The opening of Preface
In the following pages I have endeavoured to give a full and concise statement of the facts and arguments adduced in support of the theory of Secular Changes of the Earth’s Climate. Considerable portions of the volume have already appeared in substance as separate papers in the Philosophical Magazine and other journals during the past ten or twelve years. The theory, especially in as far as it relates to the cause of the glacial epoch, appears to be gradually gaining acceptance with geologists. This, doubtless, is owing to the greatly increased and constantly increasing knowledge of the drift-phenomena, which has induced the almost general conviction that a climate such as that of the glacial epoch could only have resulted from cosmical causes.