed his scheme of +exact chronological sequence, basing it entirely upon the mineral or +mechanical character of his "suites." And hundreds of enthusiastic +followers long declared that the rocks everywhere conformed to this +classification, even so great an observer as von Humboldt thinking that +the rocks which he examined in Central and South America fully confirmed +Werner's chronological arrangement. + +But such notions to-day only cause a smile of pity, for it is now well +known that, take the world over, =the rocks do not occur= as Werner +imagined, though, as Geikie says, he and his disciples were as certain +of the matter "as if they had been present at the formation of the +earth's crust." Besides, as already pointed out, we moderns ought now to +have pretty well assimilated the idea that while one kind of mineral or +rock was forming in one locality, =a totally different kind of deposit= +may have been in process of formation in another spot some distance off +=at the very same time=, and we cannot imagine a time in the past when +this principle would not hold good. But in a precisely similar way the +idea of a time value was, as we shall see, transferred from the +mechanical and mineral character of the rocks to their fossil contents; +and from observations again "limited to a small district," William Smith +and Cuvier conceived the idea that the fossils occurred =only= in a +certain order; that only certain fossils lived at a certain time; that, +for example, while Trilobites were living and dying in one locality, +Nummulites or Mammals positively were not living and dying in another +locality, though in any system of clear thinking this latter notion is +just as irrational as that of Werner. Hence Spencer is compelled to say, +"though the onion-coat hypothesis is dead, its spirit is still +traceable, under a transcendental form, even in the conclusions of its +antagonists." + +The two cases are exactly parallel; only it has taken us nearly a +hundred years, it seems, to find out that the fossils do not follow the +prearranged order of Smith and Cuvier any better than the rocks and +minerals do the scheme of Werner. If hundreds of geologists still seem +to think that the fossils in general agree with the standard order, we +must remember how many sharp observers said the same thing for decades +about Werner's scheme. The taint of heredity will always come out sooner +or later; and both of these schemes exhibit very strongly the family +history of the whole tribe of Cosmogonies, viz., =the facts refuse to +certify that they are of sound mind=. + +It was William Smith, an English land surveyor, who first conceived the +idea of fixing the relative ages of strata by their fossils. Just how +far he carried this idea it seems difficult to determine exactly. +Lyell[8] says nothing along this line about him, save that he followed +the leading divisions of the Secondary strata as outlined by Werner, +though he claims "independently" of the latter. Whewell[9] remarks +rather pityingly on his having had "no literary cultivation" in his +youth, but has nothing about the degree in which he is responsible for +the modern scheme of life succession of which many modern geologists +have made him the "father". Geikie and Zittel are much more explicit. +The former[10] says that "he had reached early in life the conclusions +on which his fame rests, and he never advanced beyond them." "His plain, +solid, matter-of-fact intellect never branched into theory or +speculation, but occupied itself wholly in the observation of facts." +Zittel[11] says pretty much the same thing, remarking that "Smith +confined himself to the empirical investigation of his country, and was +never tempted into general speculations about the history of the +formation of the earth"--words which to my mind are the very highest +praise, for they seem to indicate that he was only in a very limited way +responsible for the unscientific and illogical scheme of a "phylogenic +series" or complete "life-history of the earth," which now passes as the +science of geology. Doubtless like his little bright-eyed German +contemporary, A. G. Werner, he had not had his imagination sufficiently +cultivated in his youth to be able to appreciate the beauty of first +assuming your premises and then proving them by means of your +conclusion, i.e., first assuming that there has been a gradual +development on the earth from the lowest to the highest, and then +arranging the fossils from scattered localities over the earth in such a +way that they cannot fail to testify to the fact. + +The following may be taken as a fair statement of what he actually +accomplished and taught: + +"After his long period of field observations, William Smith came to the +conclusion that one and the same succession of strata stretched through +England from the south coast to the east, and that each individual +horizon could be recognized by its particular fossils, that certain +forms reappear in the same beds in the different localities, and that +each fossil species belongs to a definite horizon of rock."[12] + +But even granting the perfect accuracy of this generalization of Smith's +for the rocks which he examined, I fail to see how it is any better than +Werner's scheme, which Zittel characterizes as "weak" and premature, and +of which Whewell (p. 521) says that "he promulgated, as respecting the +world, a scheme collected from a province, and even too hastily gathered +from that narrow field." + +Quoting again from Zittel's criticism of Werner's work ("Hist. of +Geology," p. 59), we must admit that Smith's observations also were +"limited to a small district," and "his chronological scheme of +formations was founded upon the mode of occurrence of the rocks +(fossils) within these narrow confines." There is, as we have shown, a +monstrous jump from this to the conclusion that =even these particular +fossils= must always occur in this particular relative order over the +whole earth. How can any one deny that if we had a complete collection +of all the fossils laid down during the last thousand years--when all +admit that the so-called "phylogenic series" is complete--particular +fossils would in many cases be found to occur only in particular rocks, +and we could still arrange them in this same order from the lowest to +the highest forms of life, while we might even happen to find "small +districts" where the "mode of occurrence of the rocks within these +narrow confines" would have all the appearance of showing a true +"phylogenic" order. This of itself ought to be sufficient to show us +the weakness of this subjective method of study, and the purely +hypothetical and imaginary value of the fossils in determining the real +age of a rock deposit. + +The name of Baron Cuvier is the next that we have to consider. An +examination of part of his teaching will come naturally a little later +when considering "extinct species." That part of his work which related +to the doctrine of Catastrophism is somewhat aside from the subject of +our study; while with regard to his influence on the succession of life +idea _per se_ there is not very much that need be said. And yet Cuvier +is the real founder of modern cosmological geology, and thus in a +certain sense the father of biological evolution. + +But if the absence of the architectonic mania for building a cosmogony +will serve to remove in a great measure any suspicions with regard to +William Smith's results, we cannot say the same for those of Cuvier. In +his scheme the hereditary Cosmological taint, which is such an +invariable characteristic of the family, is very strong, though +disguised and almost transfigured by learning and genius. It is +doubtless these latter qualities which have secured for the theory such +a phenomenal length of life, though of course we know that nothing born +of this whole brood can ever secure a permanent home in the kingdom of +science. + +"How glorious," wrote this otherwise truly great man in his famous +"Preliminary Discourse," "it would be if we could arrange the organized +products of the universe in their chronological order, as we can already +(Werner's onion-coats) do with the more important mineral substances!" + +His work (with that of his co-laborer Brongniart) on the fossils of the +Paris basin was probably accurate and logical enough for that limited +locality. It was only when he quietly assumed as Werner had done, that +the rocks must always occur in this particular order all over the world, +or as Whewell expresses it, "promulgated as respecting the world, a +scheme collected from a province, and (perhaps) even too hastily +gathered from that narrow field"--it was only, I say, when this +monstrous assumption was incorporated into his scheme, and he began to +call into being his vision of organic creation on the instalment plan, +as Werner had done with the minerals, that his great and valuable work +for science became tainted with the deadly Cosmological virus, dooming +it to death sooner or later. Sherlock Holmes might attempt to diagnose a +disease by a mere glance at his patient's boots, but even this gave him +more data and was a more logical proceeding than the facts and methods +of Cuvier supplied for constructing a scheme of organic creation. + +It will not be necessary to detail the manner in which the modern +"phylogenic series" was gradually pieced together from the scattered +fragments here and there all over the globe; but it should be noted here +that the whole chain of life was practically complete before any serious +attempt was made to study the rocks on the top of the ground, and to +find out how this marvellous record of the past =joined on to the modern +period=, thus reversing completely the true inductive method, and +leaving the most important of all, viz., the rocks containing human +remains and other living species, over till the last, with the result +that we have for over half a century been laboring under a "Glacial +Nightmare," and these deposits on the top of the ground "still remain in +many respects the despair of geology." + +Then came Lyell, Agassiz, and Darwin; and now in the light of the keen +discussions instituted by Weismann in the later eighties of the last +century, the modern world is pretty well agreed on two results, viz., +that so far from natural selection being able to originate a species, it +can't possibly =originate= anything at all, and also that no individual +can transmit to his descendants what he has himself acquired in his +lifetime, and hence it is hard to see how he can transmit what he has +not got himself and what none of his ancestors ever had. + +I have not the space to show how Agassiz further complicated the problem +immensely by his absurdly illogical use of his three "laws" of +comparison, when the prime fact of there ever having been a succession +of life on the globe in any order whatever had never been proved; but I +am free to say that if Cuvier's system of creation on the instalment +plan had been fact instead of fancy, some scheme of evolution would +undoubtedly be implied in this general fact. It is this instinctive +feeling on the part of modern scientists which makes them to-day, while +confessing the failure of Darwinism, still cling to the general idea of +evolution =somehow=. Hence it seems quite evident that, having deviated +from strict inductive methods by pursuing this _ignis fatuus_ of a +cosmological history of creation, it was essential in the interests of +true science to go the whole journey and make a complete investigation +of the biological side of the question, in order to complete the +demonstration that science was on a wrong tack entirely. Darwin and +Weismann were inevitable in view of the wholly unscientific course on +which biology entered under the guidance of Buffon and Cuvier. + +What then can we take as the general lesson to be learned from the +stubborn way in which, for over a hundred years, the world has followed +this hypnotic suggestion of folly, that we might explain our genesis and +being from the scientific standpoint? One of the lessons--there may be +others--is that =science knows nothing about origins=, and that, in +speculating along these lines, the cosmological taint will always +vitiate the accuracy of our conclusions and debauch the true spirit of +induction. A hundred years ago, they thought they knew all about how the +world was made. The keen investigations inspired by Darwinism were +necessary to convince us that we know nothing at all about it. Modern +biology has simply developed a gigantic _reductio ad absurdum_ argument +against the easy assumptions of the earlier geologists that it occurred +by a progression from the low to the high. A hundred years--nay fifty +years ago--this assumption did not appear so unscientific, for we did +not then have the biological evidence to refute such an idea. Now, +however, in the light of the modern progress of science, this awful +mystery of our existence, of our creation and destiny, is borne in upon +us from every dividing cell, from every sprouting seed, from countless +millions of the eloquent voices of nature, which our forefathers were +too blind to see, too deaf to understand; and with weary, reluctant +sadness does science confess that about it all she knows absolutely +nothing. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[4] Nature, Nov. 28, 1901, pp. 76, 77. + +[5] "History of Geology," p. 23. + +[6] Zittel, p. 42. + +[7] "Founders of Geology," p. 112; Johns Hopkins Press, 1901. + +[8] "Principles," p. 50, 8th Ed. + +[9] "History of the Inductive Sciences," vol. ii., p. 521. + +[10] "Founders of Geology," pp. 237-8. + +[11] "History," p. 112. + +[12] Zittel, "History," p. 110. It should be noted that all these rocks + in England thus examined by Smith make up only a small fraction of + the total geological series--largely what we now call the Jurassic + and Cretaceous rocks. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +FACT NUMBER ONE + + +Hitherto we have been dealing only with the _a priori_ aspects of the +succession of life idea. We have seen that it is really based on two +primary assumptions, viz.: + +(1) That over all the earth the fossils =must always occur= in the +particular order in which they were found to occur in a few corners of +Western Europe; and also-- + +(2) That in the long ago =there were no such things as zoological +provinces and zones=, and totally different types of fossils from +separated localities could not possibly have been contemporaneous with +one another as we know they are to-day in "recent" deposits.[13] + +On the blending of these two assumptions, the latter essentially absurd, +and the former long ago disproved by the facts of the rocks, has been +built up the towering structure of a complete "phylogenic series" from +the Cambrian to the Pleistocene. The way in which, as we have been, +Spencer and Huxley treated this subject, reminds us very much of the old +advice, "When you meet with an insuperable difficulty, look it +steadfastly in the face--and pass on." For neither they nor any of their +thousands of followers have ever, so far as I know, pointed out the +horrible logic in taking this immense complex of guesses and assumptions +as the starting-point for new departures, the solid foundation for +detailed "investigations" as to =just how= this wonderful phenomenon of +development has occurred. For after Agassiz and his contemporaries had +built on these large assumptions of Cuvier, and had arranged the details +and the exact order of these successive forms by comparison with the +embryonic life of the modern individual, the evolutionists of our time, +led by such men as Spencer and Haeckel, with their "philogenetic +principle," =prove= their theory of evolution by showing that the +embryonic life of the individual is only "a brief recapitulation, as it +were from memory," of the geological succession in time. There would +really seem to be little hope of reaching with any arguments a +generation of scientists who can elaborate genealogical trees of descent +for the different families and genera of the animal kingdom, based +wholly on such a series of assumptions and blind guesses, and then palm +off their work on a credulous world as the proved results of =inductive= +science. + +And yet I am tempted to make some effort in this direction. And since we +have now examined the _a priori_ aspects of the question, it remains to +test the two above mentioned assumptions by the facts of the rocks. The +=second=, indeed, involving as it does a profound supernatural knowledge +of the past, and being so positively contrary to all that we know of the +modern world as to seem essentially absurd, is yet by its very nature +beyond the reach of any tests that we can bring to bear upon it. Hence +it remains to test by the facts of the rocks =the assumption that all +over the earth the fossils invariably occur in the particular order in +which they were first found in a few corners of Western Europe= by the +founders of the science. Have we already a sufficiently broad knowledge +of the rocks of the world to decide such a question? I think we have. + +To begin then at the beginning, let us try to find out how we can fix on +the rocks which are absolutely the oldest on the globe. We would expect +to find a good many patches of them here and there, but there must be +some common characteristic by which they may be distinguished wherever +found. Of course, when I say "rocks" here I mean fossils, for as has +long been agreed upon by geologists, mineral and mechanical characters +are of practically no use in determining the age of deposits, and we are +here dealing only with life and the order in which it has occurred on +the globe. Accordingly our problem is really to find that typical group +of fossils which is essentially older than all dissimilar groups of +fossils. + +In most localities we do not have to go very far down[14] into the earth +to find granite or other so-called igneous rocks, which not only do not +contain any traces of fossils, but which we have no proper reason for +supposing ever contained any. These Azoic or Archaean rocks constitute +practically all the earth's crust, there being only a thin skim of +fossiliferous strata on the outside somewhat like the skin on an apple. +Now it would be natural enough to suppose that those fossils which occur +at the bottom, or next to the Archaean, are the oldest. This is +doubtless what the earlier geologists had in mind, or at least ought to +have had, for it is not quite certain that they had any clear thoughts +on the matter whatever. They did not really begin at the bottom, but +half way up, so to speak, at the Mesozoic and Tertiary rocks, and +Sedgwick and Murchison, who undertook to find bottom, got too excited +over their Cambro-Silurian controversy to attend to such an +insignificant detail as the logical proof that any type of fossils was +really older than all others. If they had really stopped to consider +that some type of fossil might occur next to the Archaean in Wales, and +another type occur thus in Scotland, while still another type altogether +might be found in this position in some other locality, and so on over +the world, leading us to the very natural conclusion that in the olden +times as now =there were zoological provinces and districts=, the +history of science during the nineteenth century might have been very +different, and this chapter might never have been written. But this +commonplace of modern geology, that any type of fossil whatever, even +the very "youngest," may occur next to the Archaean, was not then +considered or understood; and when about 1830 it came to be recognized, +other things were allowed to obscure its significance, and the habit of +arranging the rocks in chronological order according to their fossils +was too firmly established to be disturbed by such an idea. + +But the Fact Number One, which I have chosen as the subject of this +chapter, is the now well established principle that =any kind of fossil +whatever, even "young" Tertiary rocks, may rest upon the Archaean or +Azoic series, or may themselves be almost wholly metamorphosed or +crystalline, thus resembling in position and outward appearance the +so-called "oldest" rocks=. + +The first part of this proposition, about any rocks occurring next to +the Archaean, is covered by the following quotation from Dana:[15] + +"A stratum of one era may rest upon any stratum in the whole of the +series below it,--the Coal-measures on either the Archaean, Silurian, or +Devonian strata; and the Jurassic, Cretaceous, or Tertiary on any one of +the earlier rocks, the intermediate being wanting. The Quaternary in +America in some cases rests on Archaean rocks, in others on Silurian or +Devonian, in others on Cretaceous or Tertiary." + +It would be tedious to multiply testimony on a point so universally +understood. + +As for the other half of this fact, that even the so-called "youngest" +rocks may be metamorphic and crystalline just as well as the "oldest," +it also is now a recognized commonplace of science. Dana[16] says that +as early as 1833 Lyell taught this as a general truth applicable to "all +the formations from the earliest to the latest." + +The first reference I can find to any disproof of this old fable of +Werner's, that only certain kinds of rock are to be found next to the +"Primitive" or Archaean, is in the observations of Studer and Beaumont +in the Alps, (1826-28), who found "relatively young" fossils in +crystalline schists, which, as Zittel says, "was a very great blow to +the geologists who upheld the hypothesis of the Archaean or pre-Cambrian +age of all gneisses and schists." + +James Geikie, doubtless referring to the same series of rocks, tells us +that:-- + +"In the central Alps of Switzerland, some of the Eocene strata are so +highly metamorphosed that they closely resemble some of the most ancient +deposits of the globe, consisting, as they do, of crystalline rocks, +marble, quartz-rock, mica schist, and gneiss."[17] + +Hence we need not be surprised at the following statement of the +situation by Zittel.[18] + +"The last fifteen years of the nineteenth century witnessed very great +advances in our knowledge of rock-deformation and metamorphism. =It has +been found that there is no geological epoch whose sedimentary deposits +have been wholly safeguarded from metamorphic changes=, and, as this +broad fact has come to be realized, it has proved most unsettling, and +has necessitated a revision of the stratigraphy of many districts in the +light of new possibilities. The newer researches scarcely recognize any +theory; they are directed rather to the empirical method of obtaining +all possible information regarding microscopic and field evidences of +the passage from metamorphic to igneous rocks, and from metamorphic to +sedimentary rocks." + +But in addition to what Zittel means by recognizing "no theory" as to +the origin of the various sorts of "igneous" rocks, it seems to me that +this "broad fact" ought surely to prove "most unsettling," to the +traditional theories about certain fossils being intrinsically older +than others. With our minds divested of all prejudice, and this "broad" +Fact Number One well comprehended, that any kind of fossil whatever may +occur next to the Archaean, and the rocky strata containing it may in +texture and appearance "closely resemble some of the most ancient +deposits on the globe," =where= on this broad earth shall we look for +the place =to start= our life-succession That is, where can we now go to +find those kinds of fossils which we can prove, by independent +arguments, to be absolutely older than all others? It may seem very +difficult for some of us to discard a theory so long an integral part of +all geology; but until it can be proved that this "broad fact" as stated +by Zittel and Dana is no fact at all, I see no escape from the +acknowledgment that the doctrine of any particular fossils being +essentially older than others is a pure invention, with absolutely +nothing in nature to support it. + +Or, to state the matter in another way, since the life succession theory +rests logically and historically on Werner's notion that only certain +kinds of rocks (fossils) are to be found at the "bottom" or next to the +Archaean, and it is now acknowledged everywhere that any kind of rocks +whatever may be thus situated, it is as clear as sunlight that the life +succession theory rests logically and historically on a myth, and that +there is =no way of proving what kind of fossil was buried first=. + +Of course, the reason the followers of Cuvier and his life succession +now find themselves in such a fix as this is because they have not been +following true inductive methods. Theirs has been a geology by +hypothesis instead of by observed fact. They started out with a pretty +scheme ready-made about the origin and formation of the world, perfectly +innocent of any evil intent in such a method of procedure, and +unconscious of its speculative character; and for nearly a hundred years +they have supposed that they were following inductive methods in +Geology. But in view of what we have now learned I think we are +perfectly justified in adapting and applying to Cuvier and the modern +school of geologists what Geikie[19] says about Werner and his school: + +"But never in the history of science did a stranger hallucination arise +than that of Cuvier and the modern school, when they supposed themselves +to discard theory and build on a foundation of accurately ascertained +fact. Never was a system devised in which theory was more rampant; +theory, too, unsupported by observation, and, as we now know, utterly +erroneous. From beginning to end of Cuvier's method and its +applications, assumptions were made for which there was no ground, and +these assumptions were treated as demonstrable facts. The very point to +be proved was taken for granted, and the evolutionary geologists who +boasted of their avoidance of speculation, were in reality among the +most hopelessly speculative of all the generations that had tried to +solve the problem of the theory of the earth." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[13] The onion-coat hypothesis, which is the only other alternative, + modern science professes to have abandoned. + +[14] When the text-books speak of ten or twelve miles thickness of the + fossiliferous rocks, the reader should remember how the rocks have + to be patched up together from here and there to make this + incredible thickness, as only a small fraction of such a thickness + exists in any one place. + +[15] "Manual," p. 399, Fourth Ed. + +[16] "Manual," p. 408. + +[17] "Manual of Historical Geol.," p. 74. + +[18] "Hist.," p. 360. + +[19] "Founders of Geology," p. 112. