46. When we are assured of the existence of such a power as this in the mineral regions, we should argue with singular inconsistency, if we did not ascribe to it all the other appearances of motion in those regions, which it is adequate to produce. If nature in her subterraneous abodes is provided with a force that could burst asunder the massy pavement of the globe, and place the fragments upright upon their edges, could she not, by the same effort, raise them from the greatest depths of the sea, to the highest elevation of the land? The cause that is adequate to one of these effects is adequate to them both together; for it is a principle well known in mechanical philosophy, that the force which produces a parallel motion, may, according to the way in which it is applied, produce also an angular motion, without any diminution of the former effect. It would, therefore, be extremely unphilosophical to suppose, that any other cause has changed the relative level of the strata, and the surface of the sea, than that which has, in so many cases, raised the strata from a horizontal to a highly inclined, or even vertical situation: it would be to introduce the action of more causes than the phenomena require, and to forget, that nature, whose operations we are endeavouring to trace, combines the possession of infinite resources with the most economical application of them. 47. From all, therefore, that relates to the position of the strata, I think I am justified in affirming, that their disturbance and removal from the place of their original formation, by a force directed from below upwards, is a fact in the natural history of the earth, as perfectly ascertained as any thing which is not the subject of immediate observation. As to the power by which this great effect has been produced, we cannot expect to decide with equal evidence, but must be contented to pass from what is certain to what is probable. We may, then, remark, that of the forces in nature to which our experience does in any degree extend, none seems so capable of the effect we would ascribe to it, as the expansive power of heat; a power to which no limits can be set, and one, which, on grounds quite independent of the elevation of the strata, has been already concluded to act with great energy in the subterraneous regions. We have, indeed, no other alternative, but either to adopt this explanation, or to ascribe the facts in question to some secret and unknown cause, though we are ignorant of its nature, and have no evidence of its existence. We are therefore to suppose, that the power of the same subterraneous heat, which consolidated and mineralized the strata at the bottom of the sea, has since raised them up to the height at which they are now placed, and has given them the various inclinations to the horizon which they are found actually to possess.