Quotes from book
Principles of Geology

Principles of Geology

Charles Lyell

Principles of Geology: being an attempt to explain the former changes of the Earth's surface, by reference to causes now in operation is a book by the Scottish geologist Charles Lyell that was first published in 3 volumes from 1830–1833. Lyell used the theory of Uniformitarianism to describe how the Earth's surface was changing over time. This theory was in direct contrast to the geological theory of Catastrophism. Many individuals believed in catastrophism to allow room for religious beliefs. For example, Noah's Flood could be described thus as a real geological event as catastrophism describes the changing of the Earth surface as one-time, violent events. Lyell challenged the believers of the catastrophic theory by studying Mount Etna in Sicily and describing the changes from one stratum to another and the fossil records within the rocks to posture that slow, gradual changes as the cause of the ever-changing Earth's surface. Lyell used geological observation to interpret that the Earth was older than 6,000 years, as otherwise contested. The book presents that the processes that are occurring in the present are the same processes that occurred in the past.

“Now, when the notion had once gained ground, whether from causes before suggested or not, that the earth had been destroyed by several general catastrophes, it would next be inferred that the human race had been as often destroyed and renovated. And, since every extermination was assumed to be penal, it could only be reconciled with divine justice, by the supposition that man, at each successive creation, was regenerated in a state of purity and innocence.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.2, p. 12
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“The clear and philosophical views of Fracastoro were disregarded, and the talent and argumentative powers of the learned were doomed for three centuries to be wasted in the discussion of these two simple and preliminary questions: first, whether fossil remains had ever belonged to living creatures; and secondly, whether, if this be admitted, all the phenomena could be explained by the Noachian deluge.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 27
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“We find in certain localities subterranean deposits of coal consisting of vegetable matter formerly drifted into seas and lakes. …These seas and The commercial prosperity and numerical strength of a nation may now be mainly dependent on the local distribution of fuel determined by that ancient state of things.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.1, p. 2
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“The old diluvialists were induced by their system to confound all the groups of strata together instead of discriminating,—to refer all appearances to one cause and to one brief period, not to a variety of causes acting throughout a long succession of epochs. …Under the influence of such prejudices, three centuries were of as little avail, as a few years in our own times, when we are no longer required to propel the vessel against the force of an adverse current.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 34
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“In another place, this learned geographer (Strabo), in alluding to the tradition that Sicily had been separated by a convulsion from Italy, remarks, that at present the land near the sea in those parts was rarely shaken by earthquakes, since there were now open orifices whereby fire and ignited matters and waters escaped; but formerly, when the volcanoes of Etna, the Lipari Islands, Ischia, and others, were closed up, the imprisoned fire and wind might have produced far more vehement movements. The doctrine, therefore, that volcanoes are safety valves, and that the subterranean convulsions are probably most violent when first the volcanic energy shifts itself to a new quarter, is not modern.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Source: Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1, Chpt.2, p. 21

