Quotes from James Hutton

The result, therefore, of this physical inquiry [into the age of the earth] is, that we find no vestige of a beginning—no prospect of an end.

The globe of this earth … [is] … not just a machine but also a organised body as it has a regenerative power.

[It] is the little causes, long continued, which are considered as bringing about the greatest changes of the earth.

In matters of science, curiosity gratified begets not indolence, but new desires.

There is no vestige of a beginning, no prospect of an end.

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 are not natural to the globe, no action to be admitted except those of which we know the principle.

What more can we require? Nothing but time.

Error, never can be consistent, nor can truth fail of having support from the accurate examination of every circumstance.

With such wisdom has nature ordered things in the economy of this world, that the destruction of one continent is not brought about without the renovation of the earth in the production of another.