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +FACT NUMBER TWO + + +If we had ample evidence that a certain man was personally acquainted +with Julius Caesar, that they were born in the same town, went to school +together, served in the same wars, and later carried on an extensive +mutual correspondence, would we not conclude that they must have lived +in the same age of the world's history? I confess that the conclusion +seems quite unavoidable. Who would dream that eighteen centuries or more +had separated the two lives, and that while one was an old Roman the +other was an American of the latter nineteenth century? + +Some such a puzzle as this is presented in geology under the general +subject of =conformability=. Let me define this term. + +Strata laid down by water are in the first place in a horizontal +position. Some subsequent force may have disturbed them, so that we may +now find them standing up on edge like books in a library. But all human +experience goes to show that they were not deposited in this position. +Some disturbing cause must have taken hold of them since they were laid +down, for the water in which they were made must have spread them out +smooth and horizontal, each subsequent layer or stratum fitting "like a +glove" on the preceding. Thus when we find two successive layers +agreeing with one another in their planes of bedding, with every +indication that the lower one was not disturbed in any way before the +upper one was spread out upon it, the two are said to be =conformable=. +But if the lower bed has evidently been upturned or disturbed before the +other was laid down, or if its surface has even been partly eroded or +washed away by the water, the strata are said to be =unconformable=, or +they show =unconformability= in bedding. + +Of course, in all this we are dealing only with =relative= time. When we +find one bed or stratum lying above another in their natural position, +the lower one is of course the older of the two; but whether laid down +ten minutes earlier, or ten million years earlier, how are we to +determine? Ignoring the matter of the fossils they contain, must we not +own that, though there is no way of telling just how much longer the +lower one was deposited before the next succeeding, yet if the two are +conformable to one another, and the bottom one shows no evidence of +disturbance or erosion before the other was fitted upon it, the strong +presumption would seem to be that no great length of time could have +elapsed between the laying down of the two layers. To say that we have +here a geological example similar to that of a modern American having +been personally acquainted with Julius Caesar, would seem to be quite +"inexplicable," as Herbert Spencer used to say. + +But if the life succession theory be true, we have just such a conundrum +in our Fact Number Two, which is that =any formation whatever may rest +conformably upon any other "older" formation=. + +The lower may be Devonian, Silurian, or Cambrian, and the upper one +Cretaceous or Tertiary, and thus according to the theory millions on +millions of years must have elapsed after the first, and before the +following bed was laid down, but the conformability is perfect, and the +beds have all the appearance of having followed in quick succession. +Sometimes, too, though less frequently, these age-separated formations +are lithologically the same, and can only be separated by their fossils! + +But before going into the minute description of any of these cases, we +must notice some general statements. Thus as long ago as the date of the +publication of "The Origin of Species," Darwin, in speaking of the +"Imperfection of the Geological Record," could speak of "The many cases +on record of a formation conformably covered, after an immense interval +of time, by another and later formation, without the underlying bed +having suffered in the interval by any wear and tear."[20] + +Also Geikie,[21] in speaking of how "fossil evidence may be made to +prove the existence of gaps which are not otherwise apparent," says that +"It is not so easy to give a satisfactory account of those which occur +where the strata are strictly conformable, and where no evidence can be +observed of any considerable change of physical conditions at the time +of deposit. A group of quite conformable strata having the same general +lithological characters throughout, may be marked by a great discrepance +between the fossils of the upper and the lower part." In many cases he +says these conditions are "not merely local, but persistent over wide +areas.... They occur abundantly among the European Palaeozoic and +Secondary rocks," and are "traceable over wide regions." + +We have seen how Dana admits that "A stratum of one era may rest upon +any stratum in the whole series below it, ... the intermediate being +wanting." He classes this under the head of the "=Difficulties=" of the +science, quite naturally as it would seem, though he does not expressly +assert that these age-separated formations are often =conformable= to +one another, as Geikie and Darwin have said in the above given +quotations. + +The literature really teems with illustrations of these facts, and the +more detailed accounts contained in the various Geological Reports are +often quite charmingly _naive_ in their description of the conditions. +Two examples, however, must suffice, both from the Canadian North West. + +The first is from the Report on the region about Banff, in Alberta, near +the line of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and just east of the Rockies. + +"East of the main divide the Lower Carboniferous is overlaid in places +by beds of Lower Cretaceous age, and here again, although the two +formations differ so widely in respect to age, one overlies the other +without any perceptible break, and the separation of one from the other +is rendered more difficult by the fact that the upper beds of the +Carboniferous =are lithologically almost precisely like those of the +Cretaceous (above them.) Were it not for fossil evidence, one would +naturally suppose that a single formation was being dealt with.="[22] + +The other example is from the District of Athabasca. + +"The Devonian limestone is apparently succeeded conformably by the +Cretaceous, and with the possible exception of a thin bed of +conglomerate of limited extent, which occurs below Crooked Rapid on the +Athabasca, the age of which is doubtful, the =vast interval of time= +which separated the two formations, is, so far as observed, +=unrepresented= either by deposition or erosion."[23] + +Of course, some geological writers labor to explain this thundering +rebuke of their theory, just as the Ptolemaic astronomers had their +"deterrents" and "epicycles" for every new difficulty. But surely the +detailed records of such observations as these are fearful examples of +the power of tradition to blind the minds of investigators to the +meaning of the very plainest facts. + +On a previous page (Id. p. 51,) the author last quoted gives us some +idea of the "remarkable persistence" of this instructive case of +conformability, which extends from the Athabasca "in a broad band around +the southern end of Birch Mountains, and across Lake Claire to Peace +River, and up the latter stream to a point two miles above Vermillion +Falls." + +The distance, as I judge from the map, can not be less than 150 miles in +a straight direction, thus making a district of probably several +thousand square miles in extent where, according to the theory of a life +succession, nature must have put an injunction on the action of the +elements, and they had to continue in the _status quo_ for millions of +ages, or from the Devonian to the Cretaceous "age," the water neither +wearing away nor building up over any part of this consecrated ground +during all this time. + +Nor is this all, for from Part E, Report (p. 209) of this same volume, +we are told of strata near Lake Manitoba, =over 500 miles away=, in +almost the same wonderful relationship,--"Devonian rocks very similar in +character" to those in Athabasca still overlaid directly by the +Cretaceous, though in this case as it happens "unconformably." It would +almost seem to be a _bona fide_ case of Werner's onion coats cropping +out. + +And all this incredible picture of nature's inconsistent behaviour in +past ages is necessitated solely by the loving allegiance with which the +infallibility of the life succession theory is regarded by modern +geologists. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[20] "Origin," Vol. II., p. 58: Sixth Ed. The first edition, I believe, + contains the same language. + +[21] "Text-Book," p. 842. + +[22] Canadian "Annual Report," New Series, Vol. II., Part A, p. 8. + +[23] "Annual Report," New Series, Vol. V., Part D, p. 52. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +TURNED UPSIDE DOWN + + +How many of us have ever seen a mountain fall? Not very many. And yet +events even more wonderful than this have frequently occurred in the +past, as we are confidently assured by the leaders in geological +science. Thus, in speaking of a certain region in the Alps, Dana[24] +says that "one of the overthrust folds has put the beds upside down over +an area of 450 square miles." + +It is well worth our while to try to understand this statement. Our +first and most natural inquiry is, What is it that leads scientists to +think so? The details of this particular case are not very accessible, +and so we are driven to reasoning from analogy from the known methods +and constructions employed in this science. We must agree that none of +the authorities who report this circumstance can testify as +eye-witnesses of this marvellous event: they were not there on the spot +when old Mother Earth turned this huge calcareous and silicious pancake. +And yet there must be some kind of evidence by which these eminent men +have arrived at this conclusion. What kind of evidence can it be? + +We cannot imagine any physical evidence which could even remotely +suggest such an idea. In fact from the universal custom of making the +contained fossils the supreme test of the age of a rock deposit, we are +perfectly safe in concluding that it is =solely because the fossils +occur here in the reverse of the accepted order=, that we have this +astounding picture of an immense mountain mass having been put "upside +down over an area of 450 square miles." The "older" fossils are +evidently here on top, while the "younger" ones are underneath, and of +course some explanation must be given of this flat contradiction of the +life succession theory. + +But let us retrace our steps somewhat, and pick up the thread of our +argument. We have already found quite serious reason to question the +accuracy of this life succession theory: but there is still another way +of testing its rationality. If certain fossils are not necessarily older +than certain others, it might reasonably be expected that we would now +and then find them reversed as to position, i.e., with the "younger" +below and the "older" above. Accordingly we have the following very +necessary caution from Prof. Nicholson:[25] + +"It may even be said that in any case where there should appear to be a +clear and decisive discordance between the physical and the +palaeontological (fossil) evidence as to the age of a given series of +beds, it is the former that is to be distrusted rather than the latter." + +To meet all ordinary cases of this character, where the differences +involve only a few formations representing a few "ages" or a few million +years, the theory of pioneer "colonies" was invented by Barrande in +1852. + +But for extreme cases, say where Silurian or Cambrian fossils occur +=above= Jurassic, Cretaceous or Tertiary, there is in such a predicament +always an anxious search made for faults and displacements; or gigantic +"thrust-faults" or "overthrust folds," like the example already quoted +from Dana, are described in picturesque language, many miles in +extent--inventions which, as I have already suggested of a similar +expedient to explain away evidence, deserve to rank with the famous +"epicycles" of Ptolemy, and will do so some day. + +Here is Geikie's highly instructive statement regarding the same +conditions:-- + +"We may even demonstrate that in some mountainous ground, the strata +have been turned completely upside down, _if_ we can show that the +fossils in what are now the uppermost layers =ought properly= to lie +underneath those in the beds below them."[26] + +Some day, I fancy, a statement like this will be regarded as a literary +curiosity. + +There are plenty of examples under this head, though two or three ought +to be as good as a dozen. In the part of Alberta east of the Rockies +already referred to, is a section of country of about fourteen square +miles at least--and we know not how much more--where Cambrian fossils +are found =above= Cretaceous, and the inevitable "thrust fault" is thus +described by one of the officers of the Canadian Geological Survey. He +has just been speaking of "a series" of these "gigantic thrust +faults":-- + +"One of the largest and most important of these occurs along the eastern +base of the chain, and brings the Cambrian limestones of the Castle +Mountain group over the Cretaceous of the foot hills. This fault has a +vertical displacement of more than 15,000 feet (? three miles), and an +estimated horizontal displacement of the Cambrian beds of about seven +miles in an easterly section. The actually observed overlap amounts to +nearly two miles. The angle of inclination of its plane to the horizon +is =very low=, and in consequence of this its outcrop follows a very +sinuous line along the base of the mountains, =and acts exactly like the +line of contact of two nearly horizontal formations=. + +"The best places for examining this fault are at the gaps of the Bow and +of the south fork of the Ghost River. At the former place the Cretaceous +shales form the floor of the bay which the Bow has cut in the eastern +wall of the range, and rise to a considerable height in the surrounding +slopes. Their line of contact with the massive gray limestones of the +overlying Castle Mountain group is well seen near the entrance of the +gap in the hills to the north. The fault plane here is nearly +horizontal, and the two formations, viewed from the valley, =appear to +succeed one another conformably=."[27] + +But what an amazing condition of affairs is this. Here are great +mountainous masses of rock, very similar in mechanical and mineral +make-up to thousands of examples elsewhere. The line of bedding between +them "acts exactly like the line of contact of two nearly horizontal +formations," and in a natural section cut out by a river the two "appear +to succeed one another conformably." And yet we are asked to believe +that all this is merely an optical illusion. The rocks could not +possibly have been deposited in this way, for the lower ones contain +"Benton fossils" (Cretaceous), and the upper ones are Cambrian, and +almost the whole geological series and untold millions of years occurred +=after= the upper one, and =before= the lower one was formed. Solely on +the strength of the infallibility of a theory invented a hundred years +ago in a little corner of Western Europe, which "promulgated, as +respecting the world, a scheme collected from that province," and +assumed that over all the world the rocks must always follow the order +there observed, we are here asked to deny the positive evidence of our +senses =because= these rocks do not follow this accepted order. I must +confess that I cannot see the force of such a method of reasoning. It is +carrying the argument several degrees beyond the reasoning of the three +little green peas in the little green pod, as narrated in the exquisite +fable of Eugene Field. These wise little fellows noticed that their +little world was all green, and they themselves green likewise, and they +shrewdly concluded from this that the whole universe must also be green. +But we are not told of their travelling abroad and persisting in a +systematic attempt to explain all subsequently observed facts in terms +of their theory. + +This government Report last quoted from says that in the eastern part of +Tennessee the Appalachian Chain "presents an almost identical +structure," and refers to a similar state of things in the Highlands of +Scotland. Dana, in the last edition of his "Manual" (p. 369), refers to +this report, and reproduces some of its plates showing some of the +structures referred to; and on another page, in speaking of this similar +example in Scotland, says that "a mass of the oldest crystalline rocks, +many miles in length from north to south, was thrust at least ten miles +westward over younger rocks, part of the latter fossiliferous"; and +further declares that "the thrust planes look like planes of bedding, +and were long so considered."[28] + +Geikie quite naturally devotes several pages in his "Text-Book" to a +description of these conditions in the Highlands; but from one of his +first reports on these observations, published in _Nature_[29] we get +some much more suggestive details. The thrust-planes, he says, are +difficult to be "distinguished from ordinary stratification planes, like +which they have been plicated, faulted, and denuded. Here and there, as +a result of denudation, a portion of one of them =appears capping a +hill-top=. One almost refuses to believe that the little outlier on the +summit does not lie normally on the rocks below it, but on a nearly +horizontal fault by which it has been moved into its place." + +Speaking of some similar conditions in Ross Shire, which he himself had +previously described as naturally conformable, he declares:-- + +"=Had these sections been planned for the purpose of deception= they +could not have been more skillfully devised ... and no one coming first +to this ground would suspect that what appears to be a normal +stratigraphical sequence is not really so." + +"When a geologist finds" things in this condition, he says, "he may be +excused if he begins to wonder =whether he himself is not really +standing on his head=." + +But I would only weary the reader by attempting to pursue this subject +further. Those who wish to do so will find many additional examples in +the larger works of Dana, LeConte, Prestwich, and Geikie, to say nothing +of the more detailed statements buried in numerous Government Reports +and special monographs in German and French. + +From the very same set of beds different observers try to explain these +puzzles in very different ways. Some, like Helm, will describe gigantic +overthrust folds, and will draw immense arcs of circles several miles +high in the air, as the place where the rocks must once have been. +Others, like Rothpletz, from an examination of the very same rocks, will +cut the mountain up into sections with imaginary fault-planes, and will +tell how, in the district about Glarus for example, an enormous mass of +mountains "travelled from east to west a distance of about twenty-five +miles from the Rhine valley to the Linth," or how the "Rhatikon Mountain +mass travelled from Montafon valley to the Rhine valley, about nineteen +miles from east to west."[30] + +With regard to some at least of these conditions in the Alps, Geikie +virtually admits that these incredible and self-contradictory +earth-movements are necessitated by and described from fossil evidence +only, for he says:-- + +"... the strata could scarcely be supposed to have been really inverted, +save for the evidence (_sic_) as to their true order of succession +supplied by their included fossils." "... portions of Carboniferous +strata appear as if regularly interbedded among Jurassic rocks, and +indeed could not be separated save after a study of their enclosed +organic remains."[31] + +In fact, we are perfectly safe in concluding in all similar cases that +we may encounter in the literature of the science that it is the +reversed order of the fossils which constitutes the whole evidence; for, +as I have said, we can imagine no possible physical evidence competent +to form a foundation for such ideas, nor do I know of anything save the +exigencies of this venerable theory of life succession, for which +otherwise competent observers will thus freely sacrifice their common +sense. When the dividing line between two sets of strata "acts exactly +like the line of contact between two nearly horizontal formations," so +much so that in a natural section cut out by a river the two "appear to +succeed one another conformably," a calm judicial mind, divested of all +theoretical prejudice, instead of talking about these conditions having +been planned by nature "for the purpose of deception," will find no +difficulty at all in believing that these rocks were really laid down in +the =reverse order= in which we now find them, with the "younger" below +and the "older" above, and only one under the hypnotic spell of a +preconceived theory would at the suggestion of such a fact begin "to +wonder whether he himself is not really standing on his head." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[24] "Manual," p. 367. + +[25] "Ancient Life-History of the Earth," p. 40. + +[26] "Text-Book," p. 837, Ed. of 1903. + +[27] "Annual Report," New Series, Vol. II., Part D, pp. 33-34. + +[28] pp. 111, 534. + +[29] Nov. 13, 1884, pp. 29-35. + +[30] See _Nature_, Jan. 24, 1901, p. 294. + +[31] "Text-Book," p. 678. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +FACT NUMBER FOUR + + +There is only one class of agents now working upon the rocks of the +globe which have been in business continuously ever since the dry land +appeared, and which have left us a legible record of approximately the +amount of business they have been doing all these centuries. And my Fact +Number Four, which will complete this line of argument in illustrating +the antagonism between the facts of the rocks and the theory of life +succession, is that the =rivers= of the world, which of course are the +agents to which I have referred, in traveling across the country, =act +precisely as if they knew nothing of the varying ages of the rocks=, but +on the contrary treat them all alike as if they were of the same age, +and =as if they began sawing at them all at the same time=. Of course it +is, evidently, in only a few cases where the records are so free from +ambiguity as to be quite incapable of being misunderstood, that is, the +cases of rivers with steep rocky gorges, or those that cut through +mountain ranges; but there are several such rivers in the world, and +they all seem to tell the same story. + +The famous Colorado River is a good example. It flows from "younger" +strata into "older" in its deep cutting across the Arizona plateau.[32] +Stated in terms of the current theory, this means that when the region +of country about the lower part of this river's course first became dry +land, the upper part was still sea, and that thus there was no such +river in existence here until the very "youngest" of these rocks was +formed. For otherwise the river must have started running from the sea +toward the dry land, i.e., running up hill. Stated in terms neutral as +to theory, it means that the whole of this region of country, drained by +this large river, with its rocks of many varying "ages," was all +elevated practically as it is now before this river began its work of +erosion. It treats all these rocks as if they were of the same age, and +as if it began sawing at them all at the same time. + +Also its companion, the Green River, cuts through the Uinta Range in the +same manner. Similar conditions are said to occur on the Danube, and in +the river-courses of the Himalayas, and elsewhere. + +In the case of the Colorado, Zittel says that: + +"Powell's explanation of the apparent enigma is that after the river had +eroded its channel rocks were uplifted in one portion of its course, but +so slow was the rate of uplift that the river was enabled to deepen its +channel, either proportionately or more rapidly, so that it was never +diverted from its former course." + +It was by similarly cunning inventions that the early writers on +astronomy, alchemy, and medicine evaded the force of accumulated facts +which told against their absurd theories. + +We have now completed our survey of the strictly stratigraphical phases +of this question, and have found four very remarkable principles about +the rocks, which I wish to summarize here before proceeding further. + +(1) The "broad fact," as stated by Zittel and Dana, that any kind of +rocks whatever, i.e. containing any kinds of fossils, even the +"youngest," may rest on the Archaean, and may thus in position, as also +in texture and appearance, resemble the very oldest deposits on the +globe. + +(2) That any kind of beds may rest in such perfect conformability on any +other so-called "older" beds over vast stretches of country that, "were +it not for fossil evidence, one would naturally suppose that a single +formation was being dealt with," while "the vast interval of time +intervening is unrepresented either by deposition or erosion." The +youngest seem to have followed the oldest in quick succession. + +(3) That in very many cases and over many square miles of country these +conditions are exactly reversed, and such very "ancient" rocks as +Cambrian limestones are on top of the comparatively "young" Cretaceous, +while the lime between them "acts exactly like the line of contact of +two nearly horizontal formations," and in a natural section made by a +river the two "appear to succeed one another conformably." To any one +ignorant of the theory of life succession they have every appearance of +having been deposited as we find them. + +(4) That the rivers of the world, in cutting across the country, +completely ignore the varying ages of the rocks in the different parts +of their courses, and act precisely as if they began sawing at them all +at the same time. + +Now I know not what additional fact can be demanded or imagined to +complete the demonstration that there is =no particular order= in which +the fossils can be said to occur as regards succession in time. It is +true, some fossiliferous deposits, metamorphosed almost beyond +recognition, and buried deep beneath thousands of feet of subsequent +deposits, have enough appearance of remote antiquity about them in all +conscience. But to increase this antiquity by saying that other equally +prodigious masses of rocks elsewhere were deposited long after these, or +by pointing to still other deposits in another region which are said to +be older than any of the others, is an illogical and wholly unscientific +procedure. I fear I could scarcely confine myself within the bounds of +parliamentary language were I to attempt to express an opinion regarding +any effort that may now be made to justify the life succession theory in +view of the above acknowledged facts. + +And surely it is scarcely necessary in this enlightened age to point out +how completely this vitiates any biological argument (such as that of +Darwinism) which has incorporated into its system the results of such +illogical reasoning, or which in any way is dependent upon the +conclusions of such a theory of geology. In view of the laws of +evidence, which every intelligent person is supposed to understand +now-a-days, surely some strange things passed for scientific proof +during the nineteenth century. For, as we have seen, the earlier +geologists did little better than =assume= the succession of life +bodily; than Agassiz and his contemporaries =arranged the details= and +the exact order of these successive life forms by comparison with the +embryonic life of the modern individual; and now the evolutionists of +our day, led by such men as Spencer and Haeckel with their "phylogenetic +principle," =prove their theory of evolution= by showing that the +embryonic life of the modern individual is only "a brief +recapitulation, as it were, from memory," of the (assumed) geological +succession in time. Surely this will some day make a more amazing record +for posterity than those of phlogiston or the epicycles of Ptolemy. + +If I am now asked: What do the rocks have to tell us, in view of the +fact that they refuse to testify to a life succession? I can only say +that we are not as yet in a position to decide this question. There are +several other matters connected with the character and mode of +occurrence of the fossils, which are almost equally important with +anything already considered, in forming a true scientific induction +regarding this matter. These facts must be considered in subsequent +chapters. Already, however, we can say this much, that we have in the +rocks almost as complete a world, in some respects vastly more complete, +than the living world of to-day. With the life succession theory +repudiated, we have still to deal with the fossils themselves which have +been thus systematically classified; =but this geological series becomes +only the taxonomic or classification series of an older state of our +present world=, buried somehow and at some time or times in the remote +past--the how and the when of which we have not as yet the means to +determine. + +But I think we are now prepared to enter the mazes of the biological +argument, and to study the subject of extinct species, which by many is +supposed to furnish a line of independent evidence in favor of the life +succession theory. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[32] See Zittel, "History of Geol.," pp. 210, 211. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +EXTINCT SPECIES + + +Let us now test the value of this assumed life succession by another +very simple question. In "Eocene times," so we are told, England was a +land of palms, with a semi-tropical flora and fauna. In fact at this +time, cycads, gourds, proteads (like the Australian shrubs and trees), +the fig, cinnamon, screw-pine, and various species of acacias and palms, +abounded in England and Western Europe; while turtles, monkeys, +crocodiles, and other sub-tropical and warm-temperate forms were equally +abundant. Then again, in the Pleistocene deposits of the same countries, +we find various species of elephant and rhinoceros, with a hippopotamus, +lion, and hyena, identical with species now living in the tropics, +"although," as Dana says, "these modern kinds are dwarfs in comparison." + +=Now, how are we to prove that these various forms of animal life did +not exist together in these countries at the same time as the trees and +plants before mentioned?