days Works given an account of in the same chapter In the Beginning God Created the Heaven and the Earth says the Scripture which is as I take it a Preface or Introduction to the following account and may be thus paraphras'd Altho' that History of the Origin of the World which shall now be given you do not extend any farther as will appear presently than that Earth we live upon with those Bodies which peculiarly belong to it and so the rest of the Universe be not at all directly concern'd therein and altho ' the same History will not reach to the Creation of the matter but only Production of the form and disposition of the Earth it self Yet to prevent any misunderstanding and obviate any ill effects of a perfect silence touching these things I am oblig'd by the Divine Command to assure you That the Original of all Beings whatsoever was primarily owing to that same God of Israel whose Works I am going to relate and that not only this Earth and all its Bodies but the vast Frame of Universal Nature was by him at first Created out of Nothing and dispos'd into those several Systems which now are extant and make up what in the largest sense is stil'd Heaven and Earth or the whole Word This sense of the Words is allow'd by our late Excellent Commentatour the Right Reverend the Lord Bishop of Ely whose Sentiments cannot but be justly valued by all who are conversant in his Expositions of the Holy Scriptures and is I think clearly confirm'd by the following words And the Earth was without Form and Void and Darkness was upon the Face of the Deep and the Spirit of God moved on the Face of the Waters Where 't is clear that as soon as the Holy Writer descends to the Description of the Chaos and the commencing of the Six Days Creation he mentions not a word of any Production out of Nothing before suppos'd and asserted to have been past and done In the Beginning he omits and thereby evidently excludes that Heaven or those Superior Systems of the World already spoken of from any place therein and by the whole coherence plainly confines the Narration following to the Earth alone with its dependencies Moses does not say as the common Expositors do That just at the commencing of the Six Days Work the Earth and all the rest of the World was originally produc'd But that When God had formerly created all the World which is usually distinguish'd into the Heaven and the Earth the latter of these the consideration whereof was alone pertinent to the present design at the time preceding the Six Days Work was in a Wild Irregular and Dark condition or such a perfect Chaos as nothing but the Power of God and his Spirit 's moving on and influencing the same could ever have reduc'd into a habitable World This is a very easie and natural account of this matter and I think the most obvious and genuine signification of the words themselves And were not Mens Minds too much prejudic'd with other apprehensions this alone might be sufficient to limit their thoughts and prevent their Enquiries after any Creation of Bodies out of nothing in the Six Days Work and their stretching the same beyond the Earth either to the whole System of things as the most do or indeed to the Solar System with which others are more modestly contented in the case Which two things once granted me the Propoposition we are now upon would soon be establish'd and little farther labour become necessary But that I may give all possible satisfaction and lay this Foundation firm on which my Account of the Mosaick Creation is intirely superstructed I shall more at large prove the same Truths craving the Pardon of those Readers who are already satisfy'd in these matters if I shall seem to them to insist too long on a plain case as perhaps they may and that I think very justly esteem this to be And indeed The prejudices of Men are here so great their fears of a Philosophical Hypothesis so rooted the attempts hitherto made have been so unsuccessful and besides the Honour of God in his Holy Word is so much concern'd and the usual Expositions of this History of the Origin of Things is so poor so jejune so unbecoming the Penman much more the primary Author of the same that a large and full Discourse is but necessary and tho' it should prove somewhat prolix will be 't is hop'd not improper but as well serviceable to Religion as to Philosophy by rescuing this Ancient Venerable and Sacred Account of the Origin of things from such false and unwary Glosses as have been and still are put upon it as have rendred it in the opinion of too many an uncouth and incredible System nay somewhat below some of those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the imperfect Traditions of the Heathen World enabled them to describe To proceed therefore in the arguments before us I affirm II. That the words here us'd of Creating Making or Framing of things on which the main stress is laid in the stile of Scripture are frequently of no larger importance than the Proposition we are upon does allow and signifie no more than the ordering disposing changing or new modelling those Creatures which existed already into a different and sometimes perhaps a better and more useful state than they were in before I do not say this is the utmost or only importance of these words I have already allow'd that Creating in the first words of Genesis includes Producing out of nothing and I add that in our common Creed wherein we profess our Faith in God the Father Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth the words are agreeably to the extent of the Divine Power and the nature of that profession to be taken in the same large and comprehensive sense and the like is to be said of many other places of the Holy Scripture But then I observe withal that the other more narrow and limited sense is very common and familiar in the Holy Writings and therefore where the subject matter and coherence requires it as I think 't will be evident it does in the present case these words both may and ought to be taken in the same acceptation This signification of the two latter words Make and Frame will I suppose be granted me by all and that the same is as true of the other Create the following Texts will sufficiently evince and from the promiscuous use of them all and others of a like importance might however be very fairly suppos'd If says Moses the Lord make a new thing or Create a Creature and the Earth open her Mouth and swallow them up Where none can imagine any thing produc'd out of nothing but only such an unusual and miraculous disposal of things as would at once demonstrate God's Vengeance against the Wicked and his absolute Command over all Creatures Thus
the Formation of things began and there was the principal occasion for their presence and efficacy that ever was or could possibly be A strange method of Generation To take away the Cause at the very instant when it was to produce its Effects and to recount the Effects not before but as soon as ever the Cause is taken away But to proceed 4. The now undoubted property of the Universal Gravitation of Matter contradicts and overthrows this fancy of the Heavenly Bodies having been originally included in and at the Creation extracted from the Chaos of which we are speaking For on this Hypothesis when once they were mingled with the parts of the Earth and are since at immense distances from it they must have fled off every way from their former place and in a small space of time have thrown themselves to those vastly remote seats which they have ever since possess'd Now if instead of the vis centripeta a vis centrifuga instead of mutual attraction a mutual repulse or avoidance were found to be the standing unchang'd Law of Nature and Property of Matter this might have look'd like a possible at least if not a probable Hypothesis and the whole Order of Nature ever since need not have been contradicted in this primary formation of things But when the contrary force that I mean of mutual tendency attraction or gravitation obtains and that as far as we have any means of knowing universally which Mr. Newton has demonstrated there is no room or foundation in Nature for such an Imagination 'T is by no means impossible that all the Bodies in the Universe should approach to one another and at last unite in the common Center of Gravity of the intire System Nay from the universality of the Law of Gravitation and the finiteness of the World in length of time without a miraculous power interpose and prevent it it must really happen But by what Law of Nature or Property of Bodies they when once conjoin'd as those I now oppose must affirm should be separated 't is hard to conceive Which difficulty is increas'd by the prodigious velocity of their motions when according to the vulgar Hypothesis but a few hours can be allow'd the Heavenly Bodies to waft them to those immensly yet variously distant Seats which they were immediately and for ever after to possess All which harsh and ungrounded fictions are intirely avoided and all things represented according to the known Laws of Matter and Motion in that natural and easie Hypothesis we take and which therefore is as consonant to as the other is averse from the Make and Constitution of the Natural World 5. This fancy that the Heavenly Bodies proceeded originally from the Terrestrial Chaos and cast themselves off from it every way supposes the Earth to be the Center of the World or of all that System of Bodies and they plac'd in a kind of circumference every way about it How well soever such a Notion would agree with the Vulgar or Ptolomaick System of the World I fear the Pythagorean which has forc'd its reception and is universally receiv'd by Astronomers will not at all square therewith In that account which would only include the Planetary or Solar System within the six days Creation the Sun it s known and undoubted Center seems the only proper place for such a Chaos as were to be the common source and promptuary of the whole But in the vulgar account where all the Stars and Planets of the Universe are to be suppos'd at a Center together we who know not the bounds and circumference of the World cannot be suppos'd able to pitch upon a Center proper for so immense and strange a Chaos Only one may venture to say that the Earth a small moveable Planet revolving about the Sun is an ill-chosen one however And now upon a recollection and view of this whole Argument I do not question but an unprejudic'd person who knew nothing of the sentiments of Commentators or of the opinions of the vulgar and who had only been conversant in the Works and Word of God the Book of External Nature and the Book of Scripture would easily find the bounds of the Mosaick Creation and on a little consideration and comparison of the Sacred and Profane Accounts of the Primitive Chaos with the present Nature and Situation of the Heavenly Bodies would quickly be convinc'd that our Earth alone were therein concern'd he could scarce be suppos'd once to Dream that the Origin of the Sun and Planets much less of innumerable Suns and Planets and of the intire Universe was there accounted for Such Notions how general soever are not the result of Nature and Scripture carefully consider'd and compar'd one with another but the effects of ignorance of the frame of the World and of the stile of Scripture of an unacquaintedness with the Works and thence an inability of judging concerning the Word of God relating to them or indeed commonly of a certain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or narrowness of Soul which Temper Education Conversation Application to some particular Studies and Authors with a strangeness to free and generous Enquiries some or all have been the unhappy occasions of In short 't is because men are not able to give themselves or others a satisfactory account of such things that they are forced to fall into a beaten path and content themselves with those poor and jejune Schemes which when carefully examin'd prove neither Rational nor Scriptural but as perfectly contradictory to sound Philosophy as the genuine sense of those very Texts on which they build their conclusions Every unbyass'd Mind would easily allow that like Effects had like Causes and that Bodies of the same general Nature Uses and Motions were to be deriv'd from the same Originals and consequently that the Sun and the fixed Stars had one as the Earth and the other Planets another sort of Formation If therefore any free Considerer found that one of the latter sort that Planet which we Inhabit was deriv'd from a Chaos by a parity of Reason he would suppose every one of the other to be so deriv'd also I mean each from its peculiar Chaos Nay truly I might carry this matter still higher and if one Planet must be made Parent to another justly claim the principal place for Jupiter about sixty times as big as our Earth and the largest and most considerable of all the Sun's Chorus and so with greater shew of Probability assert that from its Chaos any of the other Planets were deriv'd than himself from theirs Particularly the Earth is so small a Globe that in point of Dignity or Origination very many of the Celestial Bodies may most fairly claim the precedence of her and curb her aspiring pretensions to any such mighty Prerogatives above her Fellows There is in reality no occasion for any such childish reasoning on either side and every one of the Planets especially the Moon so exactly resembling her
