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A27207
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Considerations on a book, entituled The theory of the earth, publisht some years since by the Dr. Burnet
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Beaumont, John, d. 1731.
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1693
(1693)
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Wing B1620; ESTC R170484
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132,774
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195
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the heaven of heavens in the Eastern part Mr. Gregory having thus establisht his Ground says that this is the reason why God planted a Garden in Eden Eastward and that though some say with Mercerus That nothing hinders but we may take it generally that Paradise was planted in the Eastern part of the World towards the rising Sun yet Damascen and Barcephas say that at the beginning of March the Sun alway rises directly over Paradise meaning that the Garden of Eden was planted toward the Aequinoctial East of the Holy Land and the meaning of this is that the Sanctum Sanctorum of this Mother Church pointed towards that part of Heaven where the Sun rises in the month Nisan For the Sanctuary of Paradise was the recess of the Garden which was distinguisht and made so by the presence of the Tree of Life Now this Tree according as we commonly translate it was planted in the midst of the Garden but in truth it stood in the Eastern part of the place And that not only Adam but the whole World also worshipt towards the East till Abraham's time Maimoni in his More and S. Ephrem and others in the Arabick Catena testifie And it depends from this very same Ground that the most solemn piece of all the Jewish Service I mean that Great attonement but once a Year to be made by the highest and most holy Man and in the most holy Place was perform'd towards the East contrary to all other manner of addressments in their Devotion For Lev 16.14 15. It 's commanded that the high Priest shall do with the blood of the Goat as with the blood of the Bullock and sprinkle it with his finger upon the Mercy-seat Eastward Now it s known that the sprinkling of blood especially this was the Figure of him who by his own blood entred into the holy Place and obtain'd Eternal Redemption Heb. 9.12 And hence Isychius Hierosolom says this was done to represent the Man Cui oriens nomen ejus and there are many passages in the Scriptures which signifie to us that Christ came down to us from the East And this is one reason why our Saviour is said to be the Man whose Name is the East in reference to whom the Christians by some have been called Orientales and the Blessed Virgin is call'd Orientalis porta The other reason is according to what was intimated before viz. that from Adam till Abraham's time the whole World worshipt towards the East Now this Original Principal and as it ought to have been everlasting Ceremony by an Errour of the Persian and Chaldean worshippers degenerating into an Idolatry of the Sun Abraham says the Learned Maimoni by divine Inspiration appointed the West to his Hebrews therefore the Tabernacle and Temple were set towards that side of Heaven So that they did and they did not worshipt towards the West 'T is true all the Sacrifices were offer'd up that way but all this while they worshipt no more towards the West than towards the North. They worship towards the Ark or towards the place of that and do so still and are so to do because the Sun of Righteousness was to set upon their Horizon and to them the Man whose Name is th' East is not yet brought forth It 's known also that Christs Star appear'd in the East and the Wise-men came thence and Christ ascended up into the Eastern part of Heaven as the Psalmist says Qui ascendit super coelum coeli ad Orientem And S. Jo. Damascen delivers as from the Apostles that he shall come again in like manner as he was seen to go hence answerable to what he himself said For as the lightning comes out of the East and shines even unto the West so shall also the coming of the Son of man be We worship him therefore toward the East as expecting him from thence Mr. Gregory concludes with an ancient Profession of the Eastern Church who say We pray toward the East for that our Lord Christ when he ascended into Heaven went up that way and there fits in the Heaven of Heavens above the East according to David Praise the Lord who sits in the Heaven of Heavens in the East and in truth we make no doubt but that our Lord Christ as respecting his humane Nature has his Seat in the Eastern part of the Heav'n of Heav'ns and sits with his Face towards this World To pray therefore or to worship toward the East is to pray and worship toward our Saviour And that all this is to be meant of the Aequinoctial East it is made out by Moses Barcephas in his Discourse of Paradise he says there that the place toward which they prayed is that over which the Sun rises in the Month Nisan which is the Vernal Aequinox This is what I have briefly collected from Mr. Gregory from which I may draw what follows as a Corollary It appears from what is said that the Ancient Jews and Christians plac'd their Terrestrial and Coelestial Paradises with reference to the states of the Churches Militant and Triumphant the one under the Sun on the Earth the other over it in the third Heavens as the Sun was plac'd in the Aequinoctial East of Hierusalem and consequently of the whole habitable World and how possibly could the ancient Mystae who took upon them to bring all things to Time and Place more aptly personate a particular presence of the divine Logos in Heav'n and Earth than there Since as he enlightens every Man coming into this World so the Sun being in that Aequinoctial East Point equally diffus'd its light over the whole habitable Earth and hence we direct our divine Worship that way and may conclude the Seat of the Terrestrial Paradise there though perhaps it was miraculously founded or at least for many Ages has not been known to Man And as the foremention'd Mr. Gregory has observ'd according to the sense of the most knowing The Year of the World began the Sun being in that Vernal Aequinox Point its Revolutions beginning and ending there nor can any other good reason be given why the Astronomers should deduce all their Calculations from the head of Aries If the Pains I have bestow'd in composing this long Chapter may help somewhat to ease the mind of any Man that peruses it concerning the Seat of Paradise I shall think it well bestow'd at least beside my labour for my pains it seems to give a little ease to my own CHAP. VIII HERE the Author sets forth the uses of his Theory for the illustration of Antiquity and endeavours to explain the Ancients Chaos the Uninhabitableness of the Torrid Zone the Changes of the Poles of the World the Doctrine of the Mundane Egg and endeavours to shew how America was first Peopled c. First then concerning the Ancients Chaos he says they have made a dark confus'd and unintelligible Story of it telling us of moral Principles in it instead