= + +Lions and monkeys, hippopotami and crocodiles, with elephants, hyenas, +and rhinoceroses, now live beneath the palms, mimosas, acacias, and +other tropical plants represented in the Eocene and Miocene beds. What +is there to hinder us from believing that they all lived there together +in that olden time? Surely it would be the very irony of scientific fate +if forms now so closely connected in life should in death be so divided. +Or, to present it in another form, why should we be asked to believe +that these acacias, cinnamons, palms, etc., lived and died ages or +millions of years before the lions, elephants, rhinoceroses and +hippopotami, came into existence to enjoy their shade; and then, after +these unnumbered ages had dragged their slow length along and vanished +into the dim past, and all these semi-tropical plants had shifted to the +tropics or been turned into lignite, these lions, elephants, and +hippopotami came into existence in these same localities, when no such +plants existed anywhere in Europe? + +Surely we ought to expect some pretty substantial evidence for such a +violation of "the observed uniformity of nature." We generally boast +that we have outgrown the crude ideas of the earlier years of the +science when they spoke of "ages" of limestone making or of sandstone +making; but it seems that some of us have not yet attained to that broad +view of the essential =unity of nature= in which the flora and fauna of +our world are seen to be just as indissolubly connected with each other. +But nature could as easily be persuaded to produce for a whole age +nothing in the way of rock but limestone or conglomerate, as to adjust +her powers to such an unbalanced state of affairs as is spoken of above, +with the animals in one age and the complementary plants in another. + +But in considering this question as to why the Eocene plants and the +Pleistocene animals may not be supposed to have lived contemporaneously +together, we are brought face to face with the =second= supposed +argument in favor of there having been a succession of life on the +globe. The answer given is that all the animals of these "early" +Tertiary beds are extinct species, also very many of the plants; while +the hyena, lion, hippopotamus, etc., of the Pleistocene are identical +with the living species, and even the mammoth is so closely like its +nearest surviving relative, the Asiatic elephant (_E. indicus_), that +these also might be classed as identical.[33] + +This point being considered by many as so important, and having such a +vital connection with the whole life succession theory, we must go into +the matter somewhat in detail, even at the risk of appearing rather +technical to some. + +If the Palaeozoic and Mesozoic strata are often of enormous extent, +spreading in vast sheets over wide regions, so that their +stratigraphical order in any particular district is quite readily made +out, it is in =most cases= altogether different with the Tertiary and +Pleistocene deposits. For these resemble one another so much in +everything except their fossils, and occur so generally in detached and +fragmentary beds, holding no stratigraphical relation to one another, +that Lyell devised the plan of distinguishing them from one another and +arranging them in the accustomed order of successive ages, by their +relative percentages of living and extinct mollusca. With only +unimportant changes, Lyell's divisions are still followed in classifying +off the Tertiary and post-Tertiary beds. Those with all the species +extinct, or less than 5 per cent. living, are classed as Eocene; those +containing =few= extinct forms, or nearly all living species, are +classed as Pleistocene or post-Tertiary. The Miocene and Pliocene +represent the intermediate grades, and all are supposed to be a true +chronological order. It goes without saying that in actual practice it +is often so extremely difficult to adjust these differences that beds +are assigned to an "early" or a "late" division on =general principles= +by what the literary critics would call "tact" or "intuition," rather +than by the strict percentage system, though for these large and +important divisions of Tertiary and post-Tertiary rocks, these are +absolutely the only professed grounds on which the subdivisions are +distinguished and arranged in the customary order of time. + +In the words of Dr. David Page: + +"As there is often no perceptible mineral distinction between many +clays, sands and gravels, it is only by their imbedded fossils that +geologists can determine their Tertiary or post-Tertiary character."[34] + +Now to say that a set of beds, ninety-five per cent. of whose fossils +belong to extinct species, and only five per cent. are now living, must +be vastly older than another set where these percentages are reversed, +i.e. where the species are nearly all living, seems at first thought an +eminently reasonable idea, and we immediately begin to imagine the long +ages it must have taken for these exceedingly numerous and apparently +vigorous species to wear out and become extinct in the alleged ordinary +way by the merciless struggle for existence with forms more fitted to +survive. + +But it is hardly necessary to point out that all this is based on the +assumption of =Uniformity= in its most extreme type, a doctrine which +not only denies that these living forms are merely the =lucky survivors= +of tremendous changes in which their contemporaries perished, but which +in essence is taking for granted beforehand the very point which ought +to be the chief aim of all geological inquiry, viz., How did the +geological changes take place? It would not be considered a very +scientific procedure for a coroner, called upon to hold a _post mortem_, +to content himself with interesting statistics about the percentage of +people who die of old age, fever, and other causes, while there was +clear and decisive evidence that the poor fellow had been =shot=. In +this case, as in geology, it is not merely the result that is wrong, but +the whole method of investigation. For, as in the latter case we don't +want to know how people generally die, but how this particular person +actually did die, so, in our study of geology, we do not wish to know +merely the rate at which changes of surface and extinctions of species +are now going on, and then project this measure backward into the past +as an infallible guide, but we wish to know for sure just what changes +of this nature have taken place. A true induction is, I think, capable +of deciding very positively whether or not the tools of nature have +always worked at the same rate and with the same force as at present; +and this method of arranging the fossils in supposed chronological order +on the percentage basis mentioned above, is only an extreme form of +methods claiming to be inductive which in this age of the world ought to +be considered a shame and a disgrace, because, as Howorth says, they are +based, "not upon induction, but upon hypotheses," and have "all the +infirmity of the science of the Middle Ages." + +Then again, it occurs to us, that this method, of attaching a time-value +to percentages of extinct or living species, would make the sub-fossil +remains of the bison on the Western prairies almost infinitely =older= +than those of the lion, hippopotamus, etc., in the Pleistocene beds of +Europe; for (except for some few specimens artificially preserved, and +which may be ignored in this connection) the bison is to-day absolutely +extinct, while the Pleistocene mammals are found by the thousand in the +proper localities and show no signs of surrender in the struggle for +existence. Similar comparisons might be made between the great wingless +birds of Madagascar, Mauritius and New Zealand, and the many cases of +"persistent" forms which have survived unchanged from Carboniferous, +Silurian, or Cambrian times, a period of time which, in the language of +the current geology, means quite a large fraction of eternity. But all +of these considerations show that the mere fact of certain species being +extinct and others being now alive, is no trustworthy guide in +determining the relative age of their remains, until we first find out +=how they happened to become extinct=. + +The inquiry as to the =how= and the =when= (relatively) is an absolutely +essential preliminary in any such investigation; and is inseparably +united in nature with the general question of how the great geological +changes have taken place in the past. Of course, if everything like a +world-catastrophe is =a priori= denied; if, in other words, it is +settled from the first that all these fossils living and extinct did not +live contemporaneously with each other, the living ones being simply the +lucky survivors of stupendous changes in which the others perished, then +all pretense of a scientific investigation of the subject is at an end. +If a coroner has it settled beforehand that an accident or a murder +could not possibly have occurred, then his profession of a candid _post +mortem_ examination is only a farce; for he does not hold it to find out +anything, since he knows everything essential about it beforehand. +Uniformitarians would certainly make poor coroners, or for that matter +poor investigators of law or history, or anything else. + +Will some one please give us a reasonable explanation of why the lion, +hippopotamus, rhinoceros, and elephant shifted from England to the +tropics? Or will they explain how, at this same general time, some +elephants and rhinoceroses got caught in the merciless frosts of +Northern Siberia so suddenly that their flesh has remained untainted all +these centuries, and is now, wherever exposed, greedily devoured by the +dogs and wolves? + +An abundant warm-climate vegetation once mantled all the polar regions, +and its fossils have been found just about as far north as explorers +have ever gone; while Dana says that, "The encasing in ice of huge +elephants, and the perfect preservation of the flesh, shows that the +cold finally became =suddenly= extreme, as of a single winter's night, +and knew no relenting afterwards."[35] + +Now, if no one can deny this =sudden= change of climate over half the +world or so at least, is it not extremely unscientific to deny that this +same cause, whatever it may have been, was quite competent to bring +about a good many other changes, and the extinction of numerous other +species which we are so often reminded must imply the lapse of untold +ages of time? The economizing of energy, or the famous law of parsimony +as stated by Leibnitz, is quite appropriate in this case, and may be +referred to again in the sequel. The principle upon which I must here +insist is that the mere fact of certain species being extinct, and +others being now alive, gives no clue whatever to the relative age of +these remains, until we first ascertain =why=, =how= and =when= this +extinction was brought about. And yet, though every one admits the fact +of tremendous changes of climate, etc., having intervened between that +ancient world and our own (the true extent and character of which, as I +have said, ought to be the chief point of all geological investigation), +no allowance seems ever to be made for this as a powerful cause of +extermination of all forms of life. But in the utter absence of any such +explanation as to =how= and =when=, and in the very teeth of these facts +assuming a dead-level uniformitarianism, the presence of ten, fifty or a +hundred per cent. of extinct forms in a set of beds is manifestly of no +scientific value in determining age. It would be many degrees more +reasonable and accurate to arrange all the Greek and Latin books of the +world in chronological order according to the percentage of their +=words= which have survived into the English language. Indeed, it would +be much like a coroner, at the inquest following a railway disaster, +attempting to arrange the exact order in which the various victims had +perished by the proportionate number of surviving relatives which each +had left behind him. + +And the completely worthless character of such "evidence" of age +becomes, if possible, more apparent when we consider that very many of +these so-called "extinct" forms are not really distinct species from +their living representatives of to-day. "It is notorious," says Darwin, +"on what excessively slight differences many palaeontologists have +founded their species." And even to-day, in spite of all that we have +learned about variation, little or no allowance seems ever to be made +for the effects of a certainly greatly changed environment. If the +fossil forms among the mollusks and other shell fish for instance, are +not precisely like the modern ones in every respect, they are always +classed as separate species, the older forms thus being "extinct," in +utter disregard of the striking anatomical differences between the huge +Pleistocene mammals and their dwarfish descendants of to-day, which for +a hundred years or so were declared positively to be distinct from one +another, but are now acknowledged to be identical. + +Of course no one denies that there are numerous extinct forms among the +invertebrates, just as we know there are among the huge vertebrates of +the Mesozoic and Tertiaries, none of which we moderns have ever seen +alive. Other forms do not appear familiar to our modern eyes, because +larger or of somewhat different form; but to say that they are really +distinct species from their modern representatives, or to say that no +human being ever saw them alive, are statements utterly incapable of +proof. Up to about the year 1869 it was stoutly maintained that man had +never seen =any= of these fossil forms in life. But no one now maintains +this view, for human remains have now been found along with undisturbed +fossils of the Pleistocene, or even middle Tertiaries, while the +paintings on the cave walls of Southern France seem conclusive that they +were copied from life when the mammoth and reindeer lived side by side +with man in that latitude. Hence the only question now is, and it is the +supreme question of all modern geology, =WITH HOW MUCH OF THAT ANCIENT +FOSSIL WORLD WERE THESE EQUALLY FOSSIL MEN ACQUAINTED?= If Man lived in +"Pliocene" or perhaps "Miocene times," when a luxuriant vegetation was +spread out over all the Arctic regions, what possible evidence is there +to show that his companions, the rhinoceros, hippopotamus, mammoth, +etc., were not also living then and browsing off just such plants, when +the Arctic frosts caught them in the grip of death and put their +"mummies" in cold storage for our astonishment and scientific +information? Things which are equal to the same thing are equal to each +other; why should not the plants and animals, contemporary with the same +creature (man), be just as truly contemporary with one another? If man +was contemporary with the Miocene plants, and the Pleistocene mammals +were contemporary with man, what is there to forbid the idea that the +Pleistocene mammals and the middle Tertiary flora were contemporary with +each other? + +For nearly half a century geologists have never had the courage to face +this problem fairly and squarely, with all preconceived prejudices about +uniformity cast aside. Is it possible that all the plants and animals of +the Tertiaries and the Pleistocene may have really lived together in the +same world after all? But the trouble would then be that, with this much +conceded, the whole "phylogenic series" would tumble with it, and become +only the taxonomic or classification series of that ancient world with +which these fossil men were acquainted. To appropriate the words of one +who has done much to clear the ground for a common-sense study of +geology, I know of nothing against such an idea save "the almost +pathetic devotion of a large school of thinkers to the religion founded +by Hutton, whose high priest was Lyell, and which in essence is based on +_a priori_ arguments like those which dominated Mediaeval scholasticism +and made it so barren."[36] + +Baron Cuvier's work in the line of comparative osteology has never been +surpassed, perhaps never equalled since, and he is said to have been +"the greatest naturalist and comparative anatomist of that, or perhaps +of any time." (LeConte, "Evol. and Rel. Thought," pp. 33, 34); and yet +he maintained till the last that all those which we now call the +Pleistocene mammals were distinct species from the modern ones; and it +is only of recent years and with extreme reluctance that many of them +have been admitted to be identical with the ones now living. All of +which tends to show how unreliable are those assertions commonly found +in the text-books about all the species of the so-called "older" rocks +being extinct. It is only with hesitation that such specific +distinctions are surrendered even to-day, though during the last few +decades a steady progress has been made in bringing the palaeontology of +the higher vertebrates into line with our increased knowledge of +zoology, thus breaking down many of the specific distinctions which have +long been maintained between the fossil and the living forms. Even the +mammoth has been found to have so many characters identical with the +modern elephant of India, and such a complete gradation exists between +the two types, that Flower and Lydekker acknowledge the transition from +one to the other is "almost imperceptible," and express a doubt whether +they "can be specifically distinguished" from one another.[37] + +But the extreme reluctance with which anything like a confession of this +fact leaks out in our modern literature can be readily understood when +we try the hopeless task of splicing the environment of the modern form +with that of the ancient on any basis of uniformity. + +Zittel gives us a peep behind the scenes which helps us to appreciate +the value of a percentage of extinct species as a test of the age of a +rock deposit. + +He pictures the uncritical work of the earlier writers on fossil botany, +until August Schink (1868-91) made a great reform in this science; and +Zittel declares that "now the author of a paper on any department" of +fossil botany "is expected to have a sound knowledge" of the systematic +botany of recent forms. But he adds: "It cannot be said that +palaeozoology (the science of fossil animals) has yet arrived at this +desirable standpoint." + +But he justifies this charge of want of confidence by saying: + +"Comparatively few individuals have such a thorough grasp of zoological +and geological knowledge as to enable them to treat palaeontological +researches worthily, and there has accumulated a dead weight of +stratigraphical-palaeontological literature wherein the fossil remains +of animals are named and pigeon-holed solely as an additional ticket of +the age of a rock-deposit, with a willful disregard of the much more +difficult problem of their relationships in the long chain of existence. + +"The terminology which has been introduced in the innumerable monographs +of special fossil faunas in the majority of cases makes only the +slenderest pretext of any connection with recent systematic zoology; if +there is a difficulty, then stratigraphical arguments are made the basis +of a solution. Zoological students are, as a rule, too actively engaged +and keenly interested in building up new observations to attempt to +spell through the arbitrary palaeontological conclusions arrived at by +many stratigraphers, or to revise their labors from a zoological point +of view."[38] + +Doubtless this scathing impeachment of the common mania for creating new +names for the fossils has especial reference to the case of the lower +forms of life. For if, in spite of the brilliant and withal careful work +of Cuvier, Owen, Wallace, Huxley, Ray Lankester, and Leith Adams, with +numerous others that might be mentioned, there are still grounds for +such grave doubts of the values of specific distinctions in the case of +the mammals, whose general anatomy and life-history are so well known +and their almost countless variations so well studied out, =what must be +the confusion and inaccuracy= in the case of the lower vertebrates, and +especially of the invertebrates, whose general life-history in so many +instances is so dimly understood, and the limits of their variations +absolutely unknown? Remembering all this, what is our amazement when we +read in this same volume by Professor Zittel[39] that the tendency among +many modern writers in dealing with these lower forms of life, is toward +the erection of the closest possible distinctions between genera and +species, until recent palaeontological literature is fairly inundated +with new names; and all this with =the purpose=, unblushingly avowed, of +"enhancing the value" of such distinctions as a means of determining the +relative ages of strata, and to "bring the ontogenetic and phylogenetic +development" of the various forms "into more =apparent= correspondence." +I do not exaggerate in the least, as the reader may see by referring to +Zittel's book; though not wishing to make my readers "spell through" +another quite technical paragraph I have refrained from direct +quotation. + +But surely we have here a most amazing style of reasoning. It is another +clear case of first assuming one's premises, and then proving them by +means of one's conclusion. The method here employed seems about like +this: First assume the succession of life from the low to the high as a +whole; then in any particular group, as of Brachiopods or Mollusks, +decide the momentous question as to which came first and which later in +"geological time" by comparing them as to size, shape, etc., with the +live modern individual in its development from the egg to maturity; and +lastly, =take the results= of this alleged chronological arrangement to +prove just =how= the modern forms have evolved. Surely it is a most +fearful example of otherwise intelligent men being hypnotized by their +theory into blind obedience to its suggestions and necessities. + +Not long ago I had occasion to write to a well-known geologist about a +Lower Cambrian mollusk which appears strikingly like a modern species. I +give below an extract from his reply which bears directly upon this +point. I withhold the name, for the information was given in a +half-confidential manner, but I may say that the author's work on the +Palaeozoic fossils is recognized on both sides of the Atlantic. + +"Some geologists make it a point to =give a new name= to all forms found +in the Palaeozoic rocks, i.e. a name different from those of modern +species. I was taken to task by a noted palaeontologist for finding a +pupa (a kind of land snail) in Devonian beds; but I could not find any +point in which it differed from the modern genus [? species]. Yet if I +could have had more perfect specimens I might have found differences." + +Such disclosures speak volumes for those able to understand; and lead +one to receive with a smile the familiar assertion that all the species +of the Palaeozoic and other "older" rocks are extinct. And we can now +form a truer estimate of the high scientific accuracy of Lyell's +ingenious division of the Tertiary beds, according to the percentage of +living or extinct Mollusks which they contain. + +But from the inherent weakness of the argument about extinct species as +thus revealed, it follows that chronological distinctions based on any +proportionate number of extinct species =have absolutely no scientific +value=; and hence that the life succession theory finds no support from +these chronological distinctions, just as we have already seen that it +is without a vestige of support from the stratigraphical argument. + +The life succession theory has not a single fact to confirm it in the +realm of nature. It is not the result of scientific research, but purely +the product of the imagination. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[33] See p. 39 of this volume. + +[34] "Intro. Text-Book," p. 189. + +[35] "Manual," p. 1007. Prof. Dana has italicized the word "=suddenly=." + +[36] Howorth, "The Glacial Nightmare and the Flood," preface, xx, xxi. + +[37] "Mammals, Living and Extinct," pp. 428-9. + +[38] "Hist. of Geol.," pp. 375-6. + +[39] pp. 400, 403, 405. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +SKIPPING + + +We have now to deal with another absurdity involved in the life +succession theory, the discussion of which grows naturally out of the +subject of extinct species. + +As preliminary to the subject here to be presented, we must bear in mind +that the present arrangement of the fossils in alleged chronological +order, as well as the naming of thousands of typical specimens, was all +well advanced while as yet little or nothing was known of the contents +of the depths of the ocean, or even of the land forms of Africa, +Australia, and other foreign countries. In most of the important groups +of both plants and animals, the detailed knowledge of the fossil forms +preceded the knowledge of the corresponding living forms, just as Zittel +says that the theories of the igneous origin of the crystalline rocks +"had been laid without the assistance of chemistry" and the knowledge of +the microscopic structure of these rocks.[40] On pp. 128-137 of his +"History," this author shows how, up to 1820, little or nothing of a +scientific character was known of any of the classes of living animals +save mammals. During the last half century, however, the progress of +science has been steadily showing case after case where families and +genera, long boldly said to have been "extinct" since "Palaeozoic time," +are found in thriving abundance and in little altered condition in +unsuspected places all over the world. And the point for consideration +here is the manifest absurdity of these inhabitants of the modern seas +and the modern land =skipping= all the uncounted millions of years from +"Palaeozoic times" down to the "recent," for, though found in profuse +abundance in these "Older" rocks, not a trace of many of them is to be +found in all the "subsequent" deposits. + +The proposition here to be considered and proved I shall venture to +formulate as follows: + +=There is a fossil world, and there is a modern living world; the two +resembling one another in various details as well as in a general way; +but to get the ancestral representatives of many modern types, e.g., +countless invertebrates, with other lower forms of animals and plants, +we must go clear back to the Mesozoic or the Palaeozoic rocks, for they +are not found in any of the "more recent" deposits.= + +I have already remarked that the blending of the doctrine of life +succession with that of uniformity, must inevitably have given birth to +the evolution theory, for it is evident that the succession from the low +to the high could only have taken place by each type blending with those +before and those after it in the alleged order of time. That such is not +the testimony of the rocks, even when arranged with this idea in view, +is too notorious to need any words of mine, for it has been considered +by many[41] the "greatest of all objections" to the theory of evolution. + +This abruptness in the disappearance of "old" and the first appearance +of "new" forms, has brought into being that "geological scape-goat," as +James Geikie has called the doctrine of the =imperfection of the +record=. But Dawson has well disposed of this argument in the following +words: + +"When we find abundance of examples of the young and old of many fossil +species, and can trace them through their ordinary embryonic +development, why should we not find examples of the links which bound +the species together?"[42] + +But it is equally evident that each successive series ought to contain, +in addition to its own characteristic or "new" species, =all the older +forms which survived into any later deposits, or are now to be found +living in our modern world=. Such no doubt was the idea of those of the +early geological explorers who discarded Werner's onion-coat theory, and +they tried to arrange their series accordingly. This reasonable demand +is still recognized as good; and the principle is alluded to by Dana +when he attempts to show how strata might be discovered and "proved" to +be older than the present Lower Cambrian rocks.