Sister Earth ought to be deduc'd from a distinct Chaos of its own as well as that particular one which Providence has allotted for the Seat of Mankind And 't is not to be question'd were we as well acquainted with the Nature Constitution and Uses of the other Planets with their various Inhabitants and the several methods of Divine Providence relating to 'em all we should not be backward to allow 'em every one a proportionable share in the care of Heaven and a like conduct in their Origins and Periods as the Earth on which we dwell can boast of We should 't is probable soon understand that bating the stupendious and miraculous dispensation of the Gospel by the Messias 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as well the Moral as the Natural Histories of these Worlds those of their first rise out of Chao's of their several Changes Revolutions and Catastrophes with regard to the inanimate the animate and Reasonable Beings both as to the dignity of the things themselves and their newness to us would equally deserve the view and consideration of Inquisitive Minds with any like Accounts relating to our own Earth and we should easily satisfy our selves that the single Chaos the Seminary of our present Earth was so far from extending it self to the Sun or fixt Stars that not the least secondary Planet in the Solar System could be contain'd therein V. The Mosaick Creation is confin'd to our Earth with its Appurtenances because otherwise the time of the Creation of each Body was so extreamly disproportionate to the Work it self as is perfectly irreconcileable to the Divine Wisdom of its Creator and the accounts of the Works themselves as they are set down by Moses In order to the Reader 's perceiving and admitting the force of this and some following Arguments I must premise some things touching the nature of such Reasonings and how far they may be made use of without any just Imputation of Boldness Irreverence or an audacious Stinting and Determining the Divine Actions And here I freely confess That 't is not necessary in all Cases that we should comprehend the reasons of the Divine Actions or Providence before we can be under an Obligation to believe them They may be hid from us on several accounts tho' the things themselves be plain in Scripture Under which circumstances I heartily own the strictest Obligation to yield our unfeigned Assent to what God has clearly reveal'd notwithstanding we cannot see the intire accountableness thereof to our imperfect Understandings But then 't is one thing to be above and another to be repugnant to our Reason 't is one thing to be beyond the comprehension of and another directly contradictory to our Humane Faculties Besides the clearness or obscurity of the Revelation is here very considerable the former case resolves our Assent into the Divine Veracity but the latter may only be the mistakes of Humane Deductions and by consequence tho' our fallible reasonings be superseded by the first yet there is room for them in the second I believe for instance and am oblig'd so to do that our Saviour Christ is truly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God and Man because I find it every where plain and evident that the Stile Titles Attributes Actions and incommunicable Name of the Eternal Deity the God of Israel are at least as frequently ascrib'd to him the Son as to the Father himself through the whole Bible notwithstanding any inability of comprehending the Nature of God and thence of judging of the Unity or Plurality of Persons in the Divine Essence But I do not think my self equally oblig'd to believe the Doctrine of absolute and uncondition'd Reprobation because the Proofs alledg'd for it are far from being clear and because 't is not so properly above as contradictory to the most evident Reason And this comes nearest to the present case in which neither can any one justly assert the plainness of the Revelation on the side of the common Scheme nor alledge the sublimity of the Subject on account whereof it might be fairly suppos'd above the reach of our finite Capacities The Scripture as I take it is evidently for at least must be own'd not evidently against this restrained Sense of the Mosaick History before us and the Subject it self is finite and limited and so within our ken and capable of our comprehension On which accounts such Arguments as follow ought to have their place and if considerable their force and influence on our Faith also and go a great way to determine such a Dispute as we are now upon And 't is sure not impossible within certain bounds for a considering man to determine what is rational wise and prudent what is consonant to the nature of things what is suitable to forecast and contrivance what is in most cases proper decent and becoming even with relation to the Divine Operations in the World We naturally in the reflecting on the System of External Nature observe many Marks and Tokens of the Wisdom and Art the Skill and Artifice of the Great Creator which supposes that we are competent Judges in such matters And indeed 't is but changing the Scene and considering what we naturally pronounce to be rational and orderly fit and proportionable among Men what will become a Wise General or Statesman a Skilful Builder and Architect nay an ordinary Workman or Artificer in usual and obvious cases What on the one hand are the Tokens of Foresight and Prudence and on the other of Heedlesness and Folly in the common Affairs of Life and we shall not wholly be to seek what to think of several analogous Actions relating to God himself Due allowance being every where made for that infinite distance and different state and management of the Supream Governour of the World from those of all finite Beings depending on and subject to him Thus we collect our Idea's of the Divine Attributes by considering what is good great valued and esteemed lovely and venerable among Men and ascribing every such thing to the Divine Nature who being the Origin of them all must contain 'em within himself in a higher and more eminent manner By accumulating all things that appear Perfections in Men or other Creatures and removing all Imperfections necessarily adhering to them we arrive at the Notion of an Infinitely Perfect Being which is but another name for God and whom on that account we justly think the proper Object of our Worship and Adoration When therefore our very Idea's of the Divine Properties are owing to and depend on our consideration of those lesser degrees of the same which we observe in Men and when the reason why the contrary Properties are not by us ascribed to him is because we find that in Men they argue imperfection what is a sign or effect of some degree of Perfection in Men must also be acknowledg'd sign or effect of a like Perfection in God And what is a sign or effect of Imperfection in Men must
on this occasion I cannot but observe That 't is not the genuine Contents of the Holy Books themselves but such unwary Interpretations of them as these which have mainly contributed to their contempt and been but too Instrumental to make 'em appear Absurd and Irrational to the Free Reason of Mankind For when Men found that the Scriptures according to the Universal Sense of Expositors ascribed such things to God as their plainest reason could not think compatible to a Wise Man much less to the All-wise God they were under a shrewd Temptation of thinking very meanly of the Bible it self and by degrees of rejecting it and therewith all Divine Revelation to the Sons of Men. How fatally this Malady hath spread of late especially I need not say and tho' I fully believe the main stroke or step as to the generality be Vicious Dispositions and a Debauched Temper yet how far such Ill-contriv'd Unskilful and Unphilosophical Interpretations or rather Misrepresentations of Scripture particularly relating to the Material World of which we are now speaking may have contributed to so fatal and pernicious an effect deserves the most serious and sober consideration This Mischief is not to be remedied nor the Veneration due to the Sacred Volumes retriev'd by an obstinate maintaining such strange opinions as those here refer'd to by patronizing the same with Divine Authority and then making vehement Invectives against such as many unskilful yet good men are ready to do whose only fault is this that they can no more be induc'd to believe what is plainly unworthy of and unsuitable to the Divine Perfections than what is evidently contradictory to Divine Revelation Wise Men would rather set themselves carefully to compare Nature with Scripture and make a free Enquiry into the certain Phaenomena of the one and the genuin Sense of the other which if Expositors would do 't were not hard to demonstrate in several such cases that the latter is so far from opposing the truths deducible from the former or the common notions of Mankind that 't is in the greatest harmony therewith and in those cases where the thing mention'd is within the sphere of human Knowledge no less accountable to the reason than enforc'd on the belief of Mankind And I persuade my self if there were a careful collection made of the Ancient knots and difficulties in the several parts of the Bible with relation to such points as we are upon or any others of a different nature and how very many of them as preludes and pledges of the rest are now intirely clear'd or might easily be so it would more contribute to the recovery of the Ancient Honour and due Esteem of the Sacred Scriptures than all the most Zealous and general Harangues from some popular Topicks either for them or against their Contemners the loose Deists and pretended Socinians of this Age. For my own part I cannot but profess that tho' I be very nice and tender in the reasonableness of my Faith and desirous to admit nothing but what agrees to the Divine Attributes the common notions of our Souls and the Phaenomena of Nature yet upon an Impartial Enquiry into some of the most perplexing difficulties occurring there I have obtain'd so great a Measure of satisfaction about them that my scruples now intirely cease and I cannot doubt either of the Truth or Divine Authority of the Scriptures I do not mean that all the difficulties are in particular vanish'd and perfectly clear'd to me That is what is scarce to be hop'd for in this World But I have so frequently met with fewer difficulties in the consideration of the Books themselves than in the common Interpretations and those very Comments which ought to assoil 'em And in so many and those most remarkable Points of all have met with such clear and plenary tho' unexpected satisfaction that I have all imaginable reason to believe the rest equally capable of the same and to remain constant in this assurance That 't is the ignorant or foolish Expositions of Men not the natural and genuine Sense of the Words themselves that makes us imagine Scripture Reason and the Nature of Things irreconcileable or contradictory to one another And I hope the instances he will meet with in the following Theory will go a great way to persuade the unbyass'd Reader of the same Truth and to convince him that greater satisfaction is to be look'd for from the view of God's own Books of Nature and Scripture than those of any Men whatsoever Whatever incompetent Judges may say nothing will so much tend to the vindication and honour of reveal'd Religion as free enquiries into and a solid acquaintance with not ingenious and precarious Hypotheses but true and demonstrable principles of Philosophy with the History of Nature and with such ancient Traditions as in all probability were deriv'd from Noab and by him from the more Ancient Fathers of the World From which mediums what surprizing and unhop'd for light may be given to some famous portions of the Holy Scriptures the following Pages will 't is hop'd afford some convincing Instances and prove sufficient to take away mens ungrounded Fears and Apprehensions in such matters And by the Divine Blessing appear a seasonable Attestation to the Certainty and Authority of those Lively Oracles on which our Happiness in this and the next World does so vastly depend But I must leave this digression and proceed VI. The Vulgar Scheme of the Mosaick Creation besides the disproportion as to time represents all things from first to last so disorderly confusedly and unphilosophically that 't is intirely disagreeable to the Wisdom and Perfection of God And here I might justly Appeal to the Conscience of every careful Reader even tho' his Knowledge of the true System of the World were not great whether the vulgar account has not ever seem'd strange and surprizing to him But if he were one Philosophically dispos'd and allow'd himself a free consideration of it whether it has not ever been the most perplexing thing to his thoughts that could be imagin'd 'T is well known how far this matter has been carried by Wise and Good Men even to the taking away the literal and the resolving the whole into a Popular Moral or Parabolick sense And under what notion this History on the same account has appear'd to others of no less free but less Religious Dispositions and Thoughts I need not say What is indeed matter of doubt and perplexity to pious men being unquestionably to the Loose and Profane the Subject of Mirth and Drollery and the sure encouragement to Atheism and Impiety But I shall not content my self with this general reflection but instead of prosecuting such a Discourse any father shall assign such particular instances of the irregular and unbecoming procedure in the vulgar Scheme of the Creation as are plainly disagreeable to the Divine Wisdom and unsuitable to the nature of things 1. Bodies Alike in Nature have here an unlike
