List of Georges Cuvier Quotes

But The Revolutions And Changes Which Are Responsible For The Present State Of The Earth Are Not Limited To The Upsetting Of The Ancient Strata And To The Ebbing Of The Sea After The Formations Of New Layers.

Moreover, It Thus Follows That Not A Great Deal Of Time Was Needed For The Large Animals Of The Three Major Parts Of The World To Become Known To The People Who Spent Time On The Coasts Of Those Regions.

It Has Been Long Considered Possible To Explain The More Ancient Revolutions On... The Earth Surface By Means Of These Still Existing Causes; In The Same Manner As It Is Found Easy To Explain Past Events In Political History, By An Acquaintance With The Passions And Intrigues Of The Present Day. But We Shall Presently See That Unfortunately This Is Not The Case In Physical History:-the Thread Of Operation Is Here Broken, The March Of Nature Is Changed, And None Of The Agents That She Now Employs Were Sufficient For The Production Of Her Ancient Works.

If They [enlightened Men] Take Any Interest In Examining, In The Infancy Of Our Species, The Almost Obliterated Traces Of So Many Nations That Have Become Extinct, They Will Doubtless Take A Similar Interest In Collecting, Amidst The Darkness Which Covers The Infancy Of The Globe, The Traces Of Those Revolutions Which Took Place Anterior To The Existence Of All Nations.

The Works Which This Man [joseph Banks] Leaves Behind Him Occupy A Few Pages Only; Their Importance Is Not Greatly Superior To Their Extent; And Yet His Name Will Shine Out With Lustre In The History Of The Sciences.

The Lowest And Most Level Land Areas Show Us, Especially When We Dig There To Very Great Depths, Nothing But Horizontal Layers Of Material More Or Less Varied, Which Almost All Contain Innumerable Products Of The Sea.

Genius And Science Have Burst The Limits Of Space, And Few Observations, Explained By Just Reasoning, Have Unveiled The Mechanism Of The Universe. Would It Not Also Be Glorious For Man To Burst The Limits Of Time, And, By A Few Observations, To Ascertain The History Of This World, And The Series Of Events Which Preceded The Birth Of The Human Race?

It Is To Them [fossils] Alone That We Owe The Commencement Of Even A Theory Of The Earth ... By Them We Are Enabled To Ascertain, With The Utmost Certainty, That Our Earth Has Not Always Been Covered Over By The Same External Crust, Because We Are Thoroughly Assured That The Organized Bodies To Which These Fossil Remains Belong Must Have Lived Upon The Surface Before They Came To Be Buried, As They Now Are, At A Great Depth.

[audubon's Works Are] The Most Splendid Monuments Which Art Has Erected In Honor Of Ornithology.

Thus It Cannot Be Denied That The Masses Which Today Form Our Highest Mountains Were Originally In A Liquid State; For A Long Time They Were Covered By Waters Which Did Not Sustain Any Life.

It Is Evident That One Cannot Say Anything Demonstrable About The Problem Before Having Resolved These Preliminary Questions, And Yet We Hardly Possess The Necessary Information To Solve Some Of Them

The Traces Of Upheavals Become More Impressive When One Moves A Little Higher, When One Gets Even Closer To The Foot Of The Great Mountain Ranges. There Are Still Plenty Of Shell Layers. We Notice Them, Even Thicker And More Solid Ones.