[43] + +It is, I say, still recognized =in theory= that the "younger" deposits +ought to contain samples of the "older" types which were still +surviving, in addition to their own characteristic species; but with the +progress of geological discovery it has long since been found that such +an arrangement was utterly impossible. Indeed, it would almost seem as +if modern writers had forgotten the principle altogether. + +For, as already said, according to the present chronological +arrangement, many kinds of invertebrates, both terrestrial and marine, +occurring in comparative abundance in our modern world, are found as +fossils only in the very "oldest" rocks and are =wholly absent from all +the rest!!!= Others which date from "Mesozoic times" are wholly absent +from the Tertiaries, though abundant in our modern world. This I regard +as another crucial test of the rationality of this idea of a life +succession. + +Of course there are certain limitations which must be borne in mind. If +we find a series of beds made up largely of deep sea deposits, we cannot +reasonably expect to find in them examples of all the land forms of the +preceding "ages" which then survived, nor even of the shallow water +types. Nor, conversely, can we demand that, in beds crowded with the +remains of the great mammals and plants, and thus probably of fresh or +shallow water formation, we ought to find examples of all the marine +types still surviving. We now know that each level of ocean depth has +its characteristic types of life, just as do the different heights on a +mountain side. This doctrine of "rock facies" was, I believe, enunciated +first in 1838. Edward Forbes also did much for this same idea, showing +how at the present time certain faunas are confined to definite +geographical limits, and particular ocean depths. Jules Marcou about +1848 applied this principle to the fossils and showed how such +distinctions must have prevailed during geological time. + +Here it seems that we are at last getting a refreshing breath of true +science; but if carried out in its entirety how shall we assure +ourselves that in the long ago very diverse types of fossils, e.g., +gratolites and nummulites, or even trilobites and mammals, =could not +have been contemporary with each other=? This principle of "rock +facies," if incorporated into the science in its early days, would have +saved the world from a large share of the nonsense in our modern +geological and zoological text-books. + +But in answer to any pleadings about the imperfection of the record, or +any protests about the injustice of judging all the life-forms of an +"age" by a few examples of local character, i.e., of fresh, shallow, or +deep water as the case may be, the very obvious retort is, Why then are +such local and fragmentary records given =a time value=? Why, for +example, should the Carboniferous and associated formations be counted +as representing all the deposits made in a certain age of the world, +when we know from the Cambrian and Silurian and also from the alleged +"subsequent" Jurassic that there must have been vast open sea deposits +formed contemporaneously? + +As Dana expresses it: + +"The Lias and Oolyte of Britain and Europe afforded the first full +display of the marine fauna of the world since the era of the +Subcarboniferous. Very partial exhibits were made by the few marine beds +of the Coal measures: still less by the beds of the Permian, and far +less by the Triassic. The seas had not been depopulated. The occurrence +of over 4,000 invertebrate species in Britain in the single Jurassic +period is evidence, not of deficient life for the eras preceding, but of +extremely deficient records."[44] + +Surely these words exhibit the "phylogenic series" in all its native, +unscientific deformity. It is =because= the Coal-measures, the Permian, +and the Triassic, are necessarily "extremely deficient records" of the +total life-forms then in the world, that I am writing this chapter, and +this book. But it seems like perverseness to plead about the +imperfection of the record, and yet refuse the =evidently complementary= +deposits when they are presented. If, as this illustrious author says, +"The seas had not been depopulated," what would he have us think they +were doing? Were they forming no deposits all these intervening ages +that the Carboniferous, Permian, and Triassic were being piled up? Were +the fishes and invertebrates all immortalized for these ages, or were +they, when old and full of days translated to some supermundane sphere, +thus escaping deposit in the rocks? Did the elements continue in the +_status quo_ all these uncounted millions of years? and if so, how did +they receive notice that the Triassic period was at last ended, and that +it was time for them to begin work again? I do not like to appear +trivial; but these questions serve to expose the folly of taking +diverse, local, and partial deposits, and attaching a chronological +value to each of them separately, and then pleading in a piteous, +helpless way about the imperfection of the record. + +And yet I cannot promise to present a tithe of the possible evidence, +because of two serious handicaps. First, the ordinary literature of the +science is silent and meagre enough in all conscience, even though the +bare fact may be recorded that a "genus" of the Cambrian or Silurian is +"closely allied" to some genus now living. It may be even admitted that +"according to some it is not genetically distinct from the modern genus" +so-and-so; but the authors =never descend below the "genus,"= and in +most cases forget to tell us whether or not it occurs in other "later" +formations, though of course the presumption is that it does not, but +has skipped all the intervening ages, or it would hardly be named as a +characteristic type of the formation in which it occurs. + +But this disadvantage, serious though it be, is scarcely worth speaking +of when we remember the significant words of a well-known authority +already quoted: + +"Some geologists make it a point to give a new name to all forms found +in the Palaeozoic rocks, i.e. a name different from those of modern +species." + +Or Zittel's confession that: + +"The terminology which has been introduced in the innumerable monographs +of special fossil faunas in the majority of cases makes only the +slenderest pretext of any connection with recent systematic zoology; if +there is a difficulty, then stratigraphical arguments are made the basis +of a solution. Zoological students are as a rule too actively engaged +and keenly interested in building up new observations to attempt to +spell through the arbitrary palaeontological conclusions arrived at by +many stratigraphers, or to revise their labors from a zoological point +of view." + +Hence I have no reluctance in saying that, in the present confused state +of the science, it is utterly impossible to find out the truth as to how +many hundreds of these "genera" of the Paleozoic rocks may have survived +to the present, though having skipped perhaps all the formations of the +intervening millions of years. I doubt not that the number is enormously +large, though as I have not attempted "to spell through the arbitrary +palaeontological conclusions" scattered through the literature, I can +only depend on a few though striking examples that lie on the open pages +of the ordinary text-books. + +The larger mammals can of course furnish us no examples, for the "age" +in which they abounded is quite conveniently modern, and is separated +from the present by no great lapse of time. Of the smaller marsupials, +quite a number of jaw-bones have been found in the Jurassic and +Triassic, one from the latter being strikingly like the living +_Myrmecobius_ of Australia. They are scarcely more numerous in the +Cretaceous of America, while in the foreign rocks of this system Dana +says that "Only one species had been reported up to 1894." Those +strange, sad-eyed creatures called Lemurs deserve a passing notice, for +though now confined as to their typical forms to the island of +Madagascar, their fossils seem as exclusively confined to the temperate +regions of the New and the Old World. Flower and Lydekker enumerate +about fifteen fossil species, and add that: + +"... it is very noteworthy that all these types seem to have disappeared +from both regions with the close of the upper portion of the Eocene +period."[45] + +But this jump from the "Eocene period" to the present is as nothing +compared with the secular acrobatics of some of the fishes and +especially of the invertebrates. The living Cestraciont sharks, of which +there are four species found in the seas between Japan and Australia, +seem to disappear with the Cretaceous, skipping the whole Tertiary +Epoch, as do also a tribe of modern barnacles which, as Darwin says, +"coat the rocks all over the world in infinite numbers." The Dipnoans or +Lung-fishes (having lungs as well as gills, such as the _Ceratodus_ and +_Lepidosiren_), which are represented by several living species in +Australia and South Africa, are the remains of a tribe found in whole +shoals in the Carboniferous, Triassic and Jurassic rocks, but not, so +far as I know, in any of the intervening rocks. The living Ceratodus was +only discovered in 1870, and was regarded as a marvel of "persistence." +On a pinch, as when his native streams dry up, this curious fellow can +get along all right without water, breathing air by his lungs like a +land animal. If in the meantime he was off on a trip to the moon, he +must have "persisted" a few million years without either. + +But his cousin, the _Polypterus_ of the Upper Nile, has a still more +amazing record, for he has actually skipped all the formations from the +Devonian down to the modern; while the Limuloids or sea scorpions have +jumped from the Carboniferous down. + +The Mollusks and Brachiopods would afford us examples too numerous to +mention. How is it possible that these numerous families disappear +suddenly and completely with the Mesozoic or even the "early" +Palaeozoic, and are not found in any "later" deposits, though alive now +in our modern world? Parts of Europe and America have, we are told, been +down under the sea and up again a dozen times since then; why then +should we not expect to find abundant remains of these "persistent" +types in the Mesozoic and Tertiaries? Surely these feats of +time-acrobatics show the folly of arranging contemporaneous, taxonomic +groups in single file and giving to each a time value. + +The Chalk points a similar lesson. It was not till the time of the +"Challenger" Expedition that the modern deposits of Globigerina ooze, +made up of species identical with those of the Chalk, were known to be +now forming over vast areas of the ocean floor. In the words of Huxley, +these modern species "bridge over the interval between the present and +the Mesozoic periods."[46] + +As for the silicious sponges found in the Chalk, which were such puzzles +for the scientists during the first half of the nineteenth century, +because their living forms were unknown, the deep-sea investigations +have solved the problem, for in 1877 Sollas demonstrated "the identity +of their structure with that of living Hexactinellids, Lithistids, and +Monactinellids."[47] + +And yet with all the alleged vicissitudes of the continents during the +millions of years since the Cretaceous age, there is so far as I am +aware not a trace of either the chalk or the sponges in any of the +"subsequent" rocks. Pieces of Cretaceous rock are of course found thus +sporadically as boulders, but there is no natural deposit of this kind. +But in the light of these modern discoveries why is not the Chalk of +"the white dear cliffs of Dover," full of modern living species as we +now know it to be, just as "recent" a deposit as the "late" Tertiaries +or the Pleistocene? + +Another good illustration of the absurdity of the present arrangement of +the rocks is found in the Echinoderms--crinoids, star-fishes, +sea-urchins, etc. Of the latter Prof. A. Agassiz found in the deep +waters of the West Indies, four genera of Echinids or sea-urchins of the +"later Tertiary," =but 24 genera of the "early" Tertiary, 10 of the +Cretaceous, and 5 of the Jurassic=.[48] + +But far from being uncommon we know that similar discoveries have been +in almost constant progress during the last half century. And were it +not that "zoological students are," as Zittel says, "too actively +engaged and keenly interested in building up new observations to attempt +to spell through the arbitrary palaeontological conclusions" found in +the "dead weight of stratigraphical-palaeontological literature," there +is no telling what hosts of similar facts might not be pointed to +regarding the forms found in all the "older" rocks. + +Of the star-fishes and serpent-stars (_Asteridea_ and _Ophiuridea_), +Zittel says: "It would seem that the Palaeozoic 'sea-stars' differed +very little from those in the seas of the present age." (p. 395.) The +crinoids, we are told, "are among the earliest in geological history," +making up vast limestones of the Palaeozoic rocks; and forms scarcely +separable from the modern are found in the Jurassic, but so far as the +text-books tell us are =absolutely unknown in any later deposits=. But +there are several modern genera, such as Pentacrinus, Rhizocrinus, +Bathycrinus, etc., found in the deep waters of nearly all the oceans. +The genus Rhizocrinus was discovered off the coast of Norway about the +sixties of the last century. But what were these creatures doing since +"Jurassic times," while the "pulsating crust" was putting parts of the +continents under the sea for ages at a stretch? Why did they form no +deposits during the Cretaceous, Eocene, Miocene or Pliocene ages? Surely +the absurdity of the present arrangement is evident to a child. During +all these intervening ages the climate of the globe continued of the +same remarkable mildness, fossils of all these formations being found +about as far north as explorers have ever gone. Why did the crinoids and +polyp-corals suspend business from "Jurassic times" to the "recent," +merely to accommodate a modern theory? Dana says that "The coral reefs +of the Oolyte in England consist of corals of the same group with the +reef-making species of the existing tropics,"[49] and he argues from +this fact that the mean temperature of the waters must have been about +69 deg. F. But a luxuriant vegetation still continued in the Arctic +regions during the Cretaceous and the Tertiaries. How absurd to say that +these corals built no reefs about the European coasts during all these +ages. Or, to put the matter in another way, considering how many of +their characteristic types are alive in our modern seas, why should we +say that the crinoidal or coral limestones of the Mesozoic or Palaeozoic +rocks are not as recent as the nummulitic limestones of the Eocene or +any late Tertiary deposits? + +It is no answer at all to tell us that, though the general types are the +same, the =species= of the Palaeozoic and the Mesozoic are entirely +extinct. I have not had the courage "to attempt to spell through" all +the "dead weight" of the modern literature, but I think that the world +would like more satisfactory proof of this oft-repeated assertion than +the customs and traditions of a hundred years, and the exigencies of a +fanciful theory. This worn-out argument of Cuvier's about extinct +species has kept up a running fight with common sense for many decades, +and though driven backward from one point to another over the long thin +line of this taxonomic series of the fossil world, it still contests +every inch of ground. + +But let us try the tree-ferns and cycads of the coal beds of the "older" +rocks. In northern regions they are not found "later" than the Triassic +and Jurassic, and doubtless the same holds good of the rocks in the +Tropics, where the modern species now live in fair abundance. But how +did they come to shift to the Tropics so many millions of years before +the palms, etc., of the Tertiaries thought it time to do the same? The +climate had not changed a bit: how did they come to scent the coming +"Glacial Age" so much earlier than their more highly organized fellows? + +The "Challenger" expedition found some Cyathophylloid corals now +building reefs at the bottom of our modern ocean. The geologists had +already assigned =the last= of them to the Carboniferous and Permian +rocks with the idea that they were extinct. But where have these fellows +kept themselves during all the intervening ages while the continents +were deep under the ocean time and time again? or why are not the rocks +containing their fossils as "recent" as any deposits on the globe? + +And so I might go on. There is hardly a tribe found in the "older" rocks +which does not have its living representatives of to-day, and with, I +believe, a fair proportion of the species identical; though in hundreds, +perhaps thousands, of cases these species, genera, or even whole tribes, +have somehow skipped all the intervening formations. + +But let us drop this method of studying our subject, and look at it from +a slightly different standpoint. + +Thus Dana[50] says that: + +"The absence of Lamellibranchs in the Middle Cambrian, although present +in both Lower and Upper, means =the absence of fossils from the rocks, +not of species from the faunas=." + +He puts this in italics by way of emphasis, for it is certainly a +reasonable idea, and as A. R. Wallace says, "no one =now= doubts that +where any type appears in two remote periods it must have been in +existence during the whole intervening period, although we may have no +record of it."[51] But what would be the result if we only extend this +idea to its logical conclusion? It seems to be an effort to avoid one of +the absurdities of the onion-coat theory, without, however, discarding +that theory altogether. + +In speaking of some corals and crinoids of the Devonian which "were +absent" from some of the divisions of this formation because the +conditions of the seas about New York "were unfavorable," Dana says +that "they were back when the seas were again of sufficient purity."[52] + +In his review of these formations he enlarges on this subject: + +"At the close of the early Devonian the evidences of clear seas--the +corals and crinoids, with most of the attendant life--disappear, +migrating no one knows whither.... With the variations in the fineness, +or other characteristics of the beds as H. S. Williams has illustrated, +the species vary.... =The faunas of each stratum are not strictly faunas +of epochs or periods of time, but local topographical faunas.= After the +Corniferous period, corals, crinoids, and trilobites still flourished +=somewhere=, as before, but they are absent from the Central Interior +until the Carboniferous age[53] opens." + +Here we are certainly getting a refreshing breath of common-sense +geology; but what would become of current theories if we enlarge a +little on this idea? + +What if the gigantic dinosaurs of the Cretaceous or the equally +marvellous mammals of the "early" Tertiaries of the Western States, +described by Marsh and Cope, and the Pleistocene mammals of other parts +of America and of Europe and Northern Siberia, "are not strictly faunas +of epochs or periods of time, but local topographical faunas?" What if +the world-wide limestones of the Cambrian and Silurian, and the no less +enormous or widespread nummulitic limestones of the Eocene, extending +from the Alps to Eastern Asia, and constituting mountains ten, fifteen, +or twenty thousand feet high--what if these are possibly +=contemporaneous with one another=? Supposing the coal-measures of Nova +Scotia and Pennsylvania, and the Cretaceous and Tertiary lignites of +Vancouver Island, Alberta, and the Western States are not strictly +floras of epochs or periods of time, but local topographical floras?[54] + +But it must be confessed that the logical extension of this broad view +of the fossils, and the projection of our modern zoological provinces +and zones back into the fossil world would mean the death-blow to the +life succession theory, and might have a very disturbing effect upon +certain theories about human origins and other genetic relationships +which have grown quite popular since the middle of the last century. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[40] "History," pp. 327, 341. + +[41] See LeConte, "Evol. and Religious Thought," p. 253. + +[42] "Modern Ideas of Evol.," p. 35. + +[43] See "Manual," pp. 487-8. + +[44] "Manual," p. 776. + +[45] "Mammals, etc." p. 696. + +[46] "Discourses Biol. and Geol.," p. 347. + +[47] Zittel, "Hist. of Geo.," p. 388. + +[46] Dana, "Manual," p. 59. + +[49] "Manual," p. 793. + +[50] "Manual," p. 488. + +[51] "Distribution of Life," p. 33. + +[52] "Manual," p. 611. + +[53] "Manual," pp. 628-9. + +[54] Note--This is only carrying the argument a little further than + Huxley does when he says that "A Devonian fauna and flora in the + British Islands may have been contemporaneous with Silurian life in + North America, and with a Carboniferous fauna and flora in Africa. + Geographical provinces and zones may have been as distinctly marked + in the Palaeozoic epoch as at present." "Discourses," p. 286. + + + + +PART II. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +GRAVEYARDS + + +"The crust of our globe," writes a distinguished scientist, "is a great +cemetery, where the rocks are tombstones on which the buried dead have +written their own epitaphs." The reading of these epitaphs is the +business of geology; and too often, as we shall see, the record is that +of a violent and sudden death. + +With the doctrine of Uniformity as a theoretical proposition, I shall +have little to say. At best it is a pure assumption that the present +quiet and regular action of the elements has always prevailed in the +past, or that this supposition is sufficient to explain the facts of the +rocks. In its more extreme form it becomes an iron dogma, which shuts +out all evidence not agreeable to its teachings. But in its essential +nature, whether in its least or its most extreme form, it is not +approaching the subject from the right standpoint. It seeks to show how +the past geological changes may have occurred; it never attempts to +prove how they =must= have occurred. And I may say in passing, that it +is largely for the purpose of avoiding the cumulative character of the +evidence gathered from every stone quarry and from every section of +strata in every corner of the globe, that the uniformitarians have +wished to have these burials take place on the installment plan; for +otherwise the violent and catastrophic character of the events recorded +in the rocks would become too plainly manifest. But if a coroner, called +upon to hold an inquest, were to content himself, after the manner of +Lyell and Hutton, with glittering generalities about how people are all +the time dying of old age, fever, or other causes, coupled with +assurances of the quiet, regular habits and good reputation of all his +fellow citizens, I do not think that he would be praised for his +adherence to inductive methods if we could get at clear and decisive +evidence that the poor fellow under examination had been shot. Just so +with common-sense methods in geology. =A true induction is capable of +finding out for certain= whether or not the present quiet regular action +of the elements has always prevailed in the past; and it is most +unscientific to assume, as the followers of Hutton and Lyell have done, +that the comparatively insignificant changes within historic time have +always prevailed in the past, when there is plenty of clear and decisive +evidence to the contrary. + +The general fact which I wish to develop in this chapter may be stated +somewhat as follows: + +=Rocks belonging to all the various systems or formations give us +fossils in such a state of preservation, and heaped together in such +astonishing numbers, that we cannot resist the conviction that the +majority of these deposits were formed in some sudden and not modern +manner, catastrophic in nature.= + +But before giving any examples of these abnormal deposits we must first +study the modern normal deposits; before we can rightly understand the +sharp contrast between the ancient and the modern action of the +elements, we must become familiar with the way in which fossils are now +being buried by our rivers and oceans. + +One of the many geological myths dissipated by the work of the +"Challenger" Expedition, which, as Zittel says, "marks the grandest +scientific event of the nineteenth century," is that about the ocean +bottom and the work now being carried on there. The older text-books +taught that, not only was the bottom of the ocean thickly strewn with +the remains of the animals which died there and in the waters above, but +also that the oceanic currents were constantly wearing away in some +places and building up in others over all the ocean floor, and hence +producing true stratified deposits. Accordingly it was said that it was +only necessary for these beds to be lifted above the surface to produce +the ordinary rocks that we find everywhere about us. But we now know +that the ocean currents have, as Dana says, "no sensible, mechanical +effects, either in the way of transportation or abrasion."[55] We know +also that all kinds of sediment drop so much quicker in salt water than +in fresh, that none of it gets beyond the narrow "continental shelf" and +the classic 100 fathom line, which in most cases is not very far from +shore. In the north Atlantic there are sediments found in deeper water +produced by ice-floes or icebergs dropping their loads there; but we +cannot suppose such work to have gone on when the Arctic regions were +clothed with a temperate-climate vegetation, much less that such things +occurred over all the earth. On the floor of the open ocean, and away +from the tracks of our modern icebergs, we have two or three kinds of +mud or ooze formed from minute particles of organic matter; but besides +these =absolutely nothing= save a possible sprinkling of volcanic +products, which of course are limited in their distribution. Where then +can we find a stratified or bedded structure now being formed over the +ocean bottom? Dana says there is nothing of the kind now being produced +there, save as the result of possible variations during the passing ages +in the organic deposits thrown down, where a bed of ooze may be supposed +to be thrown down directly upon another kind of ooze. There is =no +gravel=, =no sand=, =no clay=, but whatever variation there might be in +the organic deposits, the new kind would be laid down immediately upon +the preceding similar deposits, unless a thin sprinkling of volcanic +dust happened to intervene. + +Thus to explain practically all the deposits found in the rocks, we are +absolutely limited to the shore deposits and the mouths of large rivers. +Here we certainly have alternations of sand, clay and gravel, producing +a true bedded structure. But I ask: What kind of organic remains will we +get from these modern deposits? Certainly nothing like the crowded +graveyards which we find everywhere in the ancient ones. + +Darwin, in his famous chapter on "The Imperfection of the Geological +Record," has well shown how scanty and imperfect are the modern +fossiliferous deposits. The progress of research has only confirmed and +accentuated the argument there presented on this point. Thus +Nordenskiold, the veteran Arctic explorer, remarks with amazement on the +scarcity of recent organic remains in the Arctic regions, where such a +profusion of animal life exists; while in spite of the great numbers of +cats, dogs and other domestic animals which are constantly being thrown +into rivers like the Hudson or the Thames, dredgings about their mouths +have revealed the surprising fact that scarcely a trace of any of them +is there to be found.