And now, as to the vast period of time--the four or five worlds, as I
called it--which elapsed between the laying down of the New Red
sandstones and the laying down of the boulder-clays.
I think this fact--for fact it is--may be better proved by taking
readers an imaginary railway journey to London from any spot in the
manufacturing districts of central England--begging them, meanwhile,
to keep their eyes open on the way.
And here I must say that I wish folks in general would keep their
eyes a little more open when they travel by rail. When I see young
people rolling along in a luxurious carriage, their eyes and their
brains absorbed probably in a trashy shilling novel, and never lifted
up to look out of the window, unconscious of all that they are
passing--of the reverend antiquities, the admirable agriculture, the
rich and peaceful scenery, the like of which no country upon earth
can show; unconscious, too, of how much they might learn of botany
and zoology, by simply watching the flowers along the railway banks
and the sections in the cuttings: then it grieves me to see what
little use people make of the eyes and of the understanding which God
has given them. They complain of a dull journey: but it is not the
journey which is dull; it is they who are dull.
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