valleys, is not permanent, the river having a tendency, when violent, to rake it up again, and carry it still lower down. In the larger and wider valleys it may remain for long periods of time. Almost all the great valleys we know are lined with matter thus brought down at early periods, and forming comparatively permanent strata, through which the river now more peaceably threads its way.

When there is a lake in the course of a river, it is at once made use of by the stream as a favourable site for deposition. Take the Lake of Geneva, for example. The Rhone stream, entering at the upper end, brings down large quantities of detritus, which is deposited there, gradually silting it up, while the water, freed by this deposition from its impurities, flows out clear and bright at the other end. The lake, however, is every year becoming smaller and smaller, and will ultimately be filled up. There are numberless instances of filled up lakes (now flat alluvial plains) in the valleys of the Alps; and what are called lacustrine or fresh-water formations, so well known to geologists, have been formed in this way.

But the great mass of the matter abraded from the rocks by a river is carried down to its natural termination-the sea. At the mouth of every large river we find a huge recent formation, called the delta, which consists entirely of detritus, brought down by the river from the upper districts, and deposited there, where the running water first comes to rest in the body of the ocean. The deltas of the Nile, and the Mississippi, and the Sunderbunds, or great delta of the Ganges, are perhaps the best known of these formations; but they exist, more or less, at the mouths of all rivers, constantly increasing, and continually causing the formation of new land where formerly existed only deep water.

But these visible accessions to the surface of the earth represent only a small part of the continual increase. As the water of the river mixes with that of the sea, the detritus it holds is carried off by tides and currents, and deposited in large quantities under water. To this action are due the bars and shoals formed near the mouths of large rivers, and which, by their continual changes and gradual increase, are so troublesome to the navigation.

In all these cases, therefore, we see how the matter eroded from the upper lands by aqueous action, is by aqueous action deposited at lower levels, thus forming land again. These considerations will, I think, show you what mighty agents rivers are in effecting geological and topographical

change. It is not too much to say, that if the present system of the world should endure sufficiently long, (and who can, without presumption, fix any time for its termination?) the mighty chains of the Alps, the Andes, and the Himalayas, must at last disappear under the agency of the Rivers, by which they are even now under progress of de

struction.

Yet, however, destruction it is not. It is only transference. For as the mountains melt away and the hills disappear, we find that, by the same agency, from their ruins new tracts of land, new continents, and, ultimately, a new world shall arise.

But did I say that water was the cause of all this? I must correct myself; for, at the outset of what I said about rivers, I pointed to a subtler and earlier agency to which all these phenomena are due-namely, heat. It is the heat of the sun that evaporates the water from the ocean; it is the heat which, in some mysterious way, produces the meteorological conditions causing its deposition; and hence it is heat which we must regard as the ultimate physical cause of all the changes I have described.

The history of geology tells us of a great controversy that long raged as to whether fire or water was the true element of the earth's change. Modern science assigns to each a large share; but the action of water is only secondary, and the Plutonians must be admitted to be right in the main.

What heat is we are only beginning to have an idea of ; recent discoveries tell us it is simply a mode of motion, and lead us to conjecture that it may be only one form of some still more mysterious action, which may ultimately be found to embrace all kinds of physical force, all varieties of material agency, and, perhaps, even all modifications of vital power. But here I am entering an unknown region, and I must go no farther.

I trust that I have now succeeded in indicating to you, in some measure at least, the interest attaching to this subject, and its many and important bearings, alike on History, Social Economy, and the vast field of Science. Before, however, quitting the subject, and thanking you for your kind attention, I would take this opportunity of entering my protest against a large and influential school of modern science, whose sagacity, indeed, and breadth of view I freely admire, but the general tendency of whose teaching I cannot but regard as unhealthy and untrue.

I am the last to deny and I have been at some pains to illustrate to you-the great influence rivers, among other natural phenomena, exert on the constitution and state of the human race. But is this all? Is Man the mere plaything of Matter? the outcome of certain physical conditions, and nothing more? In other words, Does Science forbid us to suppose a Great First Cause, working, though latent, in all Creation, and bid us find in brute matter the ultimate source of the Universe?