[56] + +Even the fishes themselves stand a very poor chance of being buried +intact. As Dana[57] puts it: + +"Vertebrate animals, as fishes, reptiles, etc., which fall to pieces +when the animal portion is removed, =require speedy burial after death=, +to escape destruction from this source (decomposition and chemical +solution from air, rain-water, etc.), as well as from animals that would +prey upon them." + +If a vertebrate fish should die a natural death, which of itself must be +a rare occurrence, the carcass would soon be devoured whole or bit by +bit by other creatures near by. Possibly the lower jaw, or the teeth, +spines, etc., in the case of sharks, or a bone or two of the skeleton, +might be buried unbroken, but a whole vertebrate fish entombed in a +modern deposit is surely a unique occurrence. + +But every geologist knows that the remains of fishes are, in countless +millions of cases, found in a marvelous state of preservation. They have +been entombed in =whole shoals=, with the beds containing them miles in +extent, and scattered over all the globe. Indeed, so accustomed have we +grown to this state of affairs in the rocks we hammer up, that if we +fail to find such well-preserved remains of vertebrate fishes, land +animals, or plants, we feel disappointed, almost hurt; we think that +nature has somehow slighted this particular set of beds. But where in +our modern quiet earth will we go to find deposits now forming like the +copper slate of the Mansfield district, the Jurassic shales of +Solenhofen, the calcareous marls of Oeningen on Lake Constance, the +black slates of Glarus, or the shales of Monte Bolca?--to mention some +cases from the Continent of Europe more than usually famous in the +literature for exquisitely preserved vertebrate fishes, to say nothing +of other fossils. According to Dana, all these must have met with a +"speedy burial after death"--perhaps before, who knows? + +Buckland[58] in speaking of the fossil fish of Monte Bolca, which may be +taken as typical of all the others, is quite positive that these fish +must have "perished suddenly," by some tremendous catastrophe. + +"The skeletons of these fish," he says, "lie parallel to the laminae of +the strata of the calcareous slate; they are always entire, and so +closely packed on one another that many individuals are often contained +in a single block.... =All these fish must have died suddenly= on this +fatal spot, and have been speedily buried in the calcareous sediment +then in course of deposition. From the fact that certain individuals +have even preserved traces of color upon their skin, we are certain that +they were entombed before decomposition of their soft parts had taken +place." + +In many places in America as well as Europe, where these remains of fish +are found, the shaley rock is so full of fish oil that it will burn +almost like coal, while some have even thought that the peculiar +deposits like Albertite "coal" and some cannel coals were formed from +the distillation of the fish oil from the supersaturated rocks. + +De La Beche[59] was also of the opinion that most of the fossils were +buried suddenly and in an abnormal manner. "A very large proportion of +them," he says, "must have been =entombed uninjured, and many alive=, +or, if not alive, at least before decomposition ensued." In this he is +speaking not of the fishes alone but of the fossiliferous deposits in +general. + +There is a series of strata found in all parts of the world which used +to be called the "Old Red Sandstone," now known as the Devonian. In +this, almost wherever we find it, the remains of whole shoals of fishes +occur in such profusion and preservation that the "period" is often +known as the "Age of Fishes." Dr. David Page, after enumerating nearly a +dozen genera, says: + +"These fishes seem to have thronged the waters of the period, and their +remains are often found in masses, =as if they had been suddenly +entombed in living shoals= by the sediment which now contains them." + +I beg leave to quote somewhat at length the picturesque language of Hugh +Miller[60] regarding these rocks as found in Scotland. + +"The river bull-head, when attacked by an enemy, or immediately as it +feels the hook in its jaws, erects its two spines at nearly right angles +with the plates of the head, as if to render itself as difficult of +being swallowed as possible. The attitude is one of danger and alarm; +and it is a curious fact, to which I shall afterward have occasion to +advert, that =in this attitude nine-tenths of the= _Pterichthes_ =of the +Lower Old Red Sandstone are to be found=.... It presents us, too, with a +wonderful record of violent death falling at once, not on a few +individuals, but on whole tribes." + +"At this period of our history, some terrible catastrophe involved in +sudden destruction the fish of an area at least a hundred miles from +boundary to boundary, perhaps much more. The same platform in Orkney as +at Cromarty is strewed thick with remains, which exhibit unequivocally +the marks of violent death. The figures are contorted, contracted, +curved, the tail in many instances is bent round to the head; the spines +stick out; the fins are spread to the full, as in fish that die in +convulsions.... The record is one of destruction at once widely spread +and total, so far as it extended.... By what quiet but potent agency of +destruction were the innumerable existences of =an area perhaps ten +thousand square miles in extent annihilated at once=, and yet the medium +in which they had lived left undisturbed in its operations? + +"Conjecture lacks footing in grappling with the enigma, and expatiates +in uncertainty over all the known phenomena of death." + +I shall not taunt the uniformitarians by asking them to direct us to +some modern analogies. But I would have the reader remember that these +Devonian and other rocks are absolutely world-wide in extent. + +Surely Howorth is talking good science when he says that his masters +Sedgwick and Murchison taught him "that no plainer witness is to be +found of any physical fact than that Nature has at times worked with +enormous energy and rapidity," and "that the rocky strata teem with +evidence of violent and sudden dislocations on a great scale." + +I have spoken only of the class Fishes. But what other class of the +animal kingdom will not point us a similar lesson? The Reptiles and +Amphibians, to say nothing of the larger Mammals, are also found in +countless myriads, packed together as if in natural graveyards. +Everybody knows of the enormous numbers and splendid preservation of the +great reptiles of the Western and Southern States, untombed by Leidy, +Cope and Marsh. One patch of Cretaceous strata in England, the Wealden, +has afforded over thirty different species of dinosaurs, crocodiles, and +pleisosaurs. Mr. Chas. H. Sternberg, one of Zittel's assistants, +recently reported great quantities of Amphibians from the Permian of +Texas. They are of all sizes, some frogs being six feet long, others +ten. Besides these he found three "bone-beds" full of minute forms an +inch or less in length. Of the small ones, which I judge must represent +whole millions of young ones =suddenly= entombed, he says: + +"I got over twenty perfect skulls, many with vertebrae attached, and +thousands of small bones from all parts of the skeleton. In one case, a +complete skull, one-fourth of an inch in length, had connected with it +nearly the entire vertebral column, with ribs in position, coiled upon +itself, bedded with many bones of other species in a red silicious +matrix. So perfectly were they weathered out that they lay in bas-relief +=as white and perfect as if they had died a month ago=; a single row of +teeth, =like the points of cambric needles=, occupied both sets of +jaws."[61] + +How many more such cases there may have been in these "three bone-beds +full" of similar remains, it would be interesting to know. But though +somewhat aside from the present subject, I cannot refrain in passing +from referring to the wonderful preservation of these remains. It is +preposterous to say that these bones have lain thus exposed to the +weather for the millions of years postulated by the popular theory. +There is not a particle of scientific evidence to prove that they are +not just as recent as any specimen from the Tertiaries or the +Pleistocene. Buffon and Cuvier proved the mammals to be of "recent" age, +because they occurred in the superficial deposits. They never heard of +the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous of Colorado and Wyoming, nor +these Permian of Texas. Think of this frog's teeth "like the points of +cambric needles," and he and his fellows "as perfect as if they had died +a month ago." Of one of the big six-foot specimens this author says: +"Its head was so beautifully preserved, and cleaned under long erosion, +it was difficult to believe it was not a recent specimen." While of the +little six-inch fellow referred to above he says: "The bones of the +skull are perfectly preserved, quite smooth, and show the sutures +distinctly; there is no distortion, some red matrix attached below seems +absolutely necessary to convince the mind that it is not =a thing of +yesterday=." James Geikie[62] mentions the case of the Elgin sandstones +"formerly classed as 'Old Red,'" but which are now called Triassic, +"from the fact that they have yielded reptilian remains of a higher +grade than one would expect to meet with in old Red Sandstone." Since +these strata =slide up and down so easily=, we have here far more urgent +scientific reasons for calling these amphibian remains of Texas among +the most "recent" geological deposits on the globe. + +But I must return to my subject. The Invertebrates are also eloquent to +the fact of abnormal conditions having prevailed when their remains were +entombed. We could go through the whole list, but it is the same old +story of abnormal deposits, essentially different from anything that is +being made to-day. + +Where, for instance, in the modern seas, will we find the remains of +polyp-corals now being intercalated between beds of clays or sands over +vast areas, as we find them in the Lias and Oolyte of England and +elsewhere? Corals require a definite depth of water, neither too deep +nor too shallow, but it must be clear and pure; and nothing but some +awful catastrophe could place a bed of coral remains a few feet or a +=few inches= in thickness over the vast areas that we find them. +Crinoids require the same clear, pure water, but much deeper, some of +the modern kinds living =over a mile down=, but every student of the +science knows that the Subcarboniferous limestone of both Europe and +America (called Mountain Limestone in England), so noted for its +crinoids and its corals, is constantly found intercalated between shale +or sandstone, or between the coal beds themselves as at Springfield, +Ill., or in the Lower Coal Measures of Westmorland County, Pa. There are +of course, here and there, great masses of these rocks which represent +an original formation by growth _in situ_; but no sane man can say this +for these great sheets perhaps =only a few inches= in thickness, for in +many cases they show a stratified or bedded structure just as much as a +sandstone or a shale. In some tables given by Dana on pp. 651-2 of his +"Manual," compiled from four different localities, I count no less than +=23 beds= of limestone thus intercalated, though we are not told how +many of them contain corals or crinoids. Such details are generally +omitted as of little consequence. + +Next, let us try the Lamellibranchs, such as the clam, oyster, and other +true bivalves. These creatures have an arrangement in the hinge region +by which the valves of the shell tend to open, but during life are held +together by the adductor muscles. When dead, however, these muscles +relax and decay, and then the valves spread wide open. Of course there +are some, such as certain kinds of clams, which burrow in the mud or +sand, and the shells of these, if they happened to die a natural death +in their holes, could not spread very far apart. However =some mud= must +even then wash into their burrows and into their empty shells. But many +kinds of bivalves do not thus burrow in the ground; and when the fossils +of such kinds are found in quantity with the valves =applied= and often +=hollow=, as is so frequently the case in many of the "older" rocks, I +cannot see how we are to understand any ordinary conditions of deposit. +And yet we are gravely assured by a high authority, that "A sudden +burial is not necessary to entombment in this condition." + +Or, let us take the Brachiopods. These have a bivalve shell, the parts +of which, however, are not pulled apart after death, and only need to +open a little way even in life to admit the sea water which brings them +their food. Yet, though the valves do not gape after death, there is +when dead and empty a =hole= at the hinge or beak, which would readily +admit mud if such were present in the water, or if the shells after +death were subject to the ordinary movements of tide, wave and current. +Yet Dawson[63] says of the Brachiopods, Spirifer and Athyris: + +"I may mention here that in all the Carboniferous limestones of Nova +Scotia the shells of this family are usually found with the valves +closed and =the interior often hollow=." + +Of course he tries to explain how this state of things might occur "in +deep and clear water"--for some of the modern species are found in the +clear depths 18,000 feet down--and he thinks that their entombment in +this condition "does not prove that the death of the animals was +sudden." But we now know that there is no means of producing a +stratified formation in this "deep and clear water," and hence that some +revolution of nature is implied by the conditions in which we find them. + +Some people seem to have converted David Hume's famous sentence into a +scientific formula, thus: "Anything contrary to Uniformity is +impossible: hence no amount of evidence can prove anything contrary to +Uniformity." + +For the trouble in this case is that, not only do such conditions +prevail "in all the Carboniferous limestones of Nova Scotia," which must +be several thousands of square miles in extent, but in the Devonian +shales and Silurian limestones of Ontario and the Middle States at +least--perhaps over the rest of the world--the Brachiopods are found =in +this same tell-tale condition=, and it would establish a very dangerous +precedent to admit abnormal conditions in even a single case. + +I have only touched upon the voluminous evidence that might be adduced +in the case of the lower forms of life. Had I the space, I might show +how the marvelously preserved plants of the coal beds tell the same +story. But we must pass on to consider the remains of the larger land +animals. I have already given a quotation from Dana about the mammoth +and rhinoceros in Northern Siberia, where he says that their encasing in +ice and the perfect preservation of their flesh "shows that the cold +finally became =suddenly= extreme, as of a single winter's night, and +knew no relenting afterward." Not very many serious attempts have been +made to account for this remarkable state of things, which is a protest +against uniformity that can be appreciated by a child, and I never heard +of any theory which attempted to account for the facts without some kind +of awful catastrophe. + +Many, however, seem to have little idea of the extent of these remains +in the Arctic regions. They are not all thus perfectly preserved, for +thousands of skeletons are found in localities where the ground thaws +out somewhat in the short summer, and here of course, the skin and +tissues could not remain intact. Remains of these beasts occur in only a +little less abundance over all Western Europe, and the mammoth also in +North America, well preserved specimens having been obtained from the +Klondike region of Alaska; and there is nothing to forbid the idea that +many, if not most of these latter specimens were also at one time +enshrined as "mummies" in the ice, which has since melted over the more +temperate regions. But we must confine ourselves to the remains in +Siberia. Flower and Lydekker tell us that since the tenth century at +least, these remains have been quarried for the sake of the ivory tusks, +and a regular trade in this fossil ivory, in a state fit for commercial +purposes, has been carried on "both eastward to China, and westward to +Europe," and that "fossil ivory has its price current as well as wheat." + +"They are found at all suitable places along the whole line of the shore +between the mouth of the Obi and Behring Straits, and the further north +the more numerous do they become, the islands of New Siberia being now +one of the favorite collecting localities. The soil of Bear Island and +of Liachoff Islands is said to consist only of sand and ice with such +quantities of mammoth bones as almost to compose its chief substance. +The remains are not only found around the mouths of the great rivers, as +would be the case if the carcasses had been washed down from more +southern localities in the interior of the continent, but are imbedded +in the frozen soil in such circumstances as to indicate that the animals +had lived not far from the localities in which they are now found, and +they are exposed either by the melting of the ice in unusually warm +summers, or by the washing away of the sea cliffs or river banks by +storms or floods. In this way the bodies of more or less nearly perfect +animals, even standing in the erect position, with the soft parts and +hairy covering entire, have been brought to light."[64] + +But these remains of the mammoth, though the best known, are not the +only ones attesting extraordinary conditions: though of course in warmer +latitudes we do not find perfect "mummies" with the hide and flesh +preserved untainted. Let us go to a warmer climate, to Sicily, and read +a description of the remains of the hippopotamus found there. I quote +from Sir Joseph Prestwich: + +"The chief localities, which centre on the hills around Palermo, arrest +attention from the extraordinary quantity of bones of _Hippopotami_ (in +complete hecatombs) which have there been found. Twenty tons of these +bones were shipped from around the one cave of San Ciro, near Palermo, +within the first six months of exploiting them, and they were so fresh +that they were sent to Marseilles to furnish animal charcoal for use in +the sugar factories. How could this bone breccia have been +accumulated?... The only suggestion that has been made is that the bones +are those of successive generations of _Hippopotami_ which went there to +die. But this is not the habit of the animal, and besides, the bones are +those of animals =of all ages down to the foetus=, nor do they show +traces of weathering or exposure.... + +"My supposition is, therefore, that when the island was submerged, the +animate in the plain of Palermo naturally retreated, as the waters +advanced, deeper into the amphitheatre of hills until they found +themselves embayed, as in a seine, with promontories running out to sea +on either side and a mural precipice in front. As the area became more +and more circumscribed the animals must have thronged together in vast +multitudes, crushing into the more accessible caves, and swarming over +the ground at their entrance, until overtaken by the waters and +destroyed."[65] + +Our author then adds this summary of his argument: + +"The extremely fresh condition of the bones, proved by the retention of +so large a proportion of animal matter, and the fact that animals of all +ages were involved in the catastrophe, shows that the event was +geologically, comparatively recent, as other facts show it to have been +sudden." + +That it must have been a good deal more "sudden" than even this author +will admit, is evident from the nature of the hippopotamus. I never +thought that it was particularly afraid of the water, or likely to be +drowned by any such moderate catastrophe as Prestwich invokes in this +singular volume. The reader must, however, note that this affair, like +the entombment of the mammoth, certainly =took place since man was upon +the globe=, even according to the uniformitarians. Would it not be +economy of energy to correlate the two together? But if man dates from +"Miocene times," as some contend, he must have witnessed half a dozen +awful affairs like these, for there is scarcely a country on the globe +that has not been under the ocean since then. + +Let us proceed. + +But whither shall we turn to avoid finding similar phenomena? The vast +deposits of mammals in the Rocky Mountains may occur to the reader. As +Dana says, they "have been found to be literally Tertiary burial +grounds." I need not go into the details of these deposits, nor of those +in other places containing the great mammals which must have been +contemporary with "Tertiary man," for I would only weary the reader with +a monotony of abnormal conditions of deposit--unlike anything now being +produced this wide world over. We shall be stating the case very mildly +indeed, if we conclude that the vast majority of the fossils, by their +profuse abundance and their astonishing preservation, tell a very plain +story of "speedy burial after death," and =are of an essentially +different character= from modern deposits. + +Prof. Nicholson, in speaking of the remains of the Zeuglodon, says: + +"Remains of these gigantic whales are very common in the 'Jackson beds' +of the Southern United States. So common are they that, according to +Dana, 'the large vertebrae, some of them a foot and a half long and a +foot in diameter, were formerly so abundant over the country in Alabama +that they were used for making walls, or were burned to rid the fields +of them.'"[66] + +Shortly before his death in 1895, Dana prepared a revised edition of his +"Manual," and in it he gives us quite a rational explanation of this +case, as follows: + +"Vertebrae were so abundant, on the first discovery, in some places that +many of these Eocene whales must have been stranded together in a common +catastrophe, on the northern borders of the Mexican Gulf--possibly by a +series of earthquake waves of great violence; or by an elevation along +the sea limit that made a confined basin of the border region, which the +hot sun rendered destructive alike to Zeuglodons and their game; or by +an unusual retreat of the tide, which left them dry and floundering +under a tropical sun." (p. 908.) + +That is, this veteran geologist in his old age would not attempt to +account for such abnormal conditions without a catastrophe of some kind. +But if we use similar explanations for similar conditions, where shall +we stop through the whole range of the rocks from the Cambrian to the +Pleistocene? + +Dana became very fond of this idea of earthquake waves, and invoked them +to account for "the universality and abruptness" with which the species +disappear at the close of "Palaeozoic time," using as the generating +cause the uplifting of the Appalachian Mountains, with "flexures miles +in height and space, and slips along newly opened fractures that kept up +their interrupted progress through thousands of feet of displacement," +from which he says "incalculable violence and great surgings of the +ocean should have occurred and been often repeated.... Under such +circumstances the devastation of the sea border and the low-lying lands +of the period, the destruction of their animals and plants, would have +been a sure result. The survivors within a long distance of the coast +line would have been few."[67] + +But as this sudden break in the life-chain "was so general and extensive +that no Carboniferous species is known to occur among the fossils of +succeeding beds, not only in America and Europe, but also over the rest +of the world" (p. 735), he is obliged to make his catastrophe by +earthquake waves positively =world wide=. Hence he adds: "The same waves +would have swept over European land and seas, and there found coadjutors +for new strife in earthquake waves of European origin." + +At the close of the Mesozoic he uses similar language, though in this +case he has the whole range of the mountains on the west of both North +and South America, the Rockies and the Andes, in length a "third of the +circumference of the globe," "undergoing simultaneous orogenic +movements, with like grand results." (p. 875.) "The deluging waves sent +careering over the land" would, he thinks, "have been destructive over +all the coasts of a hemisphere," and "may have made their marches inland +for hundreds of miles" (p. 878), sweeping all before them. + +I should think so; but then what becomes of this doctrine of uniformity? +Personally, I have not the slightest objection to these "deluging waves +sent careering over the land," for I feel sure that just such things +have occurred, and on just such a scale as our author pictures, for, as +he says, the destruction of species "was great, =world-wide=, and one of +the most marvelous events in geological history." (p. 877.) + +But it seems to me that here we have an enormous amount of energy going +to waste. Others have demanded a continent to explain the appearance of +a beetle in a certain locality; but here we have a great world-wide +catastrophe to explain the sudden disappearance of merely a few species. +Why not utilize this surplus energy in doing other necessary work, that +has certainly been accomplished somehow, but has hitherto gone a-begging +for a competent cause? The only thing I object to in Dana's view of the +case is his way of having these "exterminations" take place on the +installment plan. For in that way we have to work up a great world +catastrophe to do only a very limited amount of work, and then have to +repeat the thing another time for a similarly limited work, =when one +such cosmic convulsion is competent to do the whole thing=. I plead for +the "law of parsimony," and the economizing of energy. + +The vast shoals of carcasses which seem to be piled up in almost every +corner of the world are _prima facie_ evidence that our old globe has +witnessed some sort of cosmic convulsion. The exact cause, nature, and +extent of this event we may never have sufficient facts to determine, +though two or three additional facts having a bearing on the subject +will be considered in the following chapters. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[55] "Manual," p. 229. + +[56] _Pop. Sci. Mo._, Vol. xxi, pp. 143, 693. + +[57] "Manual," p. 141. + +[58] "Geol. and Min.," Vol. I., pp. 124-5. Ed. 1858. + +[59] "Theoretical Geol.," p. 265. London, 1834. + +[60] "Old Red Sandstone," pp. 48, 221-2. + +[61] _Pop. Sci. News_, May, 1902, pp. 106-7. + +[62] "Histor. Geol.," p. 53. + +[63] "Acadian Geol.," p. 260. + +[64] "Mammals," p. 430. + +[65] "On Certain Phenomena, etc.," pp. 50-52. + +[66] "Ancient Life-History," p. 300. + +[67] "Manual," p. 736. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +CHANGE OF CLIMATE + + +Another great general fact about the fossil world may be stated about as +follows: + +=All of the fossils= (save a very few of the so-called "Glacial Age," +and they admit of other easy explanation) =give us proofs of an almost +eternal spring having prevailed in the Arctic regions, and semi-tropical +conditions in north temperate latitudes; in short give us proofs of a +singular uniformity of climate over the globe which we can hardly +conceive possible, let alone account for.= + +The proofs of this are almost unnecessary, as this subject of climate +has been pretty well discussed of late years. And it was the +overwhelming evidence on this point which forced Lyell and so many +others to decide against the theory of Croll, which called for a regular +rotation of climates, for they said that the fossil evidence was wholly +against such a view. Howorth has given an admirable argument on this +point in Chapter XI of his second work on the Glacial Theory[68] and to +it I would refer the reader for details which I have not the space to +reproduce here. + +This author first remarks: + +"The best thermometer we can use to test the character of a climate is +the flora and fauna which lived while it prevailed. This is not only the +best, but is virtually the only thermometer available when we inquire +into the climate of past geological ages. Other evidence is always +sophisticated by the fact that we may be attributing to climate what is +due to other causes; boulders can be rolled by the sea as well as by +sub-glacial streams, and conglomerates can be formed by other agencies +than ice. But the biological evidence is unmistakable; cold-blooded +reptiles cannot live in icy water; semi-tropical plants, or plants whose +habitat is in the temperate zone, cannot ripen their seeds and sow +themselves under arctic conditions.... We may examine the whole series +of geological horizons, from the earliest Palaeozoic beds down to the +so-called Glacial beds, and find, so far as I know, no adequate evidence +of discontinuous and alternating climates, no evidence whatever of the +existence of periods of intense cold intervening between warm periods, +but just the contrary. Not only so, but we shall find that the +differentiation of the earth's climate into tropical and arctic zones is +comparatively modern, and that in past ages not only were the climates +more uniform, but more evenly distributed over the whole world." + +Without attempting to follow through the whole series of formations we +may note a few characteristic statements of the text-books. Thus Dana +says of the Cambrian: + +"There was no frigid zone, and there may have been no excessively torrid +zone." + +While of the Silurian coral limestones of the Arctic regions he says: + +"The formation of thick strata of limestone shows that life like that of +the lower latitudes not only existed there, but flourished in +profusion."