Page:Geology and Mineralogy considered with reference to Natural Theology, 1837, volume 1.djvu/56

 52 anterior to the earliest of these systems; a period in which we find a series of primary strata, wholly destitute of organic remains; and from this circumstance, we infer their deposition to have preceded the commencement of organic life. Those who contend that life may have existed during the formation of the primary strata, and the animal remains have been obliterated by the effects of heat, on strata nearest to the granite, do but remove to one point further backwards the first term of the finite series of organic beings; and there still remains beyond this point an antecedent period, in which a state of total fusion pervaded the entire materials of the fundamental granite; and one universal mass of incandescent elements, wholly incompatible with any condition of life, which can be shown to have ever existed, formed the entire substance of the globe.