intire Bodies of all Plants and Animals 't is by no means hard to conceive that he might Create them in what degree of Maturity and Perfection he pleas'd without any manner of infringement of the Order of Nature then to be establish'd And if we have reason to believe that the Bodies of bruit Creatures were created in parvo in a small State such as we now call Seeds and so requir'd a proper Generation i. e. Nutrition and Augmentation of parts as the Mosaick History plainly describes them and had it not done so we could not with any certainty have asserted it We have sure equal reason to believe from the description of the same Author in this other case that the Bodies of our First Parents were Originally created in their Mature Bulk and State of Manhood so as immediately to be capable of the same Operations which at any time afterward they might be thought to be This Miraculous Origination of the Bodies of our First Parents is therefore very rationally ascribed to the Finger of God by Moses And we may justly believe that the Blessed Trinity as 't is represented in the Sacred History was peculiarly concern'd in the Production of that Being which was to bear the Image of God and be made capable of some degree of his Immortality And then as to the Soul of Man 't is certainly a very distinct Being from and one very much advanced above the Body and therefore if we were forc'd to introduce a Divine Power in the Formation of the latter we can do no less than that in the Creation and Infusion of the former And indeed the Dignity and Faculties of the Human Soul are so vastly exalted above all the Material or merely Animal Creation that its Original must be deriv'd from the immediate Finger of God in a manner still more peculiar and Divine than all the rest That nearer resemblance of the Spiritual Nature Immortal Condition Active Powers and Free Rational and Moral Operations of the Divine Being it self which the Souls of men were to bear about them did but require some peculiar and extraordinary Conduct in their first Existence after-Union with Matter and Introduction into the Corporeal World Agreeably whereto we may easily observe a signal distinction in the Sacred History between the formation of all other Animals and the Creation of Man In the former case 't is only said Let the waters bring forth the moving creature that hath life Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind But of the latter the entire Trinity consult And God said Let Us make man in our image after our likeness And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul. As therefore the several parts of the Mosaick Creation before-mention'd are not to be mechanically attempted but look'd upon as the effects of the Extraordinary and Miraculous Power and Providence of God so more especially the Formation of the Body of Man in its mature state and most of all the primary Creation and after-Infusion of the Rational Human Soul is to be wholly ascrib'd to the same wonderful Interposition and Efficiency of the Supreme Being the Creator of all things God blessed for evermore All which taken together and duly considered is I think a sufficient and satisfactory Account of the Proposition before us and attributes as much to the Miraculous and Immediate Hand of God as either Tradition Reason or Scripture require in the present Case III. The Days of Creation and that of Rest had their beginning in the Evening III. This has been already accounted for and need not here be repeated Corollary 1. This Phaenomenon in some measure confirms our Hypothesis that the Primitive Days of the World were Years also For otherwise the space of one single short Night seems too inconsiderable to have been taken such notice of in this History and then and ever after made the first half of the Natural Day But if it were equal to half a Year it was too considerable to be omitted and its memory was very justly preserv'd in succeeding Ages Corollary 2. We may here begin to take notice of the Regularity and Methodicalness of this History of the Creation Which tho' it principally intends the giving an account of the Visible Parts of the World and how the state of Nature in each Period appeared in the Day time yet Omits not the foregoing Night which is very Mechanical and Natural For in the preceding Night all things were so prepar'd and dispos'd that the Work of each Day might upon its appearance display it self might be exhibited not in its unseen beginnings or secret Workings not in its praevious Causes and gradual Procedure which was not the Design of this History but in that more distinct and perfect condition in which things would in the Day time appear to the view of a Spectator and under which chiefly they were to be discribed and recorded in this History IV. At the time immediately preceding the Six Days Creation the Face of the Abyss or superior Regions of the Chaos were involv'd in a Thick Darkness IV. If we consider what has been already said of the Nature of a Comet or peculiarly of that Atmosphere which has been before shewn to have been the ancient Chaos we ought to represent it to our selves as containing a Central Solid Hot Body of about 7000 or 8000 Miles in Diameter and besides that a vastly large fluid heterogeneous Mass or congeries of Bodies in a very rare seperate and expanded condition whose Diameter were twelve or perhaps fifteen times as long as that of the central Solid or about 100000 Miles which is the Atmosphere or Chaos now to be consider'd In which we must remember was contain'd both a smaller quantity of dry solid or earthy Parts with a still much smaller of Aery and Watery and a much larger quantity of dense and heavy Fluids of which the main bulk of the Atmosphere was compos'd all confusedly mix'd blended and jumbled together In which state the Theorist's First Figure excepting the omission of the Central Solid will well enough represent it and in which state we accordingly delineate it in the following Figure But upon the change of the Comet 's Orbit from Elliptical to Circular the Commencing of the Mosaick Creation and the Influence of the Divine Spirit all things would begin to take their own places and each species of Bodies rank themselves into that order which according to the law of specifick gravity were due to them By which method the Mass of dense Fluids which compos'd the main bulk of the intire Chaos being heavier than the Masses of Earth Water and Air would sink downwards with the greatest force and velocity and elevate those Masses inclosed among them upwards Which procedure must therefore distinguish the Chaos or Atmosphere into two very different and
replenish'd with those first Pairs which by the Benediction they straightway receiv'd were enabled to become the original of all of the same Kinds which ever were to be the Inhabitants of those Regions afterwards Which time and procedure is no less agreeable to the State of the World in our Hypothesis than 't is to the express Affirmations of Moses who makes Fish and Fowl the sole Product of the fifth Day or Year of the Creation X. The Sixth Day 's Work was the Production of all the Terrestrial or Dry-land Animals and that in a different manner For the Brute Beasts were produc'd out of the Earth as the Fish and Fowl had been before out of the Waters but after that the Body of Adam was form'd of the Dust of the Ground who by the Breath of Life breath'd into him in a peculiar manner became a Living Soul Some time after which on the same day he was cast into a deep Sleep and Eve was form'd out of a Rib taken from his side Together with several other things of which a more particular account has been already given on another occasion X. The Earth being now grown more Solid Compact and Dry its Surface distinguish'd into Sea and Dry-land each of which were stor'd in some sort with Inhabitants and Vegetables the Air being fully clear and fit for Respiration and the other Dispositions of External Nature being equally subservient to this as well as it had been before to the last day's Productions 't was a proper Season for the Generation of the Dry-land Animals and the Introduction of the noblest of them Man which accordingly were the first Works on this sixth Day or Year of the Creation Any more particular account of which or of the following Works is not so directly the design of this Theory and so shall not be here farther insisted on We may only take notice of two things the one is the peculiar Manner the other the peculiar Time for the Creation of Man As to the former Tho' 't is granted that all the other Day 's Works mention'd by Moses were brought to pass in a natural way by proper and suitable Instruments and a mechanical Process as we have seen through the whole Series of the foregoing Creation yet 't is evident as has been already observ'd That an immediate and miraculous Power was exercis'd in the formation of the Body and Infusion of the Soul of Man as well as in some other particular Cases belonging to this Origin of Things In plain terms I take it to be evident That that same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our Blessed Mediator who was afterward very frequently conversant on Earth appear'd in a humane Form to the Patriarchs gave the Law in a visible Glory and with an audible Voice on Mount Sinai guided the Israelites personally in a Pillar of Fire and of a Cloud through the Wilderness inhabited between the Cherubins in the Holy of Holies and took the peculiar Stile Titles Attributes Adoration and incommunicable Name of the God of Israel and at last was Incarnate liv'd a true Man amongst us died for us and ascended into Heaven makes still Intercession for us with the Father and will come to Judge the World in Righteousness at the last Day That this very same Divine Person was actually and visibly in a humane Shape conversant on Earth and was truly and really employ'd in this Creation of the World and particularly in this peculiar Formation of Man so frequently ascribed to him in the Holy Scriptures It being both unfit and impossible for the Divine Nature it self or at least that of the Father to be so much and in such a manner concern'd with the Corporeal World and the sinful Race of Mankind as we find here and every where this Divine Person our Blessed Mediator to have been as the Texts quoted a little above compar'd together do I think fully prove Seeing therefore our Saviour Christ God-man was personally present and actually employ'd in this Primitive Creation of the World Seeing Man was to be a Creature intirely different from all the rest a Being compounded of a Spiritual and Immortal Soul and of a Material and Corruptible Body Seeing in both these he was to be made in the likeness of that Divine Person who created him and be constituted his Deputy and Vicegerent among the Creatures here below 't was but reasonable there should be as great a distinction in his Original as was to be in his Nature and Faculties his Office and Dignity his Capacities and Happiness from the other parts of the visible Creation and by consequence that peculiar Interposition of God himself in the Formation of the Body and Infusion of the Soul of our first Parents so particularly observable in the Mosaick History is both very agreeable to the Nature of things very suitable to the Wisdom of God and very reconcilable to the most Philosophick Accounts of this Origin of the World and withal a remarkable token of the Dignity of Human Nature of the distinction between his Soul and Body and of the great Condescension and Love of God towards us and so the most highly worthy of our consideration Neither is the other circumstance the peculiar Time of the Creation of Man to be pass'd over without a proper Reflection on it 'T were easy to shew That none of the preceding Days were in any degree so fit for nay most of them not capable of this Creation and Introduction of Man But upon this sixth Period when every thing which could be subservient to him and advance his felicity was compleated he who was to be the Lord of All and for whose sake the whole was fram'd was brought into the World When the Light had been penetrating into and clarifying this dark and thick Atmosphere for more than five compleat Years together when the Air was freed from its numberless Vapours and become pure clear and fit for his Respiration when the Waters as well superior as interior were so dispos'd as to minister to his necessities by Mists and Dews from the Heavens and by Springs and Rivers from the Earth when the Surface of the Earth was become dry and solid for his support and was cover'd over with Trees Shrubs Plants Herbs Grass and Flowers for his Sustenance and Delight when the glorious Firmament of Heaven and the beautiful System of the Sun Moon and Stars were visible and conspicuous to him the Objects of his Contemplation the Distinguishers of his Seasons by whose powerful Influences the Earth was invigorated and the World rendred a fruitful and useful a lightsome and pleasant Habitation to him when lastly all sorts of Animals in the Seas in the Air or on the Earth were so dispos'd as to attend benefit and please him one way or other when I say all these things were by the Care Beneficence and Providence of God prepar'd for the entertainment of this principal Guest then
was demonstrated by this account of their Original to be foolish and absurd that of the Celestial Bodies would seem thereby to be permitted at least if not patroniz'd and recommended to ' em For when as we have before observ'd 't was impossible for the Jews to know the real state of the case and to apprehend that they were vastly remote from and so no way belonging to this Earth or its Formation there was no other way to apply a fitting remedy to that prevailing custom of Worshiping the Host of Heaven so particularly caution'd by Moses but to condescend to the Capacities of the People and supposing them Light and Fiery Globes pendulous in the Air and revolving just beyond or among the Clouds to recount their respective as well as the real Formation of the other parts of the visible World and assign them their proper place and distinct period in the Six days work as well as any other more directly concern'd therein The Sun Moon and Stars were such noble and glorious Bodies and so visible so remarkable so useful parts of the World and the Heathen Nations so generally doted on the Worship of them that had they been intirely omitted in this particular account of the Origin of things there would have been the most eminent danger of this kind of Idolatry among the Jews and the seeming approbation of that practice to which they were so prone before from the silence of their great Lawgiver in his Creation of the World might probably have defy'd all dissuasions and been the most fatal encouragement to them to so vile a Worship that were easie to be imagin'd Any particular declaration of the reasons of such omission from the real Distance Magnitude Motions and Designs of the said Bodies and how improperly they could be reduc'd within the said narration the only precaution supposable in the case being more likely to discredit the whole Book than overcome their prejudices than give them a true and just Idea of the matter it self and so obviate their false reasonings and practices thereupon in the foremention'd Idolatry So that 't was absolutely necessary to include the Heavenly Bodies in the Mosaick Creation in order to prevent Idolatry among the Jews which seems to have been a principal aim not only of recording this whole Narration but of the intire Mosaick Dispensation and therefore was in the first place by all means to be consider'd 2. The peculiar Nature and Circumstances of this History of the Creation necessarily require the mention of the Heavenly Bodies as well as of any other parts of the Visible World And 't is this mistake that has hitherto hindred any rational account thereof that men have either suppos'd it a Real and Philosophical relation of the proper Creation of all things or a meer Mythological and Mysterious Reduction of the visible parts of it to six periods or divisions under which mighty Mysteries were suppos'd to be hid and by which the foundation of a seventh-day Sabbath was to be laid among the Jews Now tho' somewhat of truth I believe be contained in each of these different notions yet I think 't is undeniable that they are neither of them to be acquiesced in and by no means give a satisfactory account of the compleat Nature and Kind of this History That alone