[69] + +Howorth thus quotes Colonel Fielden, the Arctic explorer, regarding the +fossil Sclerodermic corals of the Silurian, widely distributed in the +Arctic regions: + +"These undoubted reef-forming corals of the Silurian epoch were just as +much inhabitants of warm water in northern latitudes at that period as +are the Sclerodermata of to-day in the Indo-Pacific and Atlantic +oceans.... These corals were forms of life which must have been tropical +in habits and requirement." + +In fact coral limestones of the Carboniferous system are the nearest +known fossiliferous rocks to the North Pole, and from the strike of the +beds must underlie the Polar Sea. In the words of Howorth, "Coal strata +with similar fossils have occurred all round the Polar basin ... and may +be said, therefore, to have occupied a continuous cap around the North +Pole."[70] + +Again I quote from Howorth regarding the Mesozoic rocks: + +"This very widespread fauna and flora proves that the high temperature +of the Secondary era prevailed in all latitudes, and not only so, it +pervaded them apparently continuously without a break. There is no +evidence whatever, known to me, that can be derived from the fauna and +flora of Secondary times, which points to any period of cold as even +possible. There are no shrunken and stunted forms, and no types such as +we associate with cold conditions, and no changes evidenced by +intercalated beds showing vicissitudes of life." + +The following is from Nordenskiold, as quoted by Howorth, and refers to +the whole geological series: + +"From what has been already stated it appears that the animal and +vegetable relics found in the Polar regions, imbedded in strata +deposited in widely separated geological eras, uniformly testify that a +warm climate has in former times prevailed over the whole globe. From +palaeontological science no support can be obtained for the assumption +of a periodical alternation of warm and cold climates on the surface of +the earth."[71] + +And now we have the equally positive language of A. R. Wallace: + +"It is quite impossible to ignore or evade the force of the testimony as +to the continuous warm climate of the North Temperate and Polar Zones +=throughout Tertiary times=. The evidence extends over a vast area both +in space and time, it is derived from the work of the most competent +living geologists, and it is absolutely consistent in its general +tendency ... Whether in Miocene, Upper or Lower Cretaceous, Jurassic, +Triassic, Carboniferous or Silurian times, and in all the numerous +localities extending over more than half the Polar regions, we find =one +uniform climatic aspect of the fossils=."[72] + +Of course in all this I am taking the various kinds of fossils in the +traditional chronological order. But I shall presently show on the best +of authority that Man existed in "Pliocene" or perhaps "Miocene times," +and in view of such an admission we have, even from the standpoint of +current theory, a vital, personal interest in this question of climate. +Let us take, then, the following from James Geikie, the great champion +of the Glacial theory, on the climate of the Arctic regions at this part +of the =human epoch=: + +"Miocene deposits occur in Greenland, Iceland, Spitzbergen, and at other +places within the Arctic Circle. The beds contain a similar (similar to +the "most luxuriant vegetation" of Switzerland) assemblage of +plant-remains; the palm-trees, however, being wanting. It is certainly +wonderful that within so recent a period as the Miocene, a climate +existed within the Arctic regions so mild and genial as to nourish there +beeches, oaks, planes, poplars, walnuts, limes, magnolias, hazel, holly, +blackthorn, logwood, hawthorn, ivy, vines, and many evergreens, besides +numerous conifers, among which was the sequoia, allied to the gigantic +_Wellingtonia_ of California. This ancient vegetation has been traced up +to within eleven degrees of the Pole."[73] + +According to Dana and other American geologists the "Glacial Period" is +only a variation intervening between the warm Tertiary and the equally +warm "Champlain Period," and it was during the latter that the mammoth, +mastodon, etc., roamed over Europe, Asia, and America. Of the climate +then indicated, when all acknowledge that Man was in existence, this +author says: + +"The genial climate that followed the Glacial appears to have been +marvelously genial to the species, =and alike for all the continents, +Australia included=. The kinds that continued into modern time became +dwindled in the change wherever found over the globe, notwithstanding +the fact that genial climates are still to be found over large +regions."[74] + +In his "Geological Story Briefly Told," he uses even stronger language: + +"The brute mammals reached their maximum in numbers and size during the +warm Champlain Period, and many species lived then which have since +become extinct. Those of Europe and Britain were largely warm-climate +species, such as are now confined to warm temperate and tropical +regions; and only in a warm period like the Champlain could they have +thrived and attained their gigantic size. The great abundance of their +remains and their condition show that the climate and food were all the +animals could have desired. They were masters of their wanderings, and +had their choice of the best."[75] + +"The genial climate of the Champlain period was _abruptly_ (italics +Dana's) terminated. For carcasses of the Siberian elephants were frozen +so suddenly and so completely at the change, that the flesh has remained +untainted." (Id. p. 230.) + +I quite agree with this author that the evidence is conclusive as to the +climate and food being "all the animals could have desired," and that +they must have "had their choice of the best." But it seems to me that +in following out their theory these authors have not left the poor +creatures very much to choose from. For as the inevitable result of +their theory in arranging the plants as well as the animals in +chronological order according to the percentages of living and extinct +forms, they have already disposed of, and consigned to the "early" +Tertiaries, etc., all the probable vegetation on which these animals +lived, and thus have nothing left on which to feed the horse and bison, +rhinoceros and elephant, etc., away within the Arctic Circle, except the +few miserable shrubs and lichens which now survive there. + +But this strange, inconsistent notion of Dana's that the so-called +Glacial phenomena lie in between the warm Tertiary and the equally warm +"Champlain period," is easily understood as the survival of the notion, +so tenaciously held even later than the middle decades of the nineteenth +century, that Man was =not= a witness of any of the great geological +changes. When the evidence became overwhelming that Man lived while the +semi-tropical animals roamed over England, the "Glacial period" still +remained as a sort of buffer against the dangerous possibility of +extending the =human= period back any further. I am not aware that this +venerable scientist ever became quite reconciled to the idea of +"Tertiary Man," though in his "Manual" he mentions a few evidences in +favor of this now almost universally accepted opinion. + +As for the real teachings of the Drift phenomena there is no need of +explanation here. At the very most they are confined to a quite limited +part of the northern hemisphere, there being no trace of them in Alaska, +nor on the plains of Siberia, where now almost eternal frosts +prevail.[76] In fact they are practically confined between the Rocky +Mountains and the Missouri River on the west, and the Ural Mountains on +the east; and with a little common sense infused into the foundation +principles of the science we will cease to be tormented with a "Glacial +Nightmare." Much of the Drift phenomena with the raised beaches are +certainly =later= events than most of the other geological work, but are +inseparably connected with the general problem in their explanation. +Even from the ordinary standpoint, I am not aware that the elaborate +argument of Howorth has even been satisfactorily answered. Indeed, I +feel almost like saying that this writer's various contributions to the +cause of inductive geology mark the beginning of the dawn. + +Hence it may suffice here to merely call attention to the great +simplicity introduced into this vast complexity of the glacialists, by +the positive assurance of this author that the "Drift period" and the +Pleistocene =end together=, and join onto the modern; or perhaps I ought +rather to say that the so-called Glacial phenomena lie in between the +true fossil world and our modern one. + +"Thus, in regard to the Pleistocene mammals, the view is now generally +accepted that, in every place where they have been found in a +contemporary bed, that bed underlies the till, and is therefore +pre-glacial. As in other places, so here (Scotland), teeth and bones of +mammals have occurred in the clay itself; but in all such cases they +occur sporadically and as boulders. As Mr. James Geikie says, 'They +almost invariably afford marks of having been subjected to the same +action as the stones and boulders by which they are surrounded; that is +to say, they are rubbed, ground, striated, and smoothed.'"[77] + +And again: + +"=The Pleistocene fauna, so far as I know, came to an end with the +so-called Glacial age.=" (Id. p. 463.) + +From a recent notice in _Nature_[78] it would seem that even Dr. H. +Woodward, of the British Museum, supports this general view in his +"Table of British Strata," by the statement that the glacial deposits +contain =only derived fossils=. + +But this is such a decided simplification of the problem of climate that +I am utterly at a loss to understand how any one can still cling to the +complex and highly artificial arrangement of numerous "interglacial" +periods, to account for a few bones of mammals or a few pockets of +lignite; and how they can even place between the "Glacial period" and +our times the "genial Champlain period," with it, as Dana says, +"=abruptly terminated=," and becoming "=suddenly= extreme as of a single +winter's night." Howorth, in the latter part of the chapter already +quoted from (pp. 460-478), gives a good review of this subject of +intermittent climates, and strongly supports his contention that the +=stratigraphical evidence= all points to the fact that the Pleistocene +forms are always older than the Drift-beds, and where the flora and +fauna of the Pleistocene occur in the Drift, they do so only as +boulders; that, in fact, as he says in his Preface, "The Pleistocene +Flood ... =forms a great dividing line= in the superficial deposits," +separating the true fossil world from the modern. + +I have hardly the space to repeat here my argument about the extremely +fanciful way in which geologists classify the various members of the +Tertiary group and the Pleistocene. And yet I must say a few words. I +have tried to show the utter nonsense of the common custom of +classifying these beds according to the percentage of living and extinct +forms which they contain, when the real fact is that the number and +kinds of the ancient life-forms which have survived into the modern era +is a purely fortuitous circumstance, being limited solely to those lucky +ones which could stand the radical change from a tepid water or a genial +air to the ice and frosts which they now experience, to mention only one +circumstance of that cosmic convulsion which we now know to have really +intervened between that ancient world and our own. =YET IT IS ON SUCH +EVIDENCE ONLY= that these Pleistocene forms are separated from the +Tertiaries, or that the Tertiaries themselves are classified off--at +least as far as the invertebrates and the plants are concerned. No one +claims that the so-called Glacial beds can be sharply distinguished from +other deposits on purely mechanical make-up. Indeed, I am strongly of +the opinion that very many Archaean soils, totally unfossiliferous +themselves, and resting on unfossiliferous rocks, have been assigned to +the "Glacial age," merely because their discoverers did not know what +else to do with them. When beds contain fossils, the latter are the one +and only guide in determining age; but in view of the purely arbitrary +character of this method of classifying off the Tertiary and +post-Tertiary rocks, I do not see where we are going to =draw the line= +when we once admit that the post-Tertiary beds contain only "derived +fossils." It seems to me truly astonishing that shrewd reasoners, like +Howorth and Dr. Woodward, have not seen the dangerous character of this +precedent which they have admitted. For with that marvelous climate of +all geological time continuing right up to that fatal day when it was +"abruptly terminated," and the mammoth and his fellows were caught in +the merciless frosts which now hold them, the percentage of all the +lucky forms of life, plants, invertebrates, or mammals, which could +stand such a change and "persist" into our modern world, must be +=utterly nonsensical as a test of age= even from their standpoint. + +In resuming the main argument of this chapter, I need only summarize by +saying that the evidence is conclusive that all geological time down to +this sharp "dividing line" was characterized by a surprisingly mild and +uniform climate over all the earth. The modern period is characterized +by terrific extremes of heat and cold; and now little or nothing can +exist where previously plant and animal life flourished in profusion. + +This radical and world-wide change in climate, therefore, demands ample +consideration when seeking a true induction as to the past of our globe. +That it was no gradual or secular affair, but that the climate "became +=suddenly= extreme as of a single winter's night," the Siberian +"mummies" are unanswerable arguments. =That it occurred within the human +epoch= all are now agreed. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[68] "The Glacial Nightmare and the Flood," pp. 426-479. + +[69] "Manual," pp. 484, 524-5. + +[70] Op. cit., pp. 434-5. + +[71] Id., p. 45. + +[72] "Island Life," pp. 182, 195-6; "Nightmare," pp. 455-6. + +[73] "Historical Geology," p. 76. + +[74] "Manual," p. 997. + +[75] p. 225, Edition of 1875. + +[76] See Dana's "Manual," pp. 945, 977; also "The Glacial Nightmare," + pp. 45-2, 511, etc. + +[77] "Great Ice Age," p. 129; "Nightmare," p. 473. + +[78] See _Nature_ April 11, 1901, p. 560. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +DEGENERATION + + +There is another great general fact about the fossil world which seems +to be a natural corollary from the one already given about climate. + +It is this: + +=The fossils, regarded as a whole, invariably supply us with types +larger of their kind and better developed in every way than their +nearest modern representatives, whether of plants or animals.= + +This fact also is so well known that it needs no proof. Through the +whole range of geological literature I do not know of a word of dissent +from this general fact by any writer whatever. Proof therefore is not +necessary, though a brief review of a little of the evidence may refresh +our memories. + +To begin with the Cambrian, Dana says: + +"The Pteropods, among Mollusks, were much larger than the modern species +of the tribe. The Trilobites even of the Lower Cambrian comprise species +as large as living Crustaceans. The Ostrapods are generally larger than +those of recent times."[79] + +Again, in speaking of the general character of the Cambrian fossils, he +says: + +"The types of the early Cambrian are mostly identical with those now +represented in existing seas, and although inferior in general as to +grade [in the "Phylogenic series"], they bear no marks of imperfect or +stunted growth from unfit or foul surroundings." (p. 485.) + +The well known Mollusk, _Maclurea magna_, which is so enormously +abundant in the Silurian, is often eight inches in diameter, and the +astounding Cephalopod genus, _Endoceras_, consisting of twenty species, +found only in two divisions of the Lower Silurian, has left shells over +a foot in diameter, and ten or twelve feet long! + +Of the fishes of the Devonian we have, among other remarks of a similar +character, the following: + +"The Dipnoans, or 'Lung-fishes,' were represented by gigantic species +called by Newberry _Dinichthys_ and _Titanichthys_, from their size and +formidable dental armature.... A still larger species is the +_Titanichthys clarki_ of Newberry, in which the head was four feet or +more broad, the lower jaw a yard long. This jaw was shaped posteriorly +like an oar blade, and anteriorly was turned upward like a sled +runner."[80] + +One of the ancient Eurypterids from the Old Red Sandstone of Europe has +a length of six feet, which is more than three times that of any +Crustacean now living. While a gigantic Isopod Crustacean from the same +strata had a leg the basal joint of which was three inches long, and +three-quarters of an inch through, which is larger than the whole body +of any modern species. + +The ancient "Horse-tails," "Ground-pines," Ferns and Cycads were trees +from 30 to 90 feet high, and their carbonized stems and leaves make up +many of our largest and best beds of coal. Compared with them the modern +representatives are mere herbs or shrubbery. + +Of the gigantic insects of the Devonian and Carboniferous beds we might +make similar remarks. Some of the ancient locusts had an expanse of wing +of over seven inches; while many of the ancient Dragon-flies had bodies +from a foot to sixteen inches long, with wings a foot long and over two +feet in spread from tip to tip. + +Here is James Geikie's summary of the leading types of the Palaeozoic: + +"Many Palaeozoic species were characterized by their large size as +compared with species of the same groups that belong to later times. +Thus, some Trilobites and other Crustaceans were larger than any modern +species of Crustaceans. The Palaeozoic Amphibians also much exceeded in +size any living members of their class. Again, the modern club-mosses, +which are insignificant plants, either trailing on the ground or never +reaching more than two feet in height, were represented by great +lepidodendroid trees." + +Sternberg, in speaking of some of the frogs which he found in the +Permian of Texas, says: + +"I found several skulls that measured over a foot from the end of the +chin to the distal point of the horns.... I think when alive the frog +must have been six feet long."[81] + +He mentions another specimen which was "about 10 feet long," the head of +which was "about 20 inches in length," with jaws "more powerful than +those of an ox." + +Of the monstrous Dinosaurs of the Mesozoic rocks one hardly needs to +speak. + +"They were the most gigantic of terrestrial animals, in some cases +reaching a length of 70 or 80 feet, while at the same time they had a +height of body and massiveness of limb that, without evidence from the +bones, would have been thought too great for muscle to move."[82] + +They abound in both the Old and the New World. + +Of the gigantic Mammals of the Tertiary beds of the Western States, it +would also be superfluous to speak; their gigantic size is known by +every high school pupil, or every one who has visited any important +museum in Europe or America. + +We may perhaps be reminded again that all the species of these "older" +rocks are extinct species. I have already suggested the grave doubts on +this point, regarding the great mass of the lower forms of life, plant +and animal; but we will let that pass. But let us take some of the +"late" Tertiary and Pleistocene mammals, which cannot be distinguished +from living species, and how do we fare? It is the same old story; the +moderns are degenerate dwarfs. + +The hippopotamus (_H. major_) is a good one to start with, for Flower +and Lydekker[83] say that it "cannot be specifically distinguished from +_H. amphibius_" of Africa. This gigantic brute used to live in the +rivers of England and Western Europe. The text-books generally say in +"Pliocene times," because, I suppose, no one has the courage to suggest +that it lived under the ice of the "Glacial period." We are always +pointed to the wool on the rhinoceros and the mammoth as indicating a +somewhat cool climate, but the well known amphibious habits of the +hippopotamus cannot be so easily disposed of. But if, as I believe, this +world never saw a foot of ice at the sea level till the end of the +"Pleistocene period," to speak after the current manner, the problem +becomes very simple. In that case the time of the Hippopotamus in +England was neither earlier nor later than that of the palms and acacias +of the "early" Tertiary or Mesozoic rocks, or than that of the mammoth, +lion, and hyena of the Pleistocene. There is as we now know absolutely +nothing but an out-of-date hypothesis to indicate that they did not all +live there together. We may, if we choose, try to dovetail those +conditions into the present on the basis of uniformity and slow secular +change, by assuming a few million years for the process, but there is +neither a particle of evidence nor of probability that the hippopotamus +was not contemporary alike with the palms of the Eocene and the +elephants and lions of the post-Tertiary. + +As for the mammoth itself, which Flower and Lydekker have intimated may +turn out identical with _E. Columbi_ and _E. armeniacus_, and thus the +direct ancestor of the modern Asiatic elephant (_E. indicus_), some have +argued that its average size was not greater than that of the existing +species of India and Africa. But Nicholson says that it was: + +"... considerably larger than the largest of living elephants, the +skeleton being over sixteen feet in length, exclusive of the tusks, and +over nine feet in height."[84] + +Dana is equally positive: + +"The species was over twice the weight of the largest modern elephant, +and nearly a third taller."[85] + +The upper incisors or tusks were very much longer than in the modern +species, being from ten to twelve feet long, and sometimes curved up and +back so as to form an almost complete circle. As these tusks continue to +grow throughout life, their enormous length is, I take it, a proof of +much greater longevity and thus of greater vitality than in the cases of +the modern species. The latter is simply a degenerate. + +And so I might go on with the Edentates, the Ungulates, the Rodents, the +Carnivores, etc., for the same thing must be said of all. + +As Sir William Dawson[86] remarks: + +"Nothing is more evident in the history of fossil animals and plants of +past geological ages than that =persistence or degeneracy are the rule= +rather than the exception.... We may almost say that all things left +to themselves =tend to degenerate=, and only a new breathing of the +Almighty Spirit can start them again on the path of advancement." + +In spite of the long popular views of Cuvier, every modern scientist +admits that the great lion and hyena of the Pleistocene are identical +with the living species of Africa. Many say the same thing of the fossil +bear as compared with the modern brown bear and the grizzly, though, as +Dana remarks of all three, lion, hyena, and bear, "these modern kinds +are dwarfs in comparison." + +I quote again from Dana: + +"Thus the brute races of the Middle Quaternary on all the continents +exceeded the moderns greatly in magnitude. Why, no one has +explained."[87] + +This was in 1875. In the last edition of his "Manual," published +shortly after his death, he has this to say in addition: + +"A species thrives best in the region of fittest climate. =In the +Pleistocene, the fittest climate was universal.= Geologists have +attributed the extinction of most of the species and the dwindling of +others to the cold of the Reindeer epoch. It is the only explanation yet +found, though seemingly insufficient for the Americas." (p. 1016.) + +However, since the discovery of the pictures of the reindeer and the +mammoth drawn and even painted =side by side= on the caverns of Southern +France, undoubtedly from life and by the same artist, we do not hear so +much about the "Reindeer epoch," and the "Mammoth epoch." A little +thought should have suggested long ago that it was more reasonable to +suppose the reindeer, glutton, musk-ox, etc., to have been originally +adapted to the high mountains and table lands of that ancient world, +than to imagine all the fauna careering up and down over continents and +across seas like a lot of crazy Scandinavian lemmings, as the migration +theory involved. But most geologists seem never to have had any use for +mountains or plateaus, except to breed glaciers and continental +ice-sheets. But the only point which I wish to insist upon here is that +the cause, =whatever it was=, that made such a zoological break at the +"close" of the Pleistocene, and which compelled the shivering, +degenerate survivors, that could not stand the new extremes of frost and +snow, to shift to the Tropics--this cause was certainly competent to do +a good deal more work in the way of "extinction" or "dwindling" of +species than the uniformitarians have generally given it credit for. + +And in summing up this matter regarding the size and physical +development of species, we must confess that we find in geology no +indication of inherent progress upward. Variation there is and variation +there has been, even "mutations" and "saltations," but with one voice do +the rocks testify that the general results of such variation have not +been upward. Rather must we confess as a great biological law, that +=degeneration has marked the history of every living form=. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[79] "Manual," p. 487. + +[80] pp. 618-9. + +[81] _Pop. Sc. News_, May, 1902, p. 106. + +[82] Dana, "Manual," p. 761. + +[83] "Mammals, etc.," p. 281. + +[84] "Ancient Life-History," p. 357. + +[85] "Manual," p. 998. + +[86] "Modern Ideas of Evolution," Appendix. + +[87] "Geol. Story Briefly Told," p. 229. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +FOSSIL MEN + + +There is still another fact which we must consider ere we can frame any +wise or safe induction regarding the geological changes. It is this: + +=Man himself, to say nothing of numerous living animals and plants, must +have witnessed something of the nature of a cosmic convulsion--how much +it is the object of our search to find out.