James Hutton Quotes

14 quotes in 361 categories

• As there is not in human observation proper means for measuring the waste of land upon the globe, it is hence inferred, that we cannot…
• Error, never can be consistent, nor can truth fail of having support from the accurate examination of every circumstance.
• Time, which measures everything in our idea, and is often deficient to our schemes, is to nature endless and as nothing; it cannot limit that…
• A rock or stone is not a subject that, of itself, may interest a philosopher to study; but, when he comes to see the necessity…
• We are not to suppose, that there is any violent exertion of power, such as is required in order to produce a great event in…
• When we trace the part of which this terrestrial system is composed, and when we view the general connection of those several parts, the whole…
• In matters of science, curiosity gratified begets not indolence, but new desires.
• Man is made for science; he reasons from effects to causes, and from causes to effects; but he does not always reason without error. In…
• [It] is the little causes, long continued, which are considered as bringing about the greatest changes of the earth.
• To a naturalist nothing is indifferent; the humble moss that creeps upon the stone is equally interesting as the lofty pine which so beautifully adorns…
• The past history of our globe must be explained by what can be seen to be happening now. No powers are to be employed that…
• There is no vestige of a beginning, no prospect of an end.
• If an organised body is not in the situation and circumstances best adapted to its sustenance and propagation, then, in conceiving an indefinite variety among…
• What more can we require? Nothing but time.

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