If the solid body of the Alps, the most consolidated masses of our land, is thus reduced to the state of soil upon the surface of the earth contrived for the use of plants, a fortiori, softer bodies, less elevated and less consolidated masses, will be considered as easily arriving at the purpose for which the surface of the earth has been intended.  We only wish now to see the ultimate effect that necessarily follows from this progress of things; and how, in this course of nature, the land must end, however long protracted shall be the duration of this body, and however much economy may be perceived in this gradual waste of land;—­a waste which by no means is so slow as not to be perceived by men reasoning in science; although scientific men, either reasoning for the purpose of a system which they had devised, or, deceived by the apparent state of things which truly change, may not acknowledge the necessary consequence of what they had perceived.

Let us now suppose all the solid mass of land, contained in our continent, to be transformed into soil and vegetable earth, it must be evident that no covering of plants, or interlacing of vegetable fibres, could protect this mass of loose or incoherent materials from the ravages of floods, so long as rivers flowed, nor from being swallowed by the ocean, so long as there were winds and tides.  From the border of the land upon the shore, to the middle of the ocean, there is either at present an equable declivity at the bottom of the sea, or every thing tends to form this declivity, in gradually moving bodies along this bottom.  But, however gradual the declivity of the bottom, or however slow the progress of loose materials from the shore towards the deepest bottom of the sea, so long as there are moving powers for those materials, they must have a progress to that end; the law of gravitation, always active, must prevail, and sooner or later the moving sea must swallow up the land.

But, along the borders of our continent, and in the courses of our rivers, there are rocks; these must be surmounted or destroyed, before the parts which they protect can be delivered up to the influence of those moving powers which tend to form a level; and we may be assured that those bulwarks waste.  The bare inspection of our rocky coasts and rivers will satisfy the enlightened observator of this truth; and to endeavour to prove this to a person who has not principles by which to reason upon the subject, or to one who has false principles, by which he would create perpetual stability to decaying things, would be but labour lost.