= Even according to the +ordinary text-books, he must have seen the uplifting of the greater part +of the mountain chains of the world; while he certainly lived in +conditions of climate, and of land and water distribution, together with +plant and animal surroundings, which preclude the possibility of +dovetailing those conditions into the present order of things on any +basis of uniformity. + +By this proposition I simply mean that Man must have witnessed a cosmic +geological catastrophe of some character and of some dimensions--the +true nature and probable limits of this catastrophe ought to be the +chief point of all geological inquiry. But instead of this method, +instead of finding out whether our present world was ever a witness of +such an event, the founders of the science began at the little end of an +assumed succession of life (involving a preposterous supernatural +knowledge of the past), and gradually worked up a habit of explaining +everything in terms of Uniformity long decades before they would +acknowledge that Man or the present order of things had anything to do +with this fossil world. The evidence on this latter point finally became +overwhelming; but with their habit of Uniformity well mastered, and +their long, single file of life succession all tabulated off and +infallibly fixed, modern geologists have hitherto refused to look at the +whole science from this new point of view, or to reconstruct geological +theory if need be in accordance with a true modern induction. + +And in this proposition the reader will understand that I believe in +what is called "Tertiary man." I am aware that a few scientists still +contest this view, but the evidence (from the standpoint of current +theory) seems to me to be overwhelmingly against them. But in this fact, +if it be a fact, that Man lived under the wholly strange and different +conditions of "Pliocene" or perhaps "Miocene times," is =THE VERY +STRONGEST POSSIBLE ARGUMENT= that I can conceive of for the necessity of +a complete reconstruction of geological theory--I mean, of course, apart +altogether from the preposterous way in which the life succession was +assumed and built up and then treated as an actual fact. It was when +this grim fact of Man's inseparable connection with the fossil world was +borne in upon me, that I began to realize the possibility and imperative +necessity of reconstructing the science on a truly inductive basis. + +I shall not undertake to give a complete up-to-date argument for +"Miocene" or even "Pliocene Man." The subject is still under discussion +as to =just how far back= along this thin line of receding life forms +Man actually did live, and from the peculiar methods now in vogue which +are so wholly subjective in character, it would seem to be capable of +settlement in almost any way one chooses. However, whole volumes are +being written on the subject, and the end is not yet. But there is no +denying that human remains have frequently been found in strata which, +but for their presence, would have been assigned a place far back in +"Tertiary time." The existence of strong evidence for "Tertiary Man" no +one would think of denying. + +In all this, of course, I am considering the question from the common +uniformitarian standpoint. But why should it be necessary for us to +positively settle the question as to just how far back in geological +time Man actually did live? For those who have attentively read my +statement of the unscientific methods of classifying these Tertiary and +post-Tertiary beds--or all the others for that matter--I need not here +add any further argument if the accepted succession of life is, to put +it as mildly as possible, not quite a scientific certainty; if the +time-honored custom of classifying these so-called "superficial" beds by +their relative percentages of extinct and living forms rests under a +shadow of suspicion as to its scientific accuracy; if, above all, we do +not at the beginning prejudice the whole case by the assumption of +uniformity, =what need is there of determining whether "Pliocene" or +"Miocene" shells are found with these fossil human remains?= + +That Man lived in Western Europe contemporary with those giants of the +prime, the elephant and the musk-ox, the rhinoceros and the reindeer, +the lion, the Cape hyena, and the hippopotamus, at which time a very +different distribution of land and water prevailed over these parts, +with a radically different mantle of climate spread over all, no one +will deny for a moment. Such facts are now found in the primary +text-books for our children in the public schools. + +But since geologists still classify the rocks as they do, and give a +time value to percentages of extinct and living species of marine +shells, etc., we are in a measure compelled to take the matter where we +find it, and enquire how far back in geological time, i.e., among what +kinds of fossils, are human remains found? + +One of the best popular works on the subject that I know of is "The +Meeting-Place of Geology and History," (1894) by Sir J. W. Dawson; +though, like all other works of its kind written from the religious +standpoint, it endeavors as far as possible to minimize the evidence in +support of Man's geological antiquity. + +This author thinks that Dr. Mourlan, of Belgium, has "established the +strongest case yet on record for the existence of Tertiary Man." (p. +30.) It is that of some worked flints and broken bones of animals +"imbedded in sands derived from Eocene and Pliocene beds, and supposed +to have been remanie by wind action." Prestwich[88] has brought forward +similar facts; and though the evidence in favor of the genuine +geological character of these remains seems to me little if any better +than that from the auriferous gravels of California, I am willing to +=take them as reported=. + +Dawson speaks of the nearly entire human skeleton described by +Quatrefages from the Lower Pliocene beds of Castelnedolo, near Brescia, +and only answers it with a sarcastic remark about the well developed +skull of this ancient man. + +"Unfortunately the skull of the only perfect skeleton is said to have +been of fair proportions and superior to those of the ruder types of +post-Glacial men. This has cast a shade of suspicion on the discovery, +especially on the part of evolutionists, who think it is not in +accordance with theory that man should retrograde between the Pliocene +and the early modern period instead of advancing."[89] + +Lastly, we have the following about the Miocene: + +"There are, however, in France two localities (Puy, Courney and Thenay), +one in the Upper and the other in the Middle Miocene, which have +afforded what are supposed to be worked flints." + +He adds that "The geological age of the deposits seems in both cases +beyond question;" but contents himself with a derisive answer about +these chipped flints being possibly "the handiwork of Miocene apes." + +This language, coming from such a source, would seem as good evidence as +is needed to prove that Man was contemporary with, and that his remains +are now found among the fossils of the Middle Miocene. For it must be +remembered that these are reluctant admissions drawn from this +illustrious scientist, who was one of the last champions of the old +ideas about the "recent" origin of Man. As Pres. Asa Mahan of Cornell +has said, "Admissions in favor of truth from the ranks of its enemies +constitute the highest kind of evidence." At any rate, I shall treat +this point as already proved, =for whether this particular instance is +accepted or not, practically all modern writers admit the fact of +"Middle Tertiary Man."= + +I have already alluded to the recently discovered paintings on the cave +walls of Southern France, where reindeer, aurochs, horses and mammoths +have been reproduced with striking accuracy and skill, and of such an +age that they have in places been covered by stalactites over two inches +in thickness. The Marquis De Nadaillac,[90] who has given the best +description of these interesting antiquities that I have been able to +see, remarks that "the drawing is wonderful," and that "we are justly +astonished to find such artistic performances in times so distant from +ours, and in which we did not suppose a like civilization." + +I have not seen the geological date to which these remains have been +assigned, but doubtless it is the very "latest" part of the +Pleistocene--they show far too high a development for "Miocene" or even +"Pliocene times." But I should like to be shown some good and sufficient +reason for saying that these men are not just as likely to have been +contemporary with the Middle Tertiary fauna and flora as any others. +=Some men were as commonly admitted.= And in the name of sacred common +sense, if the human period is thus elastic enough to stretch out over +the Pleistocene, the Pliocene, and clear back to the "Middle Miocene," +=why can't we do the same for all of man's strange companions=, the +mammoth and the Cape hyena, the reindeer and the hippopotamus, the lion +and the musk-ox, etc.? The usual sneers about it being impossible for +this apparently incongruous mixture to live side by side in the same +district must now cease. They certainly did live side by side, as is +shown by these companion pictures of the mammoth and the reindeer in the +very southern part of sunny France, to say nothing of the numerous cases +where the bones of the above mentioned animals are all mixed together +indiscriminately. How is it unreasonable to suppose that these +elephants, lions and hippopotami lived beneath the "early" Tertiary +palms, cinnamons, and mimosas of the lower elevations, while the +reindeer, musk-ox and glutton lived beneath the maples, birches and +beeches of the high mountain sides? Some such conditions must have +existed, for that magnificent world, whose ruins we now find buried +beneath our feet, was a =homogeneous and harmonious= unit in its plant +and animal life, in spite of the fables upon which we have so long been +fed in the name of geological science. Things which are equal to the +same thing must be equal to one another; hence the plants and animals +which were contemporary with the same creature (Man) must have been +=contemporary with each other=; and hence there is absolutely nothing to +forbid the idea that Man and his Pleistocene companions were really +contemporary with the flora and fauna of the Middle Tertiary. + +Hence we may now proceed to inquire what geological changes have +occurred since the "Middle of the Miocene," according to the accepted +teachings of geology. + +Our first point must be that of climate, and I have already given +abundant evidence to show that at that "time" an abundant warm-climate +vegetation mantled all the Arctic regions. As already quoted from +Wallace, throughout the whole Arctic regions, and during the whole of +geological time, "we find one uniform climatic aspect of the fossils," +and "It is quite impossible to ignore or evade the force of the +testimony as to the continuous warm climate of the North Temperate and +Polar Zones throughout Tertiary times." + +That this astonishingly mild and uniform climate prevailed over these +regions until and during the time of the mammoth, we ought not to have a +shadow of doubt. =What single bit of positive evidence is there to show +that it did not?= That he must have had some such vegetation on which to +feed is certain, and there is no proof of any previous interruption of +these conditions save a series of hypotheses. He and his fellows browsed +on semi-tropical and warm temperate plants far within the Arctic Circle, +if there happened to be land there, doubtless over the very Pole itself; +but suddenly!! lo, something caught him with the grip of death-- + + "And wrapped his corpse in winding-sheet of ice, + And sung the requiem of his shivering ghost." + +Who has not read of their untainted meat now making food for dogs and +wolves? Their stomachs are well filled with undigested food, showing, as +one author remarks, that they "were quietly feeding when the crisis +came." Dr. Hertz recently reported one not only with its stomach full of +food, but with its mouth full, too. No wonder that even an orthodox +geologist like Prof. Dana is compelled to say that these things prove +"that the cold finally became =suddenly= extreme, as of a single +winter's night, and knew no relenting afterward." + +Here then is one very notable geological event which has taken place +within the human epoch, and the only thing of its kind of which geology +has an undeniable record, viz., a sudden and radical change in the +earth's climate; =a cosmic affair, and not a local phenomenon=. I need +not here attempt to discuss the how of this world catastrophe as it must +have been, or the other changes inseparably involved. The fact itself is +as certain as Man's own existence. + +The next division of our subject, in further consideration of the +changes that have taken place since Man's existence, as stated at the +beginning of this chapter, relates to the changes of land and water +distribution since "Middle Miocene times." And here again I shall try to +take the classification of these rocks just as I find them. + +The first thing which impresses us is the extremely fragmentary +distribution of the Miocene and Pliocene beds. Not, however, that they +are uncommon nor yet of small extent. On the contrary they are scattered +over America and Eurasia--and all the rest of the globe for that +matter--like the spots on a leopard, or the warts on a toad's back, till +it becomes one of the unsearchable mysteries of the science how these +innumerable patches can be got down under the ocean to receive their +load of sediment, without deluging the surrounding regions in a similar +manner. But then, to be sure, fresh-water lakes will answer the same +purpose, and are particularly indicated when the proportion of plants +and terrestrial animals is =in excess= of the true marine fossils. And +so enormous fresh-water basins are described here and there, with the +great mammals crowding about their margins in their zeal to become +fossilized, that the mountain tops may be saved from going under once +more--or perhaps I should say to enable the modern writers to get some +of these strata puckered up to their full height before these "late" +Tertiary deposits were made. This mountain making business is another +affair that geologists would like to have take place on the installment +plan, but unfortunately it seems to have been nearly all postponed till +the very close of "geological time." This arrangement of fresh-water +lakes saves the central Rocky Mountain region from going down again +beneath the deep. But it cannot save the Alps, Juras and Appennines in +Europe, nor parts of the Himalayas, and I know not what other mountains +in Asia, nor the coast region of California and Oregon in America, to +say nothing of large parts of the Andes in South America, with regions +in Africa and Australia. + +But what is the use of trying to figure out the amount of our earth +which has been under the ocean since "Middle Tertiary times," and thus +since Man was upon it? To save the northern half of Europe with all of +Canada from again going under at the close of the "Tertiary period," +geologists have spread out their continental ice sheets, and have asked +them to do duty instead of water. But this is hardly sufficient, for the +"upper" or "later" part of the so-called "Glacial" deposits are clearly +stratified; and so they either invoke a "=flood vast beyond +conception=," as Dana does in America for the "final event in the +history of the glacier," or, as others prefer, the whole region is +baptized again. As Dawson says in his "Meeting-Place of Geology and +History," "=No geological event is better established than the +post-Pliocene submergence.=" + +But I must not weary the reader by dwelling on this monotonous +repetition of catastrophes--for must they not have been catastrophic if +such ups and downs of whole continents are crowded within the human +period? We may allow a number of thousands of years for Man's possible +existence, but Archaeology and History alike protest against the +=millions= of years required to explain these continental oscillations +on any basis of uniformity. One such period of horror ought to be enough +for us, and to understand or explain it in a truly scientific manner, we +must with it correlate the sudden and world-wide change of climate +already described. + +One more point demands consideration ere we complete this subject of +what Man has witnessed of geological change. For, according to current +theory =almost all the mountains have been either wholly formed or at +least completed within quite "recent" times=: indeed many of the +greatest mountain chains have been puckered up from the position of +horizontal strata wholly since "Miocene times," which for us means since +Man was upon the globe. + +Thus Dana in speaking of the part of Western America which has been +elevated since "Miocene times," says that it-- + +"... probably included the whole of the Pacific mountain border, from +the line of the Mississippi Valley to the Pacific coast line and outside +of this line for one or more scores of miles."[91] + +And he adds the significant words: + +"Contemporaneously, similar movements were in progress over the other +continents: along the Andes, affecting half, at least, of South America; +the Pyrenees, Carpathian Alps, and a large part of Europe; the Himalayas +and much of Asia." (p. 365.) + +Let us now take a brief glance at a few of the details of what these +mountains were thus doing while Man was living in semi-tropical England, +or at least Western Europe. + +In speaking of foreign examples of Tertiary mountain-making this author +devotes especial attention to the Alps and the Juras, for their +structure is better understood, having been more carefully studied. And +of an example described by Heim, already spoken of, he says: + +"One of the overthrust folds in the region has put the beds upside down +over an area of 450 square miles. Fifty thousand feet of formations of +the Jurassic, Cretaceous, Eocene Tertiary and Miocene Tertiary, were +upturned =at the close of the Miocene period=."[92] + +With what a whack must this mighty mass of rocks have fallen on +itself--miles in thickness, and turned "upside down over an area of 450 +square miles"!!! + +Of course I am here taking the record just as I find it, as I have +already discussed this matter of "overthrust folds." + +I need not give further examples from the other great mountain ranges. +Their structure is not so well understood as that of the Alps, though +doubtless when examined they will be found just as "young," and just as +full of astonishing mountain movements as those already examined. But +this much is already certain, that =practically over all the world the +mountains were either completed or wholly raised from the sea level= +during "late Tertiary" and "early Quaternary time." No wonder Dana says +that this fact "is one of the most marvelous in geological history." + +"It has been thought incredible that the orographic climax should have +come =so near the end= of geological time, instead of in an early age +when the crust had a plastic layer beneath, and was free to move; yet +=the fact is beyond question=." ("Manual," p. 1020.) + +I think I have now abundantly proved the various heads of the +proposition with which I began this chapter, viz., that even from the +standpoint of the current theories:--[93] + +(1) Man must have seen the entire elevation or at least the completion +of practically all the great mountains of the world, such as the +Rockies, Andes, Alps, Himalayas, etc. + +(2) The relative distribution of land and water surface has--since Man's +advent as commonly stated--changed completely. The land and water have +practically changed places over the greater part of the globe. + +(3) Man lived while the Arctic regions had a mild soft climate, and he +lived to see these conditions so suddenly changed that some of his dumb +brute companions were caught in the waters and frozen so speedily that +their flesh has remained untainted. Other considerations show this +change of climate to have affected the whole globe. + +The lesson to be drawn from this as the last fact in the line of +cumulative evidence here presented, will be considered in the following +chapter. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[88] "Controverted Questions of Geology," Article III., 1895. + +[89] "Meeting-Place," pp. 28, 29. + +[90] _Pop. Sc. News_, Feb. 1902. + +[91] "Manual," p. 364. + +[92] p. 367. + +[93] (Note. In this discussion I have purposely ignored the various + instances where human remains have been reported from deposits of + even greater "antiquity" than the Middle Tertiaries.) + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +INDUCTIVE METHODS + + +In the First Part of this book I tried to examine into the facts and +methods which are commonly supposed to prove that there has been a +succession of life on the globe. We found that this life succession +theory has not a single fact to support it; that it is not the result of +scientific research, but wholly the product of an inventive imagination; +that no one kind of fossil has even been proved or can be proved to be +intrinsically older than another, or than Man himself; and hence that a +complete reconstruction of geological theory is imperatively demanded by +our modern knowledge. + +In the Second Part I have brought out the following additional facts: + +1. The abnormal character of much of the fossiliferous deposits. + +2. A radical and world-wide change of climate. + +3. The marked degeneration in passing from the fossil world to the +modern one. + +4. The fact that the human race, to say nothing of a vast number of +living species of plants and animals, has participated in some of the +greatest of the geological changes--we really know not how to limit the +number or character of these changes. + +Surely a true spirit of scientific investigation would now begin to +inquire, =How did these changes take place?= Discarding the use of +stronger language, it is at least utterly unscientific to begin +somewhere at the vanishing point of a past eternity and formulate our +pretty theories as to how this deposit was made, and how that was laid +down, and the exact order in which they all occurred; while these +"recent" deposits, in which our race and the plants and animals living +about us are acknowledged to be concerned, are left over till the last, +and we then find that they admit of absolutely no explanation. We +ourselves, to say nothing of thousands of living species of plants and +animals, have participated in some of the very greatest of the +geological changes--we know not how many or how great. =These things +must be first explained.= Has anything happened to our world that will +explain them? Are there known forces and changes now in operation which, +granting time enough, will amply and sufficiently explain these facts, +as simply one in kind with those of the present day? + +To this last question we must admit that our historic experience, +prolonged over several thousand years, utters a thundering =NO!= +Volcanoes are every now and then breaking forth; but volcanoes and +mountain ranges have nothing in common with one another as to structure +and origin. No one claims that a single mountain flexure is now being +formed or has been formed within the historic period. There are indeed +"creeps" in the rocks in certain places, but these are not such as to +contribute to the height of the mountains in which they occur, but +rather the reverse. Sudden changes of level within small areas have +occurred, but neither in extent nor in kind do they furnish any key as +to past changes of level; while the so-called "secular" changes are so +microscopic in extent and so doubtful in character that they are utterly +unworthy of consideration in view of the stupendous problems which we +are trying to explain. The well-known work of Eduard Suess is a standing +protest that such geological chances are =not now in progress=; for, in +speaking of how the land and ocean have exchanged places in the past, +Zittel represents him as teaching that their "cause of origin until now +=has not yet been discovered=."[94] + +Or, to quote the expressive words of Suess himself, with which he +concludes his discussion of this very subject: + +"As Rama looks across the ocean of the universe, and sees its surface +blend in the distant horizon with the dipping sky, and as he considers +if indeed a path might be built far out into the almost immeasurable +space, so we gaze over the ocean of the ages, but =no sign of a shore +shows itself to our view=." (Id. p. 294.) + +As for climate, I never heard any one suggest that cosmic changes of +climate are now known to be going on, much less that =sudden= changes of +the kind indicated by the North Siberian "mummies" are in the habit of +occurring. In fact, we must all own that the mountains, the relative +position of land and water, as well as the climate of our globe, are +each and all now in a state of stable equilibrium, and have been in this +state since the dawn of history or of scientific observation. + +Accordingly I ask, =How much time is needed= to account for the facts +before us on the basis of Uniformity? In common honesty will a short +eternity itself satisfy the stern problem before us? I cannot see that +it holds out the slightest promise of solving it; while, on the other +hand, I am sure that, in dealing with the past of Man's existence +(theories of evolution and all other theories of origins whatever cast +aside), we are not at liberty to make unreasonable demands of time. The +evidence of history and archaeology is all against it. + +From the latter sciences it can be shown that at their very dawn we +have, over all the continents, a group of civilizations seldom equalled +since save in very modern times, and all so undeniably related to one +another and of such a character that they prove a previous state of +civilization in some locality =together=, before these scattered +fragments of our race were dispersed abroad. We can track these various +peoples all back to some region in Southwestern Asia, though the exact +locality for this source of inherited civilization has never yet been +found, and it is now almost certain that it is somehow lost in the +geological changes which have intervened. For when we cross the well +marked boundary line between history and geology, we have still to deal +with men who apparently =were not savages=, men who with tremendous +disadvantages could carve and draw and paint as no savages have ever +done, and who had evidently domesticated the horse and other animals. +But as to time, history gives no countenance to long time, i.e., what +geologists would call long. Good authentic history extends back a few +score centuries, archaeology may promise us a few more. As for +=millions= of years, of even a few =hundred thousands=, the thing +seems too absurd for discussion, unless we forsake inductive methods, +and assume some form of evolution _a priori_. + +Hence it ought to be evident that no amount of learned trifling with +time will solve our problem without supposing some strange event to have +happened our world and our race, long ago, and before the dawn of +history. I see no possible way for scientific reasoning to avoid this +conclusion. Ignoring for the present the Chaldean Deluge tablets, and +what Rawlinson calls the "consentient belief" in a world-catastrophe +"among members of all the great races into which ethnologists have +divided mankind," which like their civilization has the earmarks of +being =an inheritance= from some common source before their dispersion, +we may note that most geologists now admit the certainty of some sort of +catastrophe since man was upon the earth. I might mention Quatrefages +and Dupont, Boyd Dawkins, Howorth, Prestwich, Wright and Sir William +Dawson, with many others. Even Eduard Suess teaches a somewhat similar +local catastrophe, though like the others only as a reluctant concession +to the insistent demands of Chaldean history and archaeological +tradition. But all of these affairs are mere makeshifts in view of the +tremendous demands of the purely geological evidence, and all alike +(save perhaps those of Wright and Howorth) labor under the strange +inconsistency of supposing that such an event could occur without +leaving abundant and indelible marks upon the rocks of our globe. While +in view of the evidence given through the previous pages, I insist that +the purely geological evidence of a world catastrophe is immeasurably +stronger than that of archaeology, that in fact the whole geological +phenomena constitute a cumulative argument of this nature. + +But if this be granted, we must then inquire, What was its nature? and +what its extent? The former is quite easily answered: the latter problem +is still somewhat beyond our reach. + +As to its character, the evidence is very plain. It was a veritable +cataclysm of some sort: it deals with great changes of land and water +surface. If the geological succession is but a hoary myth, and if we +find countless modern living species of plants and animals mixed up in +all the "older" rocks, we cannot ignore these in a rational and +unprejudiced reconstruction of the science. But, ignoring these, we must +remember that =even the Tertiary and post-Tertiary deposits are +absolutely world wide, and are packed with fossils of living species=. +Not a continent and scarcely