to which all its particulars exactly answer and which is as Literal and Philosophical as the capacities of the Jews could expect or reach and did require is An Historical Journalor Diary of the Mutations of the Chaos and of the visible Works of each Day such an one as an honest and observing Spectator on the Earth would have made and recorded nay and believ'd to be in all cases the truth and reality of the things themselves Now that this Idea alone fits this Sacred History might easily be made out by the consideration of the particulars related and of those omitted with all the other circumstances thereof by no means corresponding to any other Hypothesis but most exactly to this before us without the least force offer'd to the Nature and System of the World to the Divine Perfections or the Free Reason of Mankind and exactly suitable to the Stile of the Holy Books in the mention of the Phaenomena of the Natural World in other places Which being suppos'd and by that time this Dissertation is consider'd throughout I hope 't will appear no precarious supposition 't is evident that both the appearance of Light and of the Bodies themselves the Sun Moon and Stars the things we are now enquiring about must as certainly come within such a Journal and make as remarkable Turns and Changes in the World as far as this Spectator could judge as any other within the intire six days could possibly do The appearance of Light to him who never before is suppos'd to have seen such a thing and was till then incompass'd with the thickest Darkness and the plain view of the Heavenly Bodies themselves to him who before had no manner of notion of 'em especially when he had no possible means of distinguishing them from Light and Fiery Balls situate with and pertaining to the Clouds must as certainly have inferr'd a new Creation and under such a notion have been recorded in their due place in the Journal before-mention'd as any other whatsoever and their order position and uses would naturally be recounted no otherwise than we now find them in the Mosaick Creation From which consideration I think 't is not at all surprizing that these parts of the Visible World how remote and seperate soever they be from our Earth in themselves are yet included in this History before us and have their distinct periods in the six days work tho' at the same time the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it self do properly relate to the formation of the Sublunary World only IV. I prove that the History before us extends not beyond the Earth and its Appendages because that confused Mass or rude heap of Heterogeneous matter which we call the Chaos whence all the several parts were deriv'd extended no farther It will here I suppose be allow'd me that the ancient Chaos so famous among the old Philosophers and so evidently refer'd to by Moses was the intire and single source or promptuary of the six days productions and that consequently nothing ought to be esteem'd a part of that Creation but what in its Rudiments and Principles was so of the Chaos also and this Postulatum is so agreeable to Moses as well as all the antient accounts of the Chaos and I think so suitable to the sentiments of most men that I shall without farther proof suppose it granted and betake my self immediately to the other branch of the argument and endeavour to evince that the Chaos was so far from comprehending the intire matter of the Universe nay or of the Solar System that it reach'd not so far as the Moon nor indeed any farther than that Terraqueous Globe we
now Inhabit with such Bodies as are immediately contiguous and appertaining thereto Which I think the following arguments will sufficiently demonstrate 1. If we Appeal to External Nature and enquire what confused Masses or Chaos's either at present are or ever within the Annals of Time were extant in the Visible World we shall discover no footsteps of any such thing excepting what the Atmosphere of a Comet affords us If therefore without the allowance of precarious and fanciful Hypotheses relying on no known Phaenomena of Nature a Comet 's Atmosphere be the sole pretender if moreover the same Atmosphere gives a Just Adequate Primitive and Scriptural Idea of that ancient Chaos if it answers its particular Phnooemena recounted by Sacred or Prophane History if it prove a peculiarly fit Foundation of such an Earth as ours is and is extraordinarily adapted to suit and account for its present and past Phaenomena all which shall be prov'd hereafter I think we may cease our farther enquiries and with the highest reason and justice conclude That a Comet or more peculiarly the Atmosphere thereof was that very Chaos from whence that World arose whose Original is related in the Mosaick History And with equal reason and justice be satisfi'd which is but a certain consequent thereof that not the innumerable Systems of the fixt Stars not the narrower System of the Sun nay nor the Moon her self but our Earth alone was the proper subject of the Mosaick Creation Which conclusion will be farther establish'd by the coincidence of the several days works recounted by Moses with those Natural and Orderly Mutations which in the Digestion and Formation of a Planet from a Comet 's Atmosphere would Mechanically proceed as hereafter will appear 2. The Chaos mention'd by Moses is by him expresly call'd The Earth in contradistinction to The Heavens or the other Systems of the Universe and all its parts taken notice of in the Sacred History appear by the following Series of the Scriptures to belong to our Earth and no other The words of Moses are In the Beginning God created the heaven and the earth and the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters Where I think 't is plain as has been already observ'd that when the Author comes to the Chaos or Foundation of the six days work he excludes the Heavens from any share therein and calls the Chaos it self An Earth without form and void with Darkness upon the Face of its Abyss and this all ought to grant these being the very Words from which 't is concluded that the Heathen Chaos was no other than what Moses deriv'd the World from And that the Chaos is here confin'd to the Earth will be sure put past doubt by the latter part of this Argument which observes no other parts to be mention'd belonging thereto than such as the succeeding Series of the Holy Scriptures shews to have afterward belong'd to our Earth and no other viz. An Abyss or Deep and Waters Both of them frequently mention'd in the Holy Books and now actual parts of the present Globe as will appear hereafter So that when Moses calls his Chaos expresly the Earth when by the coherence of his discourse he excludes the Heavens taken in a large and proper sense from the same when lastly he mentions no other parts of this Chaos than such as afterward and at this day are parts of our Earth 'T is somewhat unaccountable and like a kind of fate upon Commentators that they should unanimously resolve to make this Chaos of so extravagant a compass as they too incongruously do and that they should agree in it so universally tho' without any warrant from nay contrary to the obvious sense of the Text it self and the plain drift coherence and description of Moses therein I know it will be said the First and Fourth days works the Origin of Light and of the Sun Moon and Stars necessitated such a supposition and gave just cause for the common Exposition Which as I believe to have been the true occasions of all such mistaken Glosses so I think them far from just and necessary ones and if what has been already said has clear'd those difficulties there can be no reason to reject the Cogency of the present Argument but a great deal to rest satisfi'd in it and to confess it no less unscriptural than 't is absurd to expect from this single Chaos a Sun Moon and Systems of fix'd Stars as hitherto the World has commonly done 3. The Mosaick and ancient Chaos could not include the Sun or fix'd Stars because just before the extraction of Light from it as 't is usually explain'd it was Dark and Caliginous which on such a supposition is not conceivable A strange Darkness this where more than ninety nine parts of an hundred whether we take in the intire System of the World or the Solar System only appear to be fiery Corpuscles and the very same from whence all the fix'd Stars or at least the Sun were constituted and are now the Fountain of all that Light and Heat which the World has ever since enjoy'd Let every unbiass'd person judge how Dark that Chaos could be where the Opake and Obscure parts were so perfectly inconsiderable in comparison of the Light the Active and the Fiery ones So that on this Hypothesis The state of the Chaos must have been exceeding Light Hot and Fiery before the first days work when it was on the contrary according to all Antiquity Sacred and Profane Dark and Caliginous 'T is true upon the separation of the particles of Light the business in this Hypothesis of the First Day the Chaos would become Obscure and Dark enough at the same time that the Sun or fix'd Stars were collecting their Masses so lately extracted and were growing Splendid and Glorious But this is to contradict the History according to which the Light on the First Day is consider'd with relation to the Chaos and its distinguishing Night and Day There not as it was collecting into Bodies of Light without it which rather must belong to the Fourth Days Work when by this account 't is evident that this day is the peculiar time for the most pitchy Darkness possible For when all the Light was just separated from the Chaos the most Caliginous Night must certainly ensue So that unless we can change the Order in Moses and prove that the Chaos before the First Days Work was all over Light and on the First Day cover'd with the Thickest Darkness we in vain pretend to justifie the vulgar opinion and include the Sun or fix'd Stars among the other Matter of the Chaos Besides when Heat is the main Instrument of Nature in all its separations of Parts and Productions of Bodies 't is sure a very improper season just then to extract the Light and Fiery Corpuscles out of the Chaos when
Original 2. Bodies Unlike in Nature have a like Original 3. Bodies most considerable in themselves have the most inconsiderable accounts given of them 4. No Bodies but the Earth have either time for or particulars of the formation of the several parts assign'd 5. The Light appears before its Cause and Fountain the Sun was made 6. The Excavation of the Channel of the Ocean and the Elevation of the Mountains is unnatural and indecent Of each of which I shall say but a word or two and then as briefly argue from them 1. Bodies Alike in nature have an unlike Original Our Earth is one of the Planets and in all reason belonging to their formation yet is she the Subject of the Second Third Fifth and Sixth days works while the rest are included in the Fourth Day 2. Bodies Unlike in nature have a like Original The Sun a glorious Body of Light with his Fellows the fixt Stars are join'd in the fourth day with the Opake and Dark Globes of the Planets 3. Bodies most considerable in themselves have the most inconsiderable accounts given of them This is very obvious in that mighty adoe about our poor Earth while the vastly greater and nobler Bodies of the Sun and Stars are scarce taken any notice of And how disproportionate such a procedure is the comparison already made of the Earth on one side with the rest of the World on the other does more than sufficiently demonstrate 4. No Bodies but the Earth have either time for or particulars of the formation of the several parts assign'd For when four days are wholly taken up with the particulars relating to our Earth the division of its Aerial from its Earthly Waters the distinguishing the latter from the dry Land and draining 'em into the Channels of the Seas the growth of Plants generation of Fish Fowl and Terrestrial Animals and at last the Creation of Man with several circumstances relating to him and the other Creatures not a syllable as to the particulars of the rest of the World Light is only commanded to shine on the First Day and the Heavenly Bodies made on the Fourth and there 's all as to themselves which occurs here 5. The Light appears before the Creation of the Sun from whence it is deriv'd That being the Work of the First This of the Fourth Day Which how Philosophical and Accountable 't is let the Reader judge 6. The Excavation of the Channel of the Ocean and the Elevation of the Mountains is unnatural and indecent For when the Earth was at first even and cover'd with Waters Expositors imagine that God as it were digg'd a vast Channel for the Ocean and heav'd away the Earth and plac'd it on all parts of the Globe to make the Mountains Which how indecent it is I had rather leave to the judgment of the Reader than stand here to exaggerate especially where the naked representation of the thing it self is a sufficient exposing thereof to free Thinkers These obvious Remarks on the vulgar Scheme of the Mosaick Creation to omit the passing by of the intire invisible World whether within or without the surface of the Earth whether corporeal or spiritual are I think sufficient demonstrations that 't is a very distant one from the true nature of things and such as is both unworthy of the Writer and Author of the Sacred History Whoever will take the pains carefully to consider the System of Nature and compare it with these Remarks and the common Opinion of the proper Creation of all things in the six Days Works will not I believe be at a loss for Arguments to over-turn the old and to prove that a new Theory is to be enquir'd after and a narrower World to be expected in the First Chapter of Genesis than has generally been But Before I conclude this Head I must here observe that the consideration of these matters has had so great influence on our late most Excellent Commentator on Genesis that tho' he keep more strictly to the letter of Moses than others yet he finds occasion and room for these four great Concessions no less contrary to the vulgar than approaching to the present Account of the History of the Creation 1. He is willing to allow that Moses meddles not with the intire Universe but with the Planetary System only 2. He allows the Creation of the World to have been over before the six Days Work begins 3. He grants the same six Days Works to be the regular and orderly reduction of a confused Chaos into a habitable World without any strange Miracles in every part 4. He supposes that