Principles of Geology

Principles of Geology: Being an Attempt to Explain the Former Changes of the Earth's Surface, by Reference to Causes Now in Operation is a book by the Scottish geologist Charles Lyell that was first published in 3 volumes from 1830 to 1833.

[4] The frontispiece of first volume of Principles of Geology, featured an illustration of three pillars of the Temple of Serapis with holes made by mollusks, indicating their past habitation when the columns were submerged underwater.

It was later understood that the movement of magma beneath the Earth's crust caused the ground to rise and fall, consequently shifting the columns.

Lyell interpreted this depiction as concrete evidence of how gradual and consistent processes could shape the Earth's terrain over extended periods of time.

[11] Lyell's interpretation of geologic change as the steady accumulation of minute changes over enormously long spans of time,[3] a central theme in the Principles, influenced the 22-year-old Charles Darwin,[3] who was given the first volume of the first edition by Robert FitzRoy, captain of HMS Beagle, just before they set out (December 1831) on the ship's second voyage.

While in South America, Darwin received the second volume, which rejected the idea of organic evolution, proposing "Centres of Creation" to explain diversity and territory of species.

[8] Cuvier and his colleagues found long periods of consistent change with intermittent patterns of sudden fossil disappearance in the geologic record for the area, which is now known as mass extinction.

Lyell responded to this argument, stating that the geologic record was "grossly imperfect" and that observations cannot be trusted if they go against "the plan of Nature".

[8] Moreover, there is evidence that certain cataclysmic occurrences that left marks in the geological and fossil records may correspond to the periodicity of the Solar System's 26-million-year cycle of movement around the galactic core of the Milky Way.