to preserve the purity of the sea, renders them unfit for the support of terrestrial animals or vegetables,) and transmitting them in genial showers to scatter fertility over the earth, and maintain the never-failing reservoirs of those springs and rivers by which they are again returned to mix with their parent ocean; in all these circumstances we find such evidence of nicely balanced adaptation of means to ends, of wise foresight, and benevolent intention, and infinite power, that he must be blind indeed, who refuses to recognize in them proofs of the most exalted attributes of the Creator."[1]
CHAPTER XXIII.
Proofs of Design in the Structure and Composition of unorganized Mineral Bodies.
Much of the physical history of the compound forms of
unorganized mineral bodies, has been anticipated in the considerations
given in our early chapters to the unstratified
and crystalline rocks. It remains only to say a few words
respecting the simple minerals that form the ingredients of
these rocks, and the elementary bodies of which they are
composed.[2]
"In crossing a heath," (says Paley,) "suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came
- ↑ Buckland, Inaug. Lecture, p. 13.
- ↑ The term simple mineral is applied not only to uncombined mineral substances, which are rare in Nature, such as pure native gold or silver, but also to all kinds of compound mineral bodies that present a regular crystalline structure, accompanied by definite proportions of their chemical ingredients. The difference between a simple mineral and a simple substance may be illustrated by the case of calcareous spar, or crystallized carbonate of lime. The ultimate elements, viz. Calcium, Oxygen, and Carbon, are simple substances; the crystalline compound resulting from the union of these elements, in certain definite proportions, forms a simple mineral, called Carbonate of lime. The total number of simple minerals hitherto ascertained according to Berzelius is nearly six hundred, that of simple substances, or elementary principles, is fifty-four.