for a considerable time before the six Days Work began there were such preparatory agitations fermentations and separations or conjunctions of parts as disposed the whole to fall ino the succeeding method and introduce the six Days Productions following Which Concessions of so great a Man and excellent a Commentator as they argue his sense of the necessity of receding from the vulgar Hypothesis so they I confess lessen and diminish the difficulties in this History Lessen I say and diminish not take them away For besides the want of any foundation in Scripture as far as I see for the distinction between the fixt Stars and Planets the Arguments I have all along urged reach and are fram'd with regard to this limited Hypothesis also and with those yet to come are I think more than sufficient to my purpose still and will demonstrate the unaccountableness of the History of the Creation even on this tho' much more on the common Interpretation VII The Mosaick Creation does not extend beyond this Earth because the alone final cause of all therein contained is the advantage of Mankind the Inhabitant thereof Now that the final cause of all the particulars mention'd in the History before us is here rightly assign'd is not only visible in almost every verse of it and in the places of Scripture afterwards referring to the same thing but commonly acknowledg'd nay contended for by the Patrons of the vulgar account So that I shall here take it for granted But then as to the consequence that therefore the Creation is no farther to be extended or at least not so far as here it must otherwise be to the Sun and Planets nay with the most to the innumerable Systems of the fix'd Stars 't is to me so natural and necessary that methinks 't is perfectly needless to go about the proof of it That so vast and noble a System consisting of so many so remote so different and so glorious Bodies should be made only for the use of Man is so wild a Fancy that it deserves any other treatment sooner than a serious confutation And one may better think silently with ones self than with due deference and decency speak what naturally arises in ones Mind on this occasion If 't is an instance of or consistent with the Divine Wisdom to make thousands of glorious Bodies for the
the Scruples the main Histories themselves appear'd so impossible to be any other way secur'd Several of the Accounts given by the Theorist were in the main so ingenious so probable and so agreeable to Ancient Tradition upon a cursory Consideration and the Arguments before-mention'd seem'd to me so considerable that 't was not easy for me to deny all Assent to that very Conclusion which yet on farther Enquiries and Discoveries I think not unworthy of the foregoing Censure And I should esteem it a very signal happiness if as that Theory was so instrumental in drawing me into the foremention'd Mistake so this might be fortunate enough to perswade the Author of that of the opposite Verity in which the Discoveries it contains have fully settled my own Mind and are I think sufficient in themselves to settle the minds of others But to wave these too ambitious Expectations I cannot but say so much in behalf of that Learned Theorist That as he justly deserves the highest Commendations for so generous and worthy an Attempt for the great Illustration he has given those Histories from the most Ancient Traditionary Learning and the Light afforded to the Holy Scriptures in several and those very considerable Points So he has I think reason to expect an easy Pardon where he was not able to do the same especially when not only Pardon but the freest Praises are bestowed on those who as I before observ'd equally have expos'd the Honour of God and equally derogated from the Reputation of the Sacred Writings by their unwary and unskilful Interpretations A good Man who to the highest Veneration for the Perfections of the Divine Nature has joyn'd a careful Enquiry into the Frame of the World and a free but modest use of those Faculties God has given him and has withal exactly consider'd the undoubted evidence for the Divine Authority of the Scripture ought to be and will be as tender of believing a Sense which is contrary to his innate Notions to the Perfections of God and the certain Observations of Nature as of that which puts a force upon the Words themselves and renders them meerly Popular and Mythological And by consequence either those who so frequently and zealously do the former are to be condemn'd which yet the Christian World has been far from doing or those who have been forc'd upon the latter ought to escape any greater Severity For my own part as in such difficult Cases I easily pass over the Mistakes and value the Truths discover'd by any well-dispos'd Persons which is but a due Debt owing from one fallible Creature to another So I humbly bless God the Author and Giver of all good things for that Light he has afforded me and which by the Divine Blessing I hope the following Pages will afford the Reader in these matters by which I am convinc'd of the no-necessity of opposing the literal to the true the Obvious and Natural to the Rational and Philosophick Interpretations of the Holy Scriptures and shall chearfully wait for that happy time when all Doubts being remov'd and all Objections prevented by the Improvement of our Knowledge and the Conduct of the Divine Providence Reason and Revelation shall reciprocally bear Witness to and embrace each other when no one shall be able to pretend to the one but he who is equally acquainted and satisfied with the other and the whole reasonable Creation shall unite their Hearts and Tongues in Hymns to God All thy Commandments are faithful Thy Statutes are right rejoicing the heart Thy Judgments O Lord are true and righteous altogether Righteous art thou O Lord and just are thy judgments Great and marvellous are thy works O Lord God Almighty Just and true are thy ways O King of Saints But to return from this Digression and to proceed VIII I prove the Mosaick Creation extends no farther then our Earth and is of no other Nature than is assign'd here because neither the Intentions of the Author require nor the Capacities of the People could bear either a strictly Philosophical or a truly Universal Account of the Origin of things The designs of Moses the inspired Penman or rather of that Blessed Spirit which inspir'd him in this History of the Creation were not the gratifying the Curiosity or satisfying the Philosophick Enquiries of a few elevated Minds but of a more general and useful Nature namely To inform the Jews and the rest of the World that all the visible Frame of Heaven and Earth was neither existent from all Eternity nor the result of blind Chance fatal Necessity nor unaccountable Accidents but the Workmanship of God Almighty To make them sensible that every Being they had any knowledge of was deriv'd from and subject to that Jehovah whom they worshipp'd and that in him themselves with all their fellow Creatures in the open Air on the wide Earth or in the deep Seas liv'd mov'd and had their Being who therefore must needs be the Governor and Ruler of them all To affect their Minds by this means with the awfullest Veneration for the God of Israel and inspire them with a just Gratitude to him for all their Enjoyments who had not only created this Earth for Mankind and furnish'd it with various Creatures for their use but beside these Terrestrial had made the very Celestial Bodies subservient to their Necessities To demonstrate the Original Goodness and Perfection of things and that therefore whatever was Evil must have been the consequent of Man's Fall and not of God's primary Introduction and thereby to teach men Humility and raise their abhorrence of Sin the cause of all their Miseries To shew them the unreasonableness of all sorts of Idolatry or of the Worship of any visible Beings tho' never so useful or glorious by assuring them they were all in common the Creatures of God and all their Influences of what kind soever intirely deriv'd from him and under his disposal In short the main design was to secure Obedience to those Laws he was about to deliver from God to them by giving them the greatest and justest Idea's of their Legislator the Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth These were I suppose the principal Reasons of thus recording the Creation of the World and these Reasons made a particular Account of the visible Parts of this Earth with all its Furniture that was observable and expos'd to their daily view necessary and expedient nay they enforc'd some kind of mention of the Heavenly Bodies so far as they were concern'd with us below and so far as to shew that God originally created them as well as the more ordinary Bodies on the Face of the Earth All this was but proper and necessary in order to the foremention'd purposes But why a Natural and Philosophical Account of the primary Formation of such remote and different Systems of Bodies whose real Bigness Distances Natures and Uses abstractedly consider'd never came into Mens thoughts nor were once imagin'd by
While I expect the same Person in the Glory of the Father coming to Judge the World in Righteousness and Mankind after that final doom to be partaker of everlasting Joy or Misery according to their behaviour here on Earth While I say I believe all this as I most sincerely do I can be under no temptation of looking with contempt upon or of entertaining a mean opinion of Mankind or of those Systems of Nature and Providence relating to it Yet all this notwithstanding I think that Opinion I am now exposing deserves no other Character than I have before given of it Tho' I look upon Mankind as one Species of very Noble and Glorious Creatures yet I suppose it but One and that there may be Millions of others at the least not inferior to him Tho' I believe Humane Nature when Innocent and Perfect at that height of Purity and Felicity which it once had and by the Christian Dispensation may be again advanc'd to as so considerable and exalted a Species of Beings yet withal I look upon it at present as under a very different Character We are all now in a deprav'd a sinful and so in a low a miserable state We have by our own wilful Rebellion and Disobedience made it necessary for God to place us in a short a vicious in an uneasie and vexatious World where at present we are under a sort of confinement in a place of Trial and Probation and through a doleful Wilderness must make our way to the Land of Canaan Quisque suos patimur manes We here feel the sad effects and punishments of former Sins We are left to struggle with great difficulties abide many assaults and undergo severe Agonies e're we must expect to recover our native dignity to retrieve our ancient felicity again Exinde per amplum Mittimur Elysium reduces laeta arva tenemus As flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God so that Kingdom is not of this World I see no reason to esteem the present condition of Mortality as at all considerable in it self tho' in its consequences it extremely be so in comparison of the past and future periods of our Beings and therefore without believing the Earth one of the greatest or noblest Globes in the World I can suppose it a very proper and suitable habitation for us at present Most wisely contriv'd as it certainly is and its Funiture peculiarly and wonderfully adapted to our needs capacities and operations I acknowledge that Providence has so constituted our Earth that we receive some advantages from all and very great ones from some other parts of the external and visible World All which were in the Original Creation of things both foreseen and foredesign'd by God and so may not improperly be so far said to have been made for our use and appointed to serve our necessities I do not think that those Systems of the Universe we here speak of are ever a whit the less useful to us or the benefits we reap from them ever the less in themselves or less worthy of our notice and observation our admiration and gratitude to God because they also are subservient to other noble purposes and are by Divine Providence made use of in several great designs over and above those advantages we are able to take notice of or can our selves enjoy from them I cannot imagine that God is peculiarly fond of any particular parts of the Material Creation or any more a Respecter of some inanimate Bodies than of Persons He no doubt equally makes use of them all according to their several kinds and capacities in the service of the various species of Intelligent Creatures and in the bringing about the great Periods of Nature and the Decrees of Heaven which as they are in great measure unknown to us so may they regard Rational Beings very different and remote from us and our concerns If we duly reflect on the Infinite Nature and unlimited Perfections of the Divine Being the Creator and Original of all things as well as on the number vastness and glory of those his works which are within our view we shall see reason to confess there may be millions of Nobler Intellectual Beings interposed between Man and God And the whole World might be more reasonably suppos'd made at the Creation and for the sole use of any one species of those than of Mankind If therefore we be unwilling to be our selves excluded from a share in the intentions and designs of Heaven let us not exclude any other rational Creatures from the same but be willing to suppose as this Earth was form'd in six days for the sake of Man so were the rest of the Heavenly Bodies form'd at other proper times for the sake of other of God's Creatures for whom Providence ought to be allow'd to have taken a proportionable Care and made a suitable provision as we our selves find has been done with regard to us and our affairs Let us learn humble and modest sentiments of our selves from the contemplation of the immensity of the Works of God in the World Which useful Lesson the Holy Psalmist would by his own example teach us With whose Natural and Pious Reflection in this very case I shall conclude this whole discourse When I consider thy Heavens the work of thy fingers the Moon and the Stars which thou hast ordained Lord what is Man that thou art mindful of him And the Son of Man that thou visitest him O Lord our Lord How excellent is thy name in all the Earth POSTULATA 1. THE Obvious or Literal Sense of Scripture is the True and Real one where no evident Reason can be given to the contrary II. That which is clearly accountable in a natural way is not without reason to be ascrib'd to a Miraculous Power III. What Ancient Tradition asserts of the constitution of Nature or of the Origin and Primitive States of the World is to be allow'd for True where 't is fully agreeable to Scripture Reason and Philosophy A NEW THEORY OF THE EARTH BOOK I. LEMMATA I. ALL Bodies will persevere for ever in that state whether of Rest or Motion in which they once are if no other force or impediment act upon them or suffer by them II. All Motion is of it self rectilinear and with the same constant uniform Celerity if no other external Cause disturb it Corollary 1. 'T is evident from these two Propositions that Matter is intirely a passive Substance Coroll 2. No Spontaneous Motion or Action can be the effect of meer Matter Coroll 3. The Soul of Man whose least Power seems to be that of Spontaneous Motion is incorporeal which is also a necessary consequence of the first Corollary for if Matter be perfectly a passive Thing the Soul which is so active a Being cannot be material Coroll 4. The Bruit Creatures giving all possible Demonstrations of Spontaneous Motion and of a principle of Action cannot reasonably be suppos'd
