The object of "The World before the Deluge" is to trace the progressive steps by which the earth has reached its present state, from that condition of chaos when it "was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep," and to describe the various convulsions and transformations through which it has successively passed. In the words of the poet- "Where rolls the deep, there grew the tree; O Earth, what changes hast thou seen! There, where the long street roars, hath been The silence of the central sea."