4* INTERNAL STRUCTURE. arduous and long-continued inveftigation, conduc ed with the moll confummate addrefs, difcovered the general ftrudure of the cruft of the globe, and pointed out the true mode of examining and af- eertaining thofe great relations, which it is one of the principal objefts of Geognofy to inveftigate. It is the feries of obfervations, made during that inveftigation, which we are now to detail. We lliould form a very falfe conception of the Werne- ftan Geognofy, were we to believe it to have any refemblance to thofe monjirojities known under the name of Theories of the Earth. Almoft all the compofitions of this kind are idle fpeculations, con trived in the clofet, and having no kind of refem- blance to any thing in nature. Armed with all the fahls and inferences contained in thefe vilionary fabrics, what account would we be able to give of the mineralogy of a country, if required of us, or of the general relations of the great mafles of which the globe is compofed ? Place one of thefe fpeculators in fuch a fituation, and you will imme diately difcover the nature of his information, and he himfelf will find that he knows nothing ; that he has been wandering in the mazes of error ; and that, however eafly he may have been able to ex plain the formation of this globe, and of the whole univerfe, he cannot give a rational or fatisfadory account of a fingle mountain. -The defcriptions and inferences we are about to detail, can only be fully underftood, and the gra tification