meerly Corporeal Machines III. All those single Corpuscles of which Bodies are compos'd do attract all other single Corpuscles of which other Bodies are compos'd and are alike mutually attracted by them If this Affection of the Parts of Bodies be consider'd with respect to those towards which the Motion is 't is call'd Attraction and they are said to draw all others But if it be consider'd with respect to those which are mov'd 't is call'd Gravitation or a Tendency in them towards others Thus in Magnetism we imagine a Power of Attraction belonging to the Loadstone and in the Iron a Tendency or as I may call it tho' somewhat improperly Gravitation towards it Tho'indeed by the way the Force or Affection being found to be mutual and equal on both sides the Terms might justly be so too and a Loadstone might as properly be said to tend or gravitate towards the Iron or Iron to attract the Loadstone as the contrary just as 't is in the Point before us This however will serve for an Illustration and explain our meaning in the present case where all the Parts of Bodies are endew'd with such a mutual Gravitation and Attraction with respect to all others SCHOLIUM That no prejudice nor misunderstanding may arise 't is to be observ'd That when we use the terms of Attraction or Gravitation we do not thereby determine the Physical Cause or Seat of any effects as if some innate Power or occult Quality were to be suppos'd in Bodies as will appear presently but only use such familiar Terms whereby our meaning may be easily understood and the Effects of Nature explain'd even where the last and proper efficient Cause is not mechanically assignable Thus we do and may say as before That the Loadstone attracts the Iron or the Iron tends or gravitates to the Loadstone not ascribing thereby any proper and positive Quality or Power to these Bodies but for ease of Expression and for supplying what we cannot otherwise readily explain relating to them Thus also we commonly say That Stones are heavy or tend towards the Center of the Earth and the Expressions rightly understood are true and natural Tho' perhaps in both cases the real cause of those Effects which we ascribe to such an Attraction Tendency or Gravitation is External and some continual Impulse from without not any inherent Power really Existent within is the Original of all But in such cases where the true Agent is invisible or unknown we must have leave to use those terms which the Matter will bear or Custom has rendred familiar without which uneasy and troublesome Circumlocutions will be unavoidable especially seeing that no Error can hereby creep into our Reasonings because 't is evident that all the Effects of Nature are exactly the very same in the World and not otherwise which they certainly would and must be if Bodies did really and properly by their own inherent Virtue or Quality attract and were attracted by all others IV. This Affection of mutual Attraction or Gravitation is universal in extent all Bodies in the whole World as far as we have any means of knowing wherefoever they are plac'd being in common subject thereto and concern'd therein V. This Affection is also universal as to the kinds of its Objects it belonging equally to all the Parts of Matter of what Sort or Form in what Figure or Condition soever they are the difference of Bodies as to Texture and Composition Fluidity and Firmness Motion and Rest Bigness and Subtily or any other such mutable Qualities not in the least diminishing the Influence thereof VI. This Affection is also universal and equable as to Time without all manner of intermission without any increase or diminution in different Ages VII The Quantity of the force of Attraction at equal distances is exactly proportionable to the Quantity of Matter in the attracting Body being in reality nothing but the Result or Summe of the united Forces of all those single Particles of which 't is compos'd Thus if A be double to i. e. has twice as much matter as B A will have a double force of Attraction also at equal distances from their Centers respectively If A represent the Earth B the Moon if B contain but the twenty sixth part of the matter in A as it really does contain no more and a Globe or Ball were plac'd at the same distance from the Center of B at which another equal to it were from that of A it would be but the twenty sixth part so heavy towards B as the other were towards A. VIII This mutual tendency of Bodies is greater or less according as the Bodies themselves are nearer to or farther from each other The same Body more forcibly attracting those which are near than those which are farther off So that Stone or Pillar which is with us very heavy would be comparatively very light if it were as far distant from us as the Moon IX The proportion of the Increase and Decrease of this Gravity of Bodies in their approach to or recess from each other is neither that of Similar Lines nor Solids but of Superficies or Plains The Force of Attraction in several distances being reciprocally in a Duplicate Proportion thereof Thus when the same Body without the Surface of the Earth is twice as near its Center as it was before 't is four times as heavy when thrice as near 't is nine times as heavy when four times as near 't is sixteen times as heavy as before In like manner the same strength which were able to sustain a Body of one hundred weight here would at twice our distance from the Earth's Center be equally able to sustain four hundred weight at three times our distance nine hundred weight at four times our distance sixteen hundred weight and so in infinitum at all other distances For as the Squares of the distances increase so does the Power of Attraction decrease and as the Squares of the distances decrease so does the Power of Attraction at the same time increase proportionably as will be prov'd presently from the known Phaenomena of Astronomy Corollary 1. From the Comparison of the two first Propositions with the seven last 't is evident That this universal force of mutual Attraction or Gravitation of Bodies is not a result from the Nature of Matter which being circumscrib'd within its own bounds being incapable of acting at a distance and besides being intirely passive in its very Essence cannot possibly draw others or tend towards them of it self Coroll 2. This universal force of Gravitation being so plainly above besides and contrary to the Nature of Matter on the formention'd Accounts must be the Effect of a Divine Power and Efficacy which governs the whole World and which is absolutely necessary to its Preservation Coroll 3. When the Divine Power is inseparable from the Essence of God 't is evident the latter is Omnipresent as well as the former and every where equally
the Planet by the Sun's Attraction must be drawn from a rectilinear to a curvilinear course and be oblig'd if the Sun's Power be great enough compar'd with the Planets velocity to revolve about him and that the attractive force always continuing for ever after The case is just the same as if B were a Stone in a Sling A the Hand of the Slinger by the help of the strings united together and represented by the line A B whirling it round continually For as the Stone at its coming to the point B were it let loose and left to it self would fly off in the straight Line or Tangent B C yet by force is still retain'd at an equal distance from the hand of the slinger and compell'd to revolve in a kind of circle so 't is here The Attraction of the Sun in the common Center or Focus compels all the Planets which of themselves would pass along their several Tangents to revolve about it self and describe their several curvilinear Orbits And the case is the same in the secondary Planets with respect to their primary ones about which they revolve in the same manner as they all both Primary and Secondary revolve about the Sun in the common Center or Focus of the intire System Coroll 1. Hence 't is manifest that the Law of universal Attraction once established unless the Divine Power had put the Planets into a suitable motion in right lines they must soon have been drawn downwards and fall'n into the Sun And still if their motions should be intirely stop'd and cease the same must happen and they must not only be uncapable of those noble uses to which they are now subservient but utterly perish in the violence of the Sun's scorching heat The preventing of which therefore ought justly to be attributed to the Wisdom and Power of God in the constitution of the World Coroll 2. If the World be limited and finite in its extent 't is so in its time also and so vice versâ if eternal in its time 't is infinite also in its extent For when all Matter as far as we have any means of knowing and so in reason all Matter whatsoever is endu'd alike with a power of attraction and must all thereby without proper motions along straight lines at last meet in the common Center of Gravity of the whole and when withal the other Systems of fixt Stars suppos'd here finite retain their site and distance from each other and thence appear not to have any projectile motion along straight lines to prevent the same had the frame of the World been eternal the effect abovemention'd must have innumerable ages ago really come to pass and all the matter of the intire Universe compos'd one single dull and unmoveable heap or mass in the common Center of Gravity of the whole Which not having happen'd demonstrates the impossibility of the Eternity of the World and the necessity of admitting its production in time by the Power of God When therefore 't is unreasonable to suppose the material World truly unlimited in extent 't is necessary to suppose it no more unlimited in duration also And this reasoning is unavoidable unless we allow the most invariable and constant property of Matter in our System to be peculiar to it and so to be a voluntary Constitution of God Almighty or at least that a miraculous Providence does hinder the foremention'd Effect continually So that upon the whole as the very Learned Mr. Bentley has observ'd either the Divine Power in Creating or peculiar Providence in Governing the frame of Nature is on these undoubted Principles for ever establish'd XII When the Projectile Motion of the Planets is in its Direction Perpendicular to a Line from the Sun and in its degree of velocity so nicely adapted and contemper'd to the quantity of the Sun's Attraction there that neither can overcome the other the force of gravitation towards the Sun and the celerity of the Planets proper motions being perfectly in aequilibrio the Orbits of such revolving Planets will be compleat Circles themselves neither approaching to nor receding from the Sun the Center of their motions And the Case is the same in the Secondary Planets about their Primary ones Thus 't is supposable that the Velocity of all the Planets about the Sun was exactly accommodate Originally to his Power of Attraction and that their Primitive Orbits were perfect Circles from which at this day they do not mightily differ Thus however Jupiter's four Satellits or little Moons have their Motions so exactly proportion'd to their gravitation to him that their Orbits as far as the most nice Observations can judge are perfect Circles they keeping at an equal distance from his Center in all the points of their courses about him XIII When the Projectile Motion is not adapted to but is either too swift or too slow for the Attraction towards the Central Body the Orbits describ'd will be Ellipses and in the former case when the Projectile Motion is too swift the Orbit will be bigger than the Circle before-mentioned and the nearer Focus of the Ellipsis will be coincident with the Central Body And in the latter case the Orbit will be less than the Circle and the farther Focus of the Ellipsis will be coincident with that Central Body Thus if the celerity of B be exactly correspondent to the attractive force of the Central Body A neither will prevail and the Body preserving an equal distance from the Center will describe the Circle Be Eb. If the Celerity be greater it will overcome the Attraction and cast it self farther off the Center for some time and so revolve about it in the larger Ellipsis BHFG the Central Body possessing that Focus A which is nearest the point B where the Attraction began But if the Celerity be smaller the Attraction of the Central Body A will be too hard for it will force it for sometime to come nearer and to describe the lesser Ellipsis BKLI the Central Body possessing that Focus A which is farthest from the point B where the Attraction began As will be very plain from the consideration of the Figure relating hereto SCHOLIUM 'T is indeed possible that the Celerity of Bodies may be so great compar'd with the force of Attraction to the Central Body as to cast them off with such violence that the Attraction will never be able to bring them round or make them revolve about it In which case the Orbits describ'd will be one of the other Conick Sections either Parabola's or Hyperbola's according to the less or greater violence with which the Bodies are thrown and the Central Body will possess the Focus of such a Figure But no Phaenomena of Nature persuading us that de facto any of the Heavenly Bodies do describe either of those Lines tho' Comets Ellipses come near to Parabola's of which hereafter I shall not farther insist upon them here For if what has been said of Ellipses has been