a country on the globe but contains great +stretches of these deposits, laid down by the sea where now the land is +high and dry. The sea and land have practically shifted places over all +the globe since Man and thousands of other living species left their +fossils in the rocks. It is only the stupendous magnitude of these +changes which has made our scientists reluctant to admit the possibility +of such a catastrophe. + +With the myth of a life succession dissipated, a broad view of the +fossil world cannot fail to convince the mind of the reality of some +such cosmic convulsion, and convince it with all the force of a +mathematical demonstration. Great groups of animals have dropped out of +sight over all the continents, and their carcasses have been buried by +sea water where we now find high plateaus or mountain ranges. Ignoring +completely the abundant fossils in the so-called "older" rocks, and +fixing our attention entirely on the Tertiary and Pleistocene beds that +are acknowledged to be closely connected with the human race and the +modern world, we still have =a problem in race extinction alone= that +appalls the mind. The mammoth, rhinoceros and mastodon, together with +"not less than thirty distinct species of the horse tribe," as Marsh +says, =all disappear from North America at one time=, and the most +ingenious disciple of Hutton and Lyell has been puzzled to invent a +plausible explanation. But when we consider that at this same +"geological period" =similar events were occurring on all the other +continents=--the huge ground-sloths (megatheriums) and glyptodons in +South America; "wombats as large as tapirs," and "kangaroos the size of +elephants" in Australia; the mammoth and woolly rhinoceros in Eurasia; +together with an enormous hippopotamus, as far as England is concerned, +to say nothing of those great bears, lions and hyenas, with a +semi-tropical vegetation, =all disappearing together at the same time=, +or shifting to the other side of the world--it becomes almost like a +deliberate insult to our intellectual honesty to be approached with +offers of "explanations" based on any so-called "natural" action of the +forces of nature. But when, in addition to all this, we consider the +fact that those human giants of the caves of Western Europe were +contemporary with the animals mentioned above, =and disappeared along +with them at this same time=, while mountain masses in all parts of the +world crowded with marine forms of the so-called "older" types +positively =cannot be separated in time from the others=, it becomes as +certain as any other ordinary scientific fact, like sunrise or sunset, +that our once magnificently stocked world =met with some sudden and +awful catastrophe in the long ago=; and is it in any way transgressing +the bounds of true inductive science to correlate this event with the +Deluge of the Hebrew Scriptures and the traditions of every race on +earth? + +We have already seen how Dana supposes =two= such events, one at the +close of the "Palaeozoic age," and the other at the close of the +"Mesozoic," merely to account for the astonishing disappearance of +species at these periods when the fossils are arranged in taxonomic +order; but if we once admit such an event =with Man and all the other +species contemporary with one another=, where shall we limit its power +to disturb the land and water and churn them all up together, leaving +the present simply as the ruins of that previous world? The fact is, the +current Geology is wholly built up from the Cambrian to the Pleistocene +on the =dogmatic denial= that any such catastrophe has occurred to the +world in which Man lived, for =one= such event happening in our modern +homogeneous world is enough to make the whole pretty scheme found in our +text-books tumble like a house of cards. Like the patient and exact +observations of the Ptolemaic astronomers, which accumulated volumes of +evidence contradicting their own theories, and which in the hands of +Copernicus and Galileo, Kepler and Newton, sealed the doom of +astronomical speculation and laid the foundations of an exact science of +the heavens; so have the indefatigable labors of thousands of geologists +accumulated evidence which strikes at the very foundation of the current +Uniformitarianism, and casts a pall of doubt over every conclusion as to +how or when any given deposit of the "older" rocks was produced. + +Here we must leave the question for the present. The possibility of such +a world-wide catastrophe, which might account for the major part of the +geological changes, needs no apology here. The slightest disturbance of +the nice equilibrium of our elements would suffice to send the waters of +the ocean careering over the land; and in the abundance of astronomical +causes competent for such disturbance we cease to regard such an event +as necessarily contrary to "natural law." The possibility of such a +thing no competent scientist now denies; it is the problem of =recovery= +from such a disaster which makes the perplexity. But incredible or not +as the latter may be regarded, I claim to have established a perfect +chain of scientific argument proving a world-wide catastrophe of some +sort since Man was upon it. But this fact, if once admitted, strikes at +the very foundation of the current science, and bids us readjust our +theories from this view-point. The venerable scheme of a life succession +=becomes only the taxonomic or classification series of the world that +existed before this disaster=, and it becomes the business of our +science to find out how many and what deposits were =due to this event=, +and what were accumulated during the =unknown period= of previous +existence. Those of us who wish to speculate can then let our +imaginations have free play as to the uncounted ages before that event; +but the "phylogenic series" as a rational scientific theory is in limbo +forever. Inductive geology, therefore, deals not with the formation of a +world, but =with the ruins of one=; it can teach us absolutely nothing +about origins. + +The latter problem lies across the boundary line in the domain of +philosophy and theology, and to these systems of thought we may +cheerfully leave the task of readjustment in view of the facts here +presented. A few disconnected thoughts along these lines I have ventured +to insert here, not strictly as a part of my purely scientific argument, +but as an appendix. + +FOOTNOTE: + +[94] "History," p. 320. + + + + +APPENDIX + + + + +APPENDIX + +REFLECTIONS + + +In the preceding pages I have endeavored to develop a scientific +argument pure and simple. Yet I do not feel called upon to apologize in +any way for attempting now to show the connection between an inductive +scheme of Geology as set forth in the body of this work and the religion +of Christianity; though my remarks along this line must necessarily be +very brief. + +The most fundamental idea of religion is the fatherhood of God as our +Creator. The only true basis of morality lies in our relationship to Him +as His creatures. During the latter half of the nineteenth century the +Biblical idea of a creation at some definite and not very remote period +in the past became much modified by reason of certain theories of +evolution, which explained the origin of plants and animals as the +result of slow-acting causes, now in operation around us, prolonged over +immense ages of time. These theories, though built up wholly on the +current Geology as a foundation, were yet supposed to be firmly +established in science, and after a spirited discussion among biologists +for a few years, were almost universally accepted in some form or other +by the religious leaders of Christendom. And though the "Theistic +Evolution" of recent years may be supposed to have modified somewhat the +stern heartlessness of pure Darwinism, it still leaves the Christian +world quite at variance with the old Pauline doctrines regarding good +and evil, creation, redemption, the atonement, etc. + +And these are not the only effects of the general acceptance of these +ideas as an explanation of the origin of things. We see their moral +effects in the generation now coming on the stage of action--men +educated in an atmosphere of Evolution, and accustomed from youth to the +idea that all progress, whether in the individual or the race, is to be +reached only by a ceaseless struggle for existence and survival at the +expense of others. In the words of Sir William Dawson, these doctrines +have "stimulated to an intense degree that popular unrest so natural to +an age discontented with its lot ... and which threatens to overthrow +the whole fabric of society as at present constituted."[95] + +This popular and perfectly natural application of the evolution doctrine +to every-day life is certainly intensifying, as never before, the innate +selfishness of human nature, and, in every pursuit of life, embittering +the sad struggle for place and power. Perhaps no other one cause and +result serve more plainly to differentiate the present strenuous age +from those that have gone before. The hitherto undreamed-of advantages +and creature comforts of the present day, instead of tending toward +universal peace and happiness, are apparently only giving a wider range +to the discontent and depravity of the natural human heart. So much so, +that any one familiar with the history of nations cannot but feel a +terrible foreboding creep over him as he faces the prospect presented +to-day by civilised society the world over. + +The only remedy for the many and increasing evils of our world is the +old-fashioned religion of Christ and His apostles. And this applied, not +to the state, but to the individual. The soul-regenerating truths of +Christianity have always, wherever given a proper test by the +individual, resulted in moral uplift and blessing. Ecclesiastical +policies and ideas have always, wherever allowed to influence civil +legislation, resulted in oppression and tyranny. + +What has Geology to do with all this? It has much to do with it. Correct +ideas of geology will remove a great many vain notions--I had almost +said superstitions--regarding our origin, which now pass under the name +of science. And in thus removing false ideas it =leaves the ground +cleared= for more correct ideas regarding =creation=, and thus for truer +concepts of =morality=, the old idea of "must" and "ought" based on our +relation to God as His creatures. + +Mark the words I have used. =Inductive Geology can never prove +creation.= It may remove obstructions which have hitherto obscured this +idea, but this is the utmost limit of any true science. Inductive +Geology removes forever the succession-of-life idea, and thus may +=suggest= the only seeming alternative, viz., Creation as the definite +act of the Infinite God. Before this awful yet sublime fact, with all +the fogs of evolution and metaphysical subtleties cleared away, the +human mind stands to-day as never before within historic times. + +With a fairly complete knowledge of the chemical make-up of protoplasm, +with a good acquaintance with the life history and reproduction of +living cells, we yet =know nothing of the origin of life=. With a good +working knowledge of variation, hybridization, etc., =we know nothing of +the origin of species=. While with a fairly good understanding of the +present geographical distribution of species, and of where their fossils +occur in the rocks, we are =profoundly ignorant of any particular order= +in which these species originated on our globe, or whether they all took +origin at =approximately one and the same time=. In short, having +reached out along every known line of investigation, until we have +apparently reached the limits of the human powers in investigation and +research, twentieth century science must stand with uncovered head and +bowed form in presence of that most august thought of the human mind, +"=In the beginning God created=." + +And yet, personally, I am firmly convinced that the origin of life and +of our cosmos, was according to law, and the laws of nature. As has been +said, How could the origin of nature be contrary to nature? How could +the origin of present forms and conditions be in any way at variance +with the laws by which these forms or conditions are maintained? And +while I do not consider it a very promising field of research, we ought +to have no more reluctance, _per se_, to considering the manner in which +the first cell or the first species was formed, than the way in which a +chicken is produced from the egg. Of course in either case we must have +the materials, and some outside Cause to originate the conditions and +conduct the process; they both require the immanent presence and +fostering care of the great Creator. + +In this connection I beg leave to quote somewhat at length from my book, +"Outlines of Modern Science and Modern Christianity." + +"We are getting no nearer the real mystery in the case by saying that +all the tissues of the chick are built up by the protoplasm in the egg. +The protoplasm in the toes is the same as that in the little creature's +brain. Why does the one build up claws and the other brain cells? Does +memory guide these little things in their wonderful division of labor? +But they all started from one original germ cell, hence they all ought +to have the same memory pictures. Or have they entered into a +mutual-benefit arrangement, like the members of a community, as Haeckel +would have us believe, each contributing by actual desire and effort, I +suppose, an individual share to the general progress of the whole?--No; +they have all the appearance of being mere automata working at the +direct bidding of a Master Mind. Every step of the process needs a +Creator, just as much as the first cell division. In the words of one of +the highest of scientific authorities, 'We still do not know why a +certain cell becomes a gland-cell, another a ganglion-cell; why one cell +gives rise to a smooth muscle-fibre, while a neighbor forms voluntary +muscle;' and this also 'at certain, usually predestined, times in +particular places.'[96] And in the same way the idea of a Creator would +not be disposed of, even if we could possibly hit upon the probable +process of world-formation. We would not, by understanding the process, +really get at the cause of the phenomena, any more than we do now at the +real cause of life. From the scientific method the real mystery remains +as much behind the veil as ever before." (pp. 111, 112.) + +Again I quote from this same work: + +"The origin of organic nature could not well have been otherwise than by +natural process. Do we understand all natural processes? At some time +life was not in existence on our globe. All agree that it had a +beginning. Even if created by the great Creator, the living was at some +time formed from the not-living or the not-material. It does not take +even Huxley's famous 'act of philosophic faith' to believe that. So +that, in spite of all the haze that has been thrown about this question, +the Biblical creation of the organic from the inorganic is no more +contrary to, or even outside of, natural law than is evolution.... + +"But see what we avoid. According to the Bible, death in even the lower +animals (and consequently all misery and suffering: the less is included +in the greater) is only the result of sin on the part of man, the head +of animated nature, a reflex or sympathetic result, if you will. But +with evolution we have countless millions of years of creature +suffering, cruelty, and death before man appeared at all, cruelty and +death that ... have no moral meaning at all, save as the work of a fiend +creator, or a bungling or incompetent one."[97] + +The author then gives a quotation from LeConte, illustrating the +extremely various ways in which matter and energy act on the different +planes of their existence, while "The passage from one plane upward to +another is not a gradual passage by sliding scale, but at one bound. +When the necessary conditions are present, a new and higher form of +force at once appears, like birth into a higher sphere.... It is no +gradual process, but sudden, like birth into a higher sphere."[98] + +The argument then proceeds as follows: + +"The living at some time originated from the not-living. =We call it +creation.= Can any one find a better name? It is preposterous to call it +a process of development or evolution due to the inherent properties of +the atoms, and effected by them alone. And yet it is doubtless as much +according to 'natural law' as are the invariable and exact combinations +of chemistry. We do not understand the ultimate reasons for chemical +affinity any more than we do for gravitation. They are only expressions +of the methodical, order-loving mind of Deity. Creation was only another +action of the same mind, and we are not really finding any new +difficulty when we say that the processes or the reasons for creative +action are beyond our comprehension. When we can really solve some of +the myriad problems right before our eyes, it will be time enough to +complain about creation being incomprehensible or contrary to 'natural +law.' + +"Well, then, remembering that, even according to Huxley's 'act of +philosophic faith,' the origin of the living from the not-living must at +some time have taken place according to natural law, =why should we +suppose that such a process was confined to one example=? If, when the +young planet 'was passing through physical and chemical conditions which +it can no more see again than a man can recall his infancy,' the +'necessary conditions' were favorable for one such creation of life, +=why not a few billion=? Would the production of a few billion such +beginnings of protoplasm be any less 'natural' than of one alone? +Remember, however, that both the arrangement of these 'necessary +conditions,' as well as the endowing of matter with these 'properties,' +not only requires a cause, but this cause must be intelligent, for there +is indisputable design in this first origin of life.... The food for a +developing embryo might, for aught that we know, be conveyed to it +direct from the ultimate laboratories of nature, and it thus be built up +by protoplasm in the usual way, without the medium of a parent +form--other than the great Father of all. Or would it be any less +according to natural law to believe that a bird passed through all the +usual stages of embryonic development from the not-living up to the +full-fledged songster of the skies =in one day=--the fifth day of +creation? And =if one example, why not a million=? For, remember that +the youthful earth was then passing through strange conditions, 'which,' +as Huxley says, 'it can no more see again than a man can recall his +infancy.'"[99] + +Omitting some remarks about embryology, I continue this quotation as +follows: + +"But what 'law' would be violated in this springtime of the world if, +instead of twenty years or so for full development, the first man passed +through all these stages =in one day=--the sixth of creation week? He +might as well have originated from the not-living as the evolutionist's +first speck of protoplasm, for he certainly now starts from a mass of +this same protoplasm, identical, as we have seen, in all plants and +animals. + +"And by originating thus, he would escape that horrible heritage of +bestial and savage propensities which he would get through evolution, a +heritage that would make it not his fault, but his misfortune, that sin +and evil are in the world, and which would also shift the responsibility +for the evidently abnormal condition of 'this present evil world' off +from the creature to the Creator, and change to us His character from +that of a loving Father, fettered by no conditions in His creation, to +that of either a bungling, incompetent workman or a heartless fiend; +for, though I am almost ashamed to write the words, the god of the +evolutionist must be either the one or the other." (p. 121.) + + * * * * * + +=With an appreciation nurtured by centuries of study of God's larger +book, baffled often though she has been, and disappointed many times in +the words she has endeavored to spell out, Science to-day proclaims its +subject, its title page, which she has now at last deciphered, "In the +beginning God created the heaven and the earth." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[95] "Modern Ideas of Evolution," p. 12. + +[96] "_Nature_," May 23, 1901, pp. 75, 76. + +[97] "Outlines," etc., p. 116. + +[98] "Evolution and Religious Thought," pp. 314-316. + +[99] "Outlines," etc., p. 119, 120. + + + + +REPORT ON "ILLOGICAL GEOLOGY" + + +Having read the foregoing argument, will you now do the Publishers and +the author the favor of _filling out the following blank_ and mailing +this slip, or a copy of it, to us as early as possible? + +It makes no difference to us even if your opinion is _adverse_. + + THE MODERN HERETIC CO. + 257 S. Hill St., Los Angeles, Cal. + + + Cut out here + +-------------------------------------------------------------------- + |1. What is your opinion of Part I as an exposure of the Evolution + | Theory? + | + | + | + |2. How can it be improved? + | + | + | + |3. What fact or facts have been omitted from Part II that should be + | included in a true, safe, induction regarding the past of our + | globe? + | + | + | + |4. Other remarks. + | + | + | + | + | + | NAME......................................... + | + | STREET AND NUMBER............................ + | + | CITY..................... + | + |Profession or Occupation........................... + + +Modern Science and Modern Christianity + + BY GEORGE McCREADY PRICE + +The Evolution Theory in its whole range, from the Nebulous Cloud, the +Cooling Earth, and the Origin of Life, through Geology and Biology up to +the Moral Nature of Man, Carefully discussed in a Popular Style. 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We realize that we are in a small minority, and that to +assail these doctrines is to-day called _heresy_. But we have chosen our +position deliberately, and shall abide by the consequences. + +This journal will try to give the most recent discoveries in geology, +biology, physiology and archæology, and to discuss their bearings on +the Christian religion; and we think that no intelligent person can +afford to be without its regular visits. + +Monthly; 50c per year; sample copies free. + +THE MODERN HERETIC CO. + 257 S. HILL ST. + LOS ANGELES, CAL. + + * * * * * + + +Transcriber's Note: + +Punctuation has been standardised, in particular, missing periods have +been supplied where obviously required. All other original errors and +inconsistencies have been retained, except as follows; (the first line +is the original text, the second the passage as currently stands): + + must less of the co-existing faunas of other + much less of the co-existing faunas of other + + which it discusses from a purely scientfic + which it discusses from a purely scientific + + works of Dana, Le Conte, Prestwich, and Geikie + works of Dana, LeConte, Prestwich, and Geikie + + of looking into the =geneology of an idea=. + of looking into the =genealogy of an idea=. + + history of science did a stranger halucination + history of science did a stranger hallucination + + we know they are today in "recent" deposits + we know they are to-day in "recent" deposits + + The author then gives a quotation from Le Conte, + The author then gives a quotation from LeConte, + + But is is equally evident that each successive + But it is equally evident that each successive + + dominated Mediaeval scolasticism and made it + dominated Mediaeval scholasticism and made it + + The Glacian Nightmare and the Flood, + The Glacial Nightmare and the Flood, + + larger species is the _Titnichthys clarki + larger species is the _Titanichthys clarki + + happening in our modern homogenous world is enough + happening in our modern homogeneous world is enough + + widespread numulitic limestones of the Eocene + widespread nummulitic limestones of the Eocene + + of organic creation on the instal ment plan, + of organic creation on the instalment plan, + + Numulites or Mammals positively were not living + Nummulites or Mammals positively were not living + + here and there to make this incredible thicknss, + here and there to make this incredible thickness, + + about 1830 it came to the recognized, other + about 1830 it came to be recognized, other + + the bison is today absolutely extinct, + the bison is to-day absolutely extinct, + + See Le Conte, "Evol. and Religious Thought," + See LeConte, "Evol. and Religious Thought," + + they are directed rather to the empyrical method + they are directed rather to the empirical method + + fitting "like a glove" on the preceeding. + fitting "like a glove" on the preceding. + + Le Conte, "Evol. and Rel. Thought," pp. 33, 34 + LeConte, "Evol. and Rel. Thought," pp. 33, 34 + + and spcial monographs in German and French. + and special monographs in German and French. + + But to incrase this antiquity by saying + But to increase this antiquity by saying + + Lions and monkys, hippopotami and crocodiles, + Lions and monkeys, hippopotami and crocodiles, + + and rhinoceroces, now live beneath the palms, + and rhinoceroses, now live beneath the palms, + + scientists who can elaborate geneological trees of descent + scientists who can elaborate genealogical trees of descent + + have taken for these excedingly numerous + have taken for these exceedingly numerous + + the Pleistocene Mammals and the middle Tertiary flora + the Pleistocene mammals and the middle Tertiary flora + + literature is fairly innundated with new names; + literature is fairly inundated with new names; + + a noted paiaeontologist for finding a pupa + a noted palaeontologist for finding a pupa + + the theories of the igenous origin of the crystalline rocks + the theories of the igneous origin of the crystalline rocks + + went to school toegther, served in the same wars, + went to school together, served in the same wars, + + =or are now to be found iiving in our modern world= + =or are now to be found living in our modern world= + + e.g. gratolites and numulites + e.g. gratolites and nummulites + + these Davonian and other rocks are absolutely + these Devonian and other rocks are absolutely + + it cannot save the Alps, Juras and Appenines + it cannot save the Alps, Juras and Appennines + + without leaving abundant and indellible marks + without leaving abundant and indelible marks + + which it can no more see again than a can can recall + which it can no more see again than a man can recall + + and yet refuse the =evidently complemntary= dposits + and yet refuse the =evidently complementary= deposits + + pages of the ordinary text-boks. + pages of the ordinary text-books. + + these is no telling what hosts of similar facts + there is no telling what hosts of similar facts + + but so far as the text-boks tell us are + but so far as the text-books tell us are + + as recent as the numulitic limestones of the Eocene + as recent as the nummulitic limestones of the Eocene + + [Footnote 2: "Old Red Sandstone," pp. 48-221-2.] + [Footnote 2: "Old Red Sandstone," pp. 48, 221-2] + + for thousands of skletons are found in localities + for thousands of skeletons are found in localities + + is easily understod as the survival of the notion, + is easily understood as the survival of the notion, + + the dim past, and all these semitropical plants had + the dim past, and all these semi-tropical plants had + + =better established than the post-Piiocene submergence.=" + =better established than the post-Pliocene submergence.=" + + example described by Helm, already spoken of, + example described by Heim, already spoken of, + + The former is qulet easily answered: + The former is quite easily answered: + + =race extinction alone= that appals the mind. + =race extinction alone= that appalls the mind. + + which in the hands of Copernicus and Galilio, + which in the hands of Copernicus and Galileo, + + CHAPTER XII INDUCTIVE METHODS + CHAPTER XIII INDUCTIVE METHODS + + In the last edition of his "=Manual=," + In the last edition of his "Manual," + + pre-conceived theory would at the suggestion of such + preconceived theory would at the suggestion of such + + evolution and metaphysical subtilties cleared away, + evolution and metaphysical subtleties cleared away, + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Illogical Geology, by George McCready Price + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42043 *** |