“We shall now conclude our remarks on the opinions entertained before the Christian era… the observation of the present course of nature presented too many proofs of alterations continually in progress on the earth to allow philosophers to believe that nature was in a state of rest or that the surface had remained and would continue to remain unaltered.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.2, p. 22
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“From the works now extant of Aristotle, and from the system of Pythagoras… we might certainly infer that these philosophers considered the agents of change now operating in Nature, as capable of bringing about in the lapse of ages a complete revolution; and the Stagyrite even considers occasional catastrophes happening at distant intervals of time as part of the regular and ordinary course of Nature.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.2, p. 17
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“In a rude state of society all great calamities are regarded by the people as judgments of God on the wickedness of man.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.2, p. 11
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“The era, it is true, of the expected millennium had passed away; and for five hundred years after the fatal hour, when the annihilation of the planet had been looked for, the monks remained in undisturbed enjoyment of rich grants of land bequeathed to them by pious donors, who, in the preamble of deeds beginning 'appropinquante mundi termino'-'appropinquante magno judicii die,' left lasting monuments of the popular delusion.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 28
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“It was not till the earlier part of the sixteenth century that geological phenomena began to attract the attention of the Christian nations. At that period a very animated controversy sprung up in Italy, concerning the true nature and origin of marine shells, and other organized fossils, found abundantly in the strata of the peninsula.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 26
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“Leibnitz, the great mathematician, published his 'Protogaea' in 1680. He imagined this planet to have been originally a burning luminous mass, and that ever since its creation it has been undergoing gradual refrigeration. Nearly all the matter of the earth was at first encompassed by fire. When the outer crust had at length cooled down sufficiently to allow the vapors to be condensed, they fell and formed a universal ocean, investing the globe, and covering the loftiest mountains. Further consolidation produced rents, vacuities, and subterranean caverns, and the ocean, rushing in to fill them, was gradually lowered. The principal feature of this theory, the gradual diminution of the original heat, and of an ancient universal ocean, were adopted by Buffon and De Luc, and entered under different modifications, into a great number of succeeding systems.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 45
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“The title of a work of Cardano's, published in 1552, 'De Subtilitate' (corresponding to what would now be called Transcendental Philosophy), would lead us to expect, in the chapter on minerals, many far fetched theories characteristic of that age; but when treating of petrified shells, he decided that they clearly indicated the former sojourn of the sea upon the mountains.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 29
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“The system of scholastic disputations encouraged in the Universities of the middle ages had unfortunately trained men to habits of indefinite argumentation, and they often preferred absurd and extravagant propositions, because greater skill was required to maintain them; the end and object of such intellectual combats being victory and not truth.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 28
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“Opponents of Fracastoro met his arguments by feigning imaginary causes, which differed from each other rather in name than in substance. Andrea Mattioli, for instance, an eminent botanist, the illustrator of Dioscorides, embraced the notion of Agricola, a German miner, that a certain 'materia pinguis' or 'fatty matter,' set into fermentation by heat, gave birth to fossil organic shapes. Yet Mattioli had come to the conclusion, from his own observations, that porous bodies, such as bones and shells, might be converted into stone, as being permeable to what he termed the 'lapidifying juice.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 29
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“Many distinguishing features of the surface may often be ascribed to the operation at a remote era of slow and tranquil causes-to the gradual deposition of sediment in a lake or in the ocean, or to the prolific increase of testacea and corals therein.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.1, p. 2
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“It seems, then, that the Greeks had not only derived from preceding nations, but had also, in some slight degree, deduced from their own observations, the theory of great periodical revolutions in the inorganic world.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.2, p. 18
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“We know that the Egyptian priests were aware, not only that the soil beneath the plains of the Nile, but that also the hills bounding the great valley, contained marine shells; and it could hardly have escaped the observation of Eastern philosophers, that some soils were filled with fossil remains, since so many national works were executed on a magnificent scale by oriental monarchs in very remote eras.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.2, p. 8
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“Pliny had no theoretical opinions of his own concerning changes of the earth's surface… But his enumeration of the new islands which had been formed in the Mediterranean, and of other convulsions, shows that the ancients had not been inattentive observers of the changes which had taken place on the earth within the memory of man.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.2, p. 22
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“Scarcely any step had been made in approximating to sound theories since the time of Fracastoro, more than a hundred years having been lost, in writing down the dogma that organized fossils were mere sports of nature. An additional period of a century and a half was now destined to be consumed in exploding the hypothesis, that organized fossils had all been buried in the solid strata by the Noachian flood. Never did a theoretical fallacy, in any branch of scienc, interfere more seriously with accurate observation and the systematic classification of facts.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.3, p. 33
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

“We learn from Plutarch, that this was the theme of one of the hymns of Orpheus, so celebrated in the fabulous ages of Greece. It was brought by him from the banks of the Nile; and we even find in his verses, as in the Indian systems, a definite period assigned for the duration of each successive world. The returns of great catastrophes were determined by the period of the Annus Magnus, or great year, a cycle composed of the revolutions of the sun, moon, and planets, and terminating when these return together to the same sign whence they were supposed at some remote epoch to have set out. The duration of this great cycle was variously estimated. According to Orpheus, it was 120,000 years; according to others, 300,000 and by Cassander it was taken to be 300,000 years.”

Charles Lyell book Principles of Geology

Chpt.2, p. 10
Principles of Geology (1832), Vol. 1

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