Sacro igne Conscientiae igne Coelesti absumente sacrificium Domini quo totus mundus uno die periturus est the Divine Nature cannot be manifested within us nor can we enter those pure Aetherial Regions undisturb'd by corporeal Passions and Affects We need not therefore go far to find where that Region lies all may be resolv'd by that Inscription in the Delphick Temple 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for though it was the great wisdom of the Ancients or rather of God himself to bring Men round in Types by a circular fetch of external Nature they well knew where all must terminate I say not in us as Men but in that God within us in whom we live move and are and who sometimes is pleas'd to manifest himself to Man And this I aver that whatsoever knowledge of God may accrue to Man from a Contemplation of external Nature he shall never have that sensible feeling of him that way as when being rais'd in the Spirit Baptismo flaminis he comes to find him within himself The Poet tells us of two sorts of Persons both Diis Geniti not born of flesh and blood but of God who may have a free Intercourse to those Aethereal Regions they must be either Quos aequus amavit Jupiter such as by a Priviledge of Nature or a Genethliacal favour of the Heav'ns are gifted for it that is according to Christian Divinity such as God is pleas'd to save by his particular Grace as it may be said of St. John who in one slumber on the Brest of Christ drew far deeper Mysteries than all the Schools in the World could teach him and of St. Paul who by an over-ruling Summons from God was rapt on a sudden to the third Heavens where a fulness of Knowledge was communicated to him Or secondly Quos ardens evexit ad aethera virtus such as having apply'd the powers of their Soul to the knowledge of that divine Nature which governs the World are at length initiated by a certain divine Institution disposing to the supernatural Act which God has been pleased to reveal to Man by which also a Regeneration is truly wrought and Paradise is open'd to us though many times the effect of it may prove but transient through the instability and frailty of Man's nature he soon relapsing into Sin without a particular Providence to uphold him as if I am not mistaken in Mythology it 's plainly set forth in the expedition for the Golden Fleece where according to some Medaea in favour of Jason by her Enchantments cast the Dragon which guarded it into a profound Sleep only and did not kill him outright whilst Jason executed his Enterprize or she for him the Dragon haply afterward awaking again And Servius well observes that Proteus receiv'd Divinity only for a time otherwise he might have known Aristaeus lying in wait for him And thus Solomon is known to have receiv'd the Spirit and as well known it is how notoriously he fell from the Rectitude of it Nor was David himself so great a Prophet as he was without great Lapses the like may be held of Gedeon and others This is that Institution by which as the Areopagite says Socrates being stirr'd up and rais'd in his Understanding sang forth divine Mysteries he owning himself before ignorant of Coelestial and sublunary Things I know not how far I may have here incurr'd the Censure of some Criticks for having seem'd to imitate as though some Mysteries of Christianity had been known among the Gentils But to pass by the Testimonies of many of the Fathers by which the knowledge of Christ is allow'd to many of them before his appearing in the Flesh we know that Virgil in what he applies to the Son of Pollio in his fourth Eclogue is judg'd to have prophesied of Christ and I know not why it may not be thought with as much reason that being mov'd with the same Spirit in his sixth Aenead he has prophesied of the Kingdom of Christ in the Soul of Man And indeed I look upon it as a Truth that to sincere Souls living according to the light they had at all times and in all Nations God has pleas'd in some extraordinary way to communicate the knowledg of Christ and that the Vertue and Efficacy of his Death and Passion has been apply'd to them tho they knew nothing of the History thereof And that the Doctors of the Gentils have mysteriously deliver'd many things concerning Christ though not with that soundness of Divinity which Christianity teaches That true Prophets were not only given by God to his People but likewise to the Gentils to announce the coming of his Son and teach them many other things it appears from the Sibyls who were given to the Greeks and Romans and from Balaam who was given to the Oriental People He that desires to see more concerning what the Ancients thought of a Paradise being without our Continent or in another Hemisphere may read what Bishop Vsher has learnedly set forth concerning it in his Tract of Limbus Patrum where in the end he plainly makes out both by sacred and profane Writers that though some of the Ancients would personate a Scene of Ades for the reception of Souls in the other Hemisphere beyond the Ocean which they suppos'd then uninhabited to gratifie vulgar Fancy yet that the Translation of Souls thither in reality signify'd only their Translation from that which is visible to that which is invisible no Topical Paradise being ever there dreamt of and if I should grant that some of the ancient Gentils fancied the Elysian Fields as some pleasant place of Habitation in the other Hemisphere I see not how this could relate to Adam's Paradise the Seat of which was to be made out by the Author according to the Opinions of the Ancients for these Fields were for the reception of the Soul separate from the Body and might answer to the Coelestial Paradise and the state of the Church Triumphant but not to any Terrestrial Habitation and the state of the Church Militant and I know nothing but the Golden Age of the Ancients that could answer to Adams Paradise concerning which I shall say somewhat beneath but so much at present concerning the Paradises of the Gentils Now in the second place when a Man considers the Fathers on this Point of Paradise he may be apt to say what Cicero said on a greater occasion Truly so great a Dissention of the most learned Men in so weighty a matter may make even those doubt who think they have somewhat certain For some of the greatest Writers amongst them are so invectively opposite in their Assertions concerning Paradise that Philo and Origen Pursuers of the Allegory and follow'd by others censure those as mad Men or Idiots who go about to establish a corporeal Paradise they concluding that the Scriptures in what is deliver'd in them concerning Paradise so manifestly present us an occasion to adhere to the Allegory