[10] Voyage aux Terres Australes, t. i. p. 161.
[12] It is a common opinion in Sweden, that the level of the sea is becoming lower, and that many places may even be forded or passed dry-shod, which were formerly impracticable. Eminent philosophers have adopted this popular opinion; and M. von Buch goes so far as to suppose that the whole of Sweden is gradually rising. But it is singular, that no one has made, or at least published, a series of accurate observations, calculated to confirm a fact that had been announced so long ago, and which would leave no doubt upon the mind, if, as Linnæus asserts, this difference of level were so much as four or five feet yearly. [Note I].
[13] Mr Stevenson, in his observations upon the bed of the German Ocean and British Channel, maintains that the level of the sea is continually rising, and has been very sensibly elevated within the last three centuries. Fortis asserts the same of some parts of the Adriatic sea. But the example of the Temple of Serapis, near Pouzzola, proves that the margins of that sea are, in many places, of such a nature as to be subject to local risings and fallings. On the other hand, there are thousands of quays, roads, and other works, made along the sea-side by the Romans, from Alexandria to Belgium, the relative level of which has never varied. Note K.
[14] When I formerly mentioned this circumstance of the science of geology having become ridiculous, I only expressed a fact, to the truth of which every day bears witness; but in this I did not profess to give my own opinion, as some respectable geologists seem to have believed. If their mistake has arisen from any thing equivocal in my expressions, I here apologize to them.
[15] Burnet, Telluris Theoria Sacra. Lond. 1681.
[16] Woodward, Essay towards the Natural History of the Earth. Lond. 1702.
[17] Scheuchzer, Mém. de l’Acad. 1708.
[18] Whiston, New Theory of the Earth. Lond. 1708.