well understood the rest can have no great difficulty in it XIV Several Bodies moving about the same Central one tho' their Primitive Velocity were equal and direction alike yet if they be at different distances from it they will describe figures of different Species about it For when that determinate degree of Velocity which at one distance were just commensurate to the Central Bodies Attraction and so would produce a circular Orbit must at a farther distance be too hard for it by reason of the diminution of the Attraction there an Elliptical Orbit must be describ'd whose nearer Focus would be coincident with the Central Body In like manner when the same determinate degree of Velocity were at a nearer distance where the Central Attraction is augmented it would be too little for the same and an Elliptical Orbit must be describ'd whose farther Focus would be coincident with the Central Body This cannot be difficult if what has been hitherto said have been rightly apprehended For when the species of the Planetary Orbits depend solely on the proportion between the Attraction towards the Central Body and the Velocity of the Projectile Motion as that proportion remaining at any distance whatsoever the bigness of the Orbits will be various but the Species the same so when that proportion is chang'd the Species of the Figures must be chang'd also Which being done the Velocity given by the various force of Attraction in several distances from the Center as well as by the various Velocity at a given distance of which before 't is evident the Species of the Orbits will be different in this as well as in the former Case Coroll The greater disproportion there is between the quantity of Attraction and the Velocity of the revolving Bodies in the circumstances mention'd in the two last Propositions the farther from a Circular and the more Oblong and Eccentrical will the Orbits describ'd be And the greater approach to correspondence there is the nearer to circular and the less Oblong and Eccentrical will the same Orbits be XV. The circular Orbits of Planets depend not only on the exact adjustment of the Projectile Velocity to the attractive Power of the Sun but upon the direction of the same Projectile Motion at the original Commencing of the Attraction Thus where the Planet is in its own Tangent neither Ascending nor Descending and the Angle preceding CBA is a right one which we have hitherto suppos'd from the correspondence of the Velocity to the Attraction the Orbits will be perfect Circles Otherwise when the direction of the motion is oblique in any measure ascending from or descending to the Central Body and the preceding Angle CBA obtuse or acute the Planet tho' its Velocity were exactly adapted to the Attraction of the Central Body would revolve in an Ellipsis and the point B where the Attraction began would be the end of the lesser Axis thereof All which will become easier by what we shall presently come to explain of that figure Coroll From these four last Propositions compar'd with the present System of the Planetary World 't is obvious to take notice of the Wise and Careful Providence of God and his most accurate contrivance in the disposal and regulation of the whole Whereby the primary Velocity of the Planets their several distances from the Central Bodies and the original direction of their motions have been each so nicely adjusted and adapted to the force of Attraction every where that all the Orbits of the Planets became thereby either truly circular or not very much different from the same Which remark will appear the more just and considerable if we reflect on the infinitely different degrees of Velocity and oblique direction with the immensly various distances from the Central Bodies equally possible with those which were so fitly pitch'd upon and observe to what noble and valuable uses these Bodies are now subservient which without the foremention'd exactness of contrivance in each particular could not have been provided for All which demonstrate the great necessity of interesting the Divine Providence and the worthiness of its so careful interposition in such cases SCHOLIUM In order to the easier apprehension of the Motions of the Celestial Bodies and of those things already said or to be said hereafter relating to them 't will not be improper in this place to give some account of the Generation Nature and Easie Properties of Ellipses in which including the Circle as is commonly done all the Heavenly Bodies as far as we have hitherto reason to believe revolve perpetually so far at least as will be directly subservient to our present purpose and give any Light to the following Theory Take therefore from the great Des Cartes this natural and obvious description or delineation of an Oval or Ellipsis which tho' familiar to the Gardener and Joyner is a very good one and gives as just and compleat an Idea of it as any other whatsoever Take a small Cord or Packthread which is very pliable and yet not easily stretch'd beyond its natural length Tye the two ends together by which means it will be a sort of round or circular circumference mutable into all Figures Let two Pins or Nails H and I be driven into a plain Board or Table put the Cord or Packthread round the two Pins or Nails H and I and with a Pencil or any such thing which as it is drawn along will make a small stroke in your hand turn it round about the two Pins or Nails as about a double Center till you return to the Point from whence you began Thus if B be the Point where you begin the delineation continue it either way by OFMKNEPD or DPENKMFO till you return to B again By which means the Point of your Pencil will describe such a Curve as is here represented and is call'd an Ellipsis The nature and properties whereof as far as at present we shall consider the same are as follow 1. The Species of the Ellipsis depends on the proportion there is between the length of the Cord and the distance of the two Centers H and I And consequently wherever that determinate proportion is given the Species is given also tho' the bigness and capacity be chang'd But where that proportion is not given as the length of the Cord remaining where the distance of the Centers is chang'd or that distance remaining the length of the Cord is chang'd or both are chang'd but not in the same proportion in all these cases the Species of the Ellipsis is different Thus in particular where the distance of the Centers or the Line H I is greater in proportion to the length of the Cord there the Ellipsis is farther from and where 't is less the Ellipsis is nearer to a Circle All which is so obvious on a very little consideration of the Delineation and Figure as 't is represented in the two different Schemes that no more words need
four times as long as the nearest distance to the Focus thereof Thus r s is four times as long as H t. XVI All Bodies which together with a Projectile or Uniform Motion along right Lines are continually attracted or impell'd towards one certain Point or Center let the attraction or impulse be of what nature or quantity soever will always no other Force interposing by a Line drawn from that Center to themselves describe equal Area's in equal times and so proportionable Area's in proportionable times through all parts of their courses Thus if the Area describ'd the first minute were equal to a thousand square Feet whether the Bodies came nearer or went farther off it would always in a minute be equal to the same thousand square feet in two minutes double or two thousand in three minutes treble or three thousand in four minutes Quadruple or four thousand and so for ever proportionably The demonstration of this noble and exceeding useful Theorem is both easie and pleasant But that not being my present business I shall as in the rest refer the Reader to the Great Author himself for satisfaction XVII All Bodies vice versâ which revolve in Curves and by a Line drawn from themselves to a certain Point or Center describe Area's proportionable to the times of description are attracted or impell'd continually towards that Point or Center Corollary When therefore Lines drawn from every one of the Planets to the Sun describe perpetually Area's proportionable to the times of description as is own'd by all Astronomers 't is certain that besides their several Projectile Motions they are every one continually attracted or impell'd towards the Sun and from such compounded forces revolve about him And the case being the same in the Moon about the Earth the Circumjovials about Jupiter and the Circumsaturnals about Saturn this Corollary equally belongs to them also XVIII If Bodies from a Projectile Motion and an attraction or impulse to a Point or Center move about the same in a Spiral Line which intersects every Radius in the same Angle the force of the attraction or impulse at different distances from that Center is reciprocally as the Cubes of such distances And vice versâ if the force of attraction or impulse to any Center be as the Cubes of the distances reciprocally Bodies revolving about the same must describe Spiral Lines intersecting the Radij in the same Angle XIX If Bodies from a Projectile Motion and an attraction or impulse to a Point move about it being the Center of an Ellipsis in the Periphery of the same Ellipsis the force of attraction is directly as the distance from such a Center And vice versâ if the force of attraction or impulse to any Point be as the distance from the same directly Bodies revolving about it must describe an Elliptick Figure with whose Center the fore-mention'd Point will be coincident XX. If Bodies from a Projectile Motion and an attraction or impulse to a Point describe an Ellipsis about that Point coincident with one of its Foci the force of Attraction towards that Focus is reciprocally as the squares of the distances from the same And vice versâ if the force or attraction to any Point be in a duplicate proportion of the distances from the same reciprocally Bodies revolving about the same must describe Ellipses about it coincident with one of the Foci thereof Corollary 1. Where Bodies revolve about any Point or Central Body from the Figure describ'd and the Situation of the Point or Central Body the Law of attraction or impulse tending towards the same is discovered And Vice versâ where the Law of attraction or impulse is known the Figure to be describ'd by revolving Bodies and the Situation of the Point or Central Body towards which the attraction or impulse is with respect to such Figures is à priori discover'd also Coroll 2. None of the Heavenly Bodies describing either Spiral Lines or Ellipses about their Centers 't is certain no Law of Gravitation in a triplicate reciprocal or direct simple proportion of the distance from the Central Body obtains in the Planetary World Coroll 3. All the Planets revolutions arising from the composition of their Projectile Motion and Gravitation towards the Sun and they all describing Ellipses about him in the Common Focus of all their Orbits as is evident from Astronomy 't is hence certain that the force of their attraction or impulse towards the Sun is in a duplicate proportion of their distances reciprocally Coroll 4. The case being the same as to the Moon about the Earth and the Circumsaturnals about Saturn this last Corollary belongs equally to them also But Jupiters Satellits revolving in compleat Circles are incapable of affording evidence in his case XXI If several Bodies revolve about the same central attractive Body at several distances and the periodical Times in which they revolve be to each other as the Squares of their distances from the same the force of Attraction or Impulse to that central Body is in a triplicate Proportion of such distances reciprocally and vice versâ if the force of Attraction or Impulse be as the Cubes of their distances reciprocally the periodical Times of Revolution will be to each other as the Squares of their distances from the same central Body XXII If several Bodies revolve about the same central attractive Body at several distances in Circular or Elliptick Orbits and the periodical Times of revolving be all equal the force of Attraction or Impulse towards the central Body is directly as the distances from the same XXIII If several Bodies revolve about the same central Body in Circular or Elliptick Orbits at several distances and the Squares of the periodical Times of revolving are to each other as the Cubes of the middle distances from the same central Body the force of Attraction or Impulse towards the same is in a duplicate Proportion of the distances from the same reciprocally Corollary 1. Where several Bodies from a projectile Motion compounded with a Gravitation towards a central Body revolve about the same at several distances from the Proportion there is between the periodical Times of revolving compar'd with the distances from the central Body the Law of Gravitation tending towards the same is discovered and vice versâ where the Law of Gravitation is known the Proportion between the periodical Times compar'd with the distances from the central Body is à priori discover'd also Coroll 2. None of the Heavenly Bodies periodical Times of revolving being to each other as the Squares of their distances from the central Body nor equal to one another 't is certain as before that no Law of Gravitation in a triplicate reciprocal or direct simple Proportion of the distances from the central Body obtains in the Planetary World Coroll 3. All the Planets Revolutions arising from the Composition of their projectile Motion and Gravitation towards the Sun and the Squares of their periodical