Such would seem to be the opinion held by many philosophers of our day. "It is all very well," you may hear them say, "to extol the beneficence of Providence in the order of Nature. It almost provokes a smile to hear you dilating on the contrivances by which rivers subserve our life and well-being. Modern Science," they will tell you, "has exploded all such day-dreams, and shows that this idea of a Providence is but mistaking cause for effect. Your rivers are but one among the infinite number of phases of the dark hidden power we call matter, by which the earth's surface undergoes incessant change, while men are but the temporary tenants of their banks. You may picture them with all glowing and gracious attributes, but you are only feeding your fancy on the reflected hues of your own mind. Rise above these human infirmities, and view Nature under the clear, cold light of Science, and you will see that she wears but an aspect of stern impassibility."

Such is the language that would be used by the materialist. I have no intention of offering a complete refutation of such metaphysical speculations, but, simply confining myself to the subject before us, I hesitate not to assert my belief, that here, as elsewhere, science requires us to recognise a first cause beyond and prior to the material phenomena we investigate.

We see how it was one and the same agency by which the sea was collected, the land and the mountains upheaved; and so the rainfall and the flow of rivers were sustained, and life was propagated, through their means-I mean heat, or the motion in matter. In rivers at least there is no room for supposing any development. As soon as our molten planet had fallen to a certain temperature, then the river system commenced in all its perfection, with all its powers of fertilizing the earth, and making it fit for the habitation of man. No "fortuitous concourse of atoms" can explain the law on which rivers depend. In it we reach a point beyond matter, nay, which constitutes the only condition in which matter exists, or at least is known to us. But

shall we, therefore, with Heraclitus, find in Heat the cause of the universe? or, with Zoroaster, inaugurate the worship of fire? It would be at least as rational as this humbling of ourselves before "eternal matter," and then ascribing to it creative power, just as if a man were to prepare a banquet and expect the dishes to create the guests.

It seems to me that this materialism is really the invasion of science on the province of religion and feeling. There is a point where knowledge ceases to be possible; but to assert therefore that nothing exists beyond, is to assert a knowledge of what we cannot know.

We are forced indeed by our minds to view everything as the effect of some agency, and therefore to assume the existence of a first cause; but know it, grasp it as an element of our knowledge, we cannot. It is beyond the range of experience, beyond the pale of science. But though science tells us of nothing beyond these ultimate and inseparable factors in all things-heat or motion, matter or the thing moved-she nevertheless refuses to invest either with the insignia of divinity, but, bowing before the altar of the God unknown to her, she steps back for religion to lift the veil.

Obituary Notice.

T. F. BARHAM, M.B., CANTAB.,

AND LICENTIATE OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS.

COMPILED BY THE HON. SECRETARY OF THE ASSOCIATION.

THOMAS FOSTER BARHAM was born at Henley-on-Thames on September the 10th, in the year 1794. He received his early education chiefly at private schools, and in due course proceeded to the University of Cambridge, and became a member of Queen's College. He took the degree of B.A. in 1816, being contemporary, or nearly so, with some whose names have existed as household words in that university, as Professors Whewell, Jeremie, Blunt, and King. Choosing medicine for his profession, he pursued his studies in London, in the hospitals of Guy's and St. Thomas's, and the schools connected with them. He took the degree of M.B. at Cambridge, and afterwards became a licentiate of the London College of Physicians. He settled in practice at Penzance, where he lived a good many years, and then removed to Exeter. At both these places he devoted much time and skilful care to the sick poor, but did not use very strenuous efforts to acquire a lucrative practice, which was not necessary to his maintenance, as he had sufficient means. He had married early in life, and his family, which proved a large one, was well provided for. More than twenty years before he died he returned to Highweek, in the neighbourhood of Newton Abbot, and lived entirely in the country; but his advice was still eagerly sought by the poor, and as heartily and cheerfully given to them.

During this latter period he devoted much time and money to the religious instruction of the people near him, and his voice of comfort was heard and listened to with devout