massed at the bottom of the sea, as well as to raise above the level of
the ocean the solid land thus formed. But the fertility of the earth,
for which those operations were performed, and the growth of plants, for
which the surface of the earth is widely adapted, require a soil; now
the natural, the proper soil for plants, is formed from the destruction
of the solid parts. Accordingly, we find the surface of this earth,
below the travelled soil, to consist of the hard and solid parts, always
broken and imperfect where they are contiguous with the soil; and we
find the soil always composed of materials arising from the ruin and
destruction of the solid parts.

CHAP. VI.

_A View of the Economy of Nature, and necessity
of Wasting the Surface of the Earth,
in serving the purposes of this World_.

There is not perhaps one circumstance, in the constitution of this
terraqueous globe, more necessary to the present theory, than to see
clearly that the solid land must be destroyed, in undergoing the
operations which are natural to the surface of the earth, and in serving
the purposes which are necessary in the system of this living world.
For, all the land of the present earth being a certain composition of
materials, perfectly similar to such as would result from the gradual
destruction of a continent in the operations of the inhabited world,
this composition of our land could not be explained without having
recourse to preternatural means, were there not in the constitution
of this earth an active cause necessarily, in the course of time,
destroying continents.

It is therefore of great importance to this Theory, to show, that the
land is naturally wasted, though with the utmost economy; and that the
continents of this earth must be in time destroyed. It is of importance
to the happiness of man, to find consummate wisdom in the constitution
of this earth, by which things are so contrived that nothing is wanting,
in the bountiful provision of nature, for the pleasure and propagation
of created beings; more particularly of those who live in order to know
their happiness, and who know their happiness on purpose to see the
bountiful source from whence it flows.

We are to conceive the continent of the earth, when first produced above
the surface of the ocean, to be in general consolidated, with regard
to its structure, by the same mineral operations which are necessarily
employed in raising it from its primary situation