erhaps, upon the
best possible plan, but upon such as is truly based upon the principles
I have developed. Mr. Stevenson has published some account of their
construction.

The earthquake regions of South America might with incalculable benefit
apply those ideas; and, indeed, they have been, to some extent, already
applied by my friend, Mr. William Lloyd, Member of the Institution of
Civil Engineers, to the New Custom Houses constructed from his designs
at Valparaiso.

As one of these utilitarian views, and an important one, it will occur
to many to ask--Can the moment of the occurrence or the degree of
intensity of earthquake shock be predicted, or is it probable that at a
future day we may be able to predict them? At present, any prediction,
either of the one or the other, is impossible; and those few who have
professed themselves in possession of sufficient grounds for such
prediction are deceivers or deceived. Nor is it likely that, for very
many years to come, if ever, science shall have advanced so as to render
any such prediction possible; but it is neither impossible nor
improbable that the time shall arrive when, within certain, perhaps
wide, limits as to space, previous time, and instant of occurrence, such
forewarnings may be obtainable.

Earthquakes, like storms and tempests, and nearly all changes of
weather, are not periodic phenomena, nor yet absolutely uncertain or, so
to say, accidental as to recurrence.

They are quasi-periodic, that is to say, some of their conditions as to
causation rest upon a really periodic basis, as, for example, the
recurrence of storms upon the periodic march of the earth, and sun and
moon, etc., and the recurrence of Earthquakes upon the secular cooling
of our earth; but the conditions in both are so numerous and complicated
with particulars, that we cannot fully analyse them--hence, cannot
reduce the phenomena to law, and so cannot predict recurrence. Yet
storms and tempests--which were, along with pestilences and Earthquakes,
amongst the natural phenomena which Bishop Butler deemed in his own day
impossible of human prediction--have already, through the persistent and
systematised efforts of meteorological observers, become to a certain
extent foreseeable; and medical science assures us that it has rendered
that, though to a much less degree of probability, true of pestilences.

We may, therefore, give the utilitarian some hope, that if he will help
us along--who value