VOLCANIC ACTION THE GREAT AGENT OF GEOLOGICAL CHANGE.
Mr. James Nasmyth observes, that “the floods of molten lava which volcanoes eject are nothing less than remaining portions of what was once the condition of the entire globe when in the igneous state of its early physical history,—no one knows how many years ago!
“When we behold the glow and feel the heat of molten lava, how vastly does it add to the interest of the sight when we consider that the heat we feel and the light we see are the residue of the once universal condition of our entire globe, on whose cooled surface we now live and have our being! But so it is; for if there be one great fact which geological research has established beyond all doubt, it is that we reside on the cooled surface of what was once a molten globe, and that all the phenomena which geology has brought to light can be most satisfactorily traced to the successive changes incidental to its gradual cooling and contraction.
“That the influx of the sea into the yet hot and molten interior of the globe may occasionally occur, and enhance and vary the violence of the phenomenon of volcanic action, there can be little doubt; but the action of water in such cases is only secondary. But for the pre-existing high temperature of the interior of the earth, the influx of water would produce no such discharges of molten lava as generally characterise volcanic eruptions. Molten lava is therefore a true vestige of the Natural History of the Creation.”