Times of revolving being to each other as the Cubes of their middle distances from him 't is hence certain That as before the force of their Attraction or Impulse towards the Sun is in a duplicate Proportion of their distances reciprocally Coroll 4. The Case being the same as to the Circumjovials about Jupiter and the Circumsaturnals about Saturn this last Corollary belongs equally to them also But the Moon being a single Planet revolving about the Earth is incapable of giving evidence in her Case Coroll 5. As before the Law of Gravitation being demonstrated from the Planets revolving in Ellipses about the central Bodies in one of the Foci the Proportion between the periodical Times compar'd with the distances from the central Bodies was deducible à priori so vice versâ the periodical Times compar'd with the distances demonstrating the Law of Gravitation thence the necessily of the Planets Revolution in Ellipses about the central Bodies in one of the Foci is à priori demonstrated also Coroll 6. 'T is certain That the Annual Motion belongs to the Earth about the Sun not to the Sun about the Earth For when from the Moon 's Orbit and the Planet's Orbits and periodical Times 't is certain That the Law of Gravitation towards the Earth and towards the Sun is the same and by consequence all the periodical Times of Bodies revolving about each of them in the same Proportion to one another compar'd with their several Distances from each of them On Which Hypothesis this Proportion suits the Phaenomena of Nature the same must be the true one and to be fully acquiesc'd in Now 't is known That on the Hypothesis of the Earth's Annual Motion her periodical Time exactly suits and is so between that of Venus and Mars as the Proportion observ'd through the whole System and demonstrable à priori withal exactly requires but on the other Hypothesis 't is enormously different For when the Moon undoubtedly and on this Hypothesis the Sun also revolves about our Earth and when the distance of the Sun is to that of the Moon as about 10000 to 46 and the Moon 's periodical Time less than 28 days the periodical Time of the Sun is by the Rule of Three discoverable thus As the Cube of the Moon 's distance 46 equal to 97336 to the Cube of the Sun 's 10000 equal to 1000000000000. or almost as 1 to 10000000 so must the Square of the Moon 's periodical Time 28 Days equal to 784. be to the Square of the Sun 's periodical Time 7840000000 whose square Root 88204 are Days also equal to 242 Years So that on the Hypothesis of the Sun's Revolution about the Earth its periodical Time must undoubtedly be 242 Years which all Experience attests to be but a single one So that at length the Controversy between the Ptolemaick and Pythagorean Systems of the World is to a Demonstration determin'd and the Earth's Annual Motion for ever unquestionably establish'd Coroll 7. 'T is certain those Opake Masses which sometimes appear at the Sun are not Planets revolving at any the least distance from him but Spots or Maculae adhering to him for whereas they revolve but once in about twenty six Days on Calculation it will appear that a Planet near the Sun's Surface as these must be cannot have three hours allow'd for its periodical Revolution which being so different from the foremention'd space of twenty six days quite decides that Controversy and demonstrates those Masses to be real Maculae adhering to the Body of the Sun as is here asserted XXIV If a Planet describe an Ellipsis about its central Body in the Focus thereof it will move fastest when 't is nearest to and slowest when 't is farthest from the said central Body or Focus and agreeably in the intermediate places For seeing wheresoever the revolving Body is the Area is still proportionable to the time as was before shew'd and so in equal times always equal 't is evident by how much the Distance is less and the Line from the Focus is shorter by so much must the Bodies motion be the swifter to compensate the same and vice versâ by how much the former is longer by so much must the latter be slower to allow for it XXV If the Planet B describe an Ellipsis about the central Body in the Focus H as the Area describ'd by the Line B H will be exactly uniform and proportional to the time of Description so the Angular Motion or Velocity of the Line from the other Focus B I will be proportional to the time and uniform also tho' not so Exactly and Geometrically XXVI The Law of Gravitation already explain'd being suppos'd if one Planet describe an Ellipsis about the central Body in the Focus H and another describe a Circle about the same in its Center If the Semidiameter of the Circle be equal to H E the middle distance in the Ellipsis from the same Center or Focus their periodical Times of revolving will be the same and when the Distances are equal their Velocity will be so too Corollary Tho' therefore the Planets revolve in Ellipses of several Species yet their periodical Times may be as well compar'd with one another and with their distances from the central Bodies as if they all revolv'd in compleat Circles as was above done XXVII If a Body revolve about a central Body as about A in a Circle as B e E b and another revolve about the same in the Focus of its Ellipsis B H F G so that the Semediameter of the Circle were equal to the nearest distance in the Ellipsis AB the Velocity of the Body at the nearest Point of the Ellipsis will be greater than the Velocity of the Body in the Circle and will be to it in half the Proportion of the Latus rectum of the Ellipsis pq to the Diameter of the Circle eb or as that Line p q to a middle proportional between it self and e b. XXVIII If one Body revolve round a central Body in a Circle and another about the same in its Focus describe so very Eccentrical an Ellipsis that it may pass for a Parabola the Velocity of the Body moving along the Ellipsis will be to that of the Body moving in the Circle the Point in the Ellipsis being as far from the central Body as the Circumference of the Circle very nearly as ten to seven XXIX If a central Body have many Bodies revolving about it 't is perfectly indifferent in it self and with regard to the central Body in what Plains soever or which way in those Plains soever they all or any of them move Corollary Hence arises a convincing Argument of the Interposition of Council and Providence in the Constitution of our System in which all the Planets revolve the same way from West to East and that in Plains almost coincident with one another and with that of the Ecliptick as Mr. Bentley hath also observ'd XXX The
neither elevated nor depress'd but situate at the Horizon would seem intirely chang'd and particularly at the Intersection of such ancient Ecliptick and the succeeding Northern Tropick the Northern Pole would appear to be elevated above the Southern depress'd below the Horizon and the Sun and Planets whose Motions were before over the Vertex and at right Angles with the Horizon would appear inclin'd or bent towards the Southern parts and that way become oblique and at unequal Angles with the Horizon for ever after Corollary 1. To the Inhabitants of that place last mention'd the beginning of the Night and of the Autumn or Sun-set and the Autumnal Equinox would in such a Primitive State of a Planet be exactly Coincident And vice versa the place to which they were so coincident was that Intersection just now assign'd or at least under the same Meridian therewith Coroll 2. Such a Planet would be more equally habitable in the Second than in the First State For from the Sphaerical Figure of the Planet at first the Central Hot Body of which hereafter would equally reach all the Regions and the Sun chiefly affect the Torrid Zone and still less the Temperate but least of all the Frigid ones as he does at present So that if any one of these Climates by reason of the due proportion of heat afforded it from the Sun were habitable neither of the other could with any sort of equality be so too But when the Figure of the Planet became an oblate Sphaeroid as on the commencing of the Diurnal Rotation we have shew'd it would the proportion of heat would be upon the whole more equable through the several Climates of the Planet the greater vicinity of the Central Hot Body to the Frigid Zones in some measure compensating the greater directness of the Sun's Position to the Torrid one and rendring the compleat surface of the Planet pretty universally habitable on account thereof Coroll 3. Where the States of External Nature are so very different as on the same Planet before and after its Diurnal Rotation begin they appear to be 't is reasonable to suppose that the Natures Constitutions and Circumstances of Creatures which were the Inhabitants in such different States must be suitably and proportionably different from one another Coroll 4. 'T is therefore without due allowance for every thing very unsafe arguing from one State or its Circumstances to another and very unjust to conclude things unaccountable or absurd in one only because they are strange and unknown to the other State The like is to be said of Phrases Descriptions or Relations concerning one which may easily be misunderstood in the other without an exact Consideration and Allowance for the Diversity of things belonging thereto LXXI If the Atmosphere of a Comet or any other such a fluid confused Chaos were by a regular and orderly Digestion and Subsidence brought into a consistent and durable state the universal Law of specifick Gravity must prevail and each Mass take its place generally speaking according to it whether 't were fluid or solid from the Center to the Circumference of the whole LXXII Fluids are capable of all degrees of Density and specifick Gravity as well as Solids Thus the Proportion of the heaviest and lightest Fluids Quicksilver and Oyl are nearly as fifteen and one when yet the Proportion of the heaviest solid Gold and the lightest Earth or Mold which we find here is not quite as ten to one On which account 't is highly reasonable to allow that possibly there may be as much Variety and Diversity in the Fluids belonging to a Planet as we see there is in the Solids thereof Corollary From these two last Lemmata it appears as reasonable to suppose a great part of the internal Constitution of a Planet to be a Fluid or System of Fluids as to be a Solid or System of firm and earthly Strata which yet is usually suppos'd and which of these Hypotheses best suits the Constitution of the Original Chaos and the Phaenomena of Nature afterward is in reason to be embrac'd LXXIII In the Formation of a Planet from a Chaos it must be much more rare and unusual to lodge very heavy Fluids near the superficiary Regions among Bodies of a lighter and rarer Texture than Solids equally so For the Corpuscles of very dense and heavy Solids when they are once entangled among and mixed with others tho' of very different density and specifick Gravity must afterward let the place proper for Bodies of their weight be never so much nearer the Center lye according to their first casual Situation Thus if you take dust of Gold Silver or Brass with Sand Gravel or Saw-dust and mix them or let them subside indifferently together as they place themselves at first so notwithstanding their different weight will they be situate ever after But in Fluids the case is quite otherwise for they will obtain their due place not only when mixed with Fluids but with any solid Corpuscles whatsoever Nay besides that they will penetrate the Interstices of heavier Bodies than themselves and unless where they are firmly consolidated or conjoin'd together will settle into and fill up the same without any regard to the Situation according to specisick Gravity Fluids are compos'd of moveable separable parts diffusing subsiding and flowing every where and thereby will be so far from resting at Regions too high and remote from the Center considering their specifick Gravity that how light soever they are unless the earthy Parts under them be either fixt and consolidated or their Interstices already intirely fill'd and satur'd they will insinuate themselves and by degrees approach as near as possible to the Center of that Planet to which they belong Corollary 1. Tho' our Earth should contain vast quantities of dense and heavy Fluids within as well as like dense and heavy Solids yet 't is more strange that we have near the Surface one Specimen of the former viz. Quicksilver than that we have so many sorts and so much larger Quantities of the latter the Mineral and Metallick Bodies much denser and heavier than that common Earth among which they are found Coroll 2. No Argument can be drawn from the variety of dense and heavy Solids and the single instance of a dense and heavy Fluid to prove the improbability of a vast subterraneous dense and heavy Fluid or System of Fluids on whose Surface our Orb of Earth may be suppos'd to rely if the other Phoenomena of Nature require such an Hypothesis LXXIV If a Chaos were chiefly compos'd of a dense Fluid of greater specifick Gravity than its solid dry or earthy Parts the place of such a dense Fluid upon a regular Formation would be nearest the Center and the solid or earthy Mass would encompass it round enclose it within it self and rest upon its Surface and vice versâ if an Orb of Earth be situate on the Surface of a Fluid that Fluid is denser and heavier
than the intire Columns of such an Orb of Earth consider'd together LXXV If a Solid be either contain'd in or fall upon a Fluid of greater specifick Gravity than it self it will neither sink to the bottom subside intirely within nor emerge quite out of the same but part of it remaining immers'd the other part will be extant above the Surface of the Fluid and that in a different degree proportionably to the different specifick Gravity of the Solid compar'd with that of the Fluid LXXVI Such a Solid will continue to that certain depth immers'd in the Fluid before-mention'd that if the space taken up thereby were fill'd with the Fluid that Portion of the Fluid were exactly equal in weight to the whole Solid Thus if a Cube of Wood or Brass were immers'd in a Fluid of twice its specifick Gravity it would one half subside within and the other half be extant above the Surface of the Fluid If it were immers'd in a Fluid of thrice its specifick Gravity two thirds of it would be extant and but a third part inclos'd within the said Surface and suitably hereto in all other Proportions whatsoever These two Propositions are demonstrated by Archimedes and are the known Foundations of Hydrostaticks LXXVII If therefore solid Bodies equal in visible Bulk or taking up equal Spaces but of unequal density and specifick Gravity rest upon the Surface of a Fluid denser and heavier than themselves they must remain immers'd in the same in different degrees the heaviest sinking deepest and the lightest being the most extant above the Fluid Thus if six several Cubes of equal apparent Magnitude made of Gold Lead Silver Brass Iron and Stone were laid upon the same Fluid denser and heavier than any of them every one severally would sink so much deeper as it was heavier and thereby the upper Surface arising from them all become very unequal LXXVIII If upon the first general Digestion and Separation of Parts in a Chaos the upper Regions are for the most part compos'd of liquid or fluid Bodies with only a few dry solid or earthy Parts intermixt the outward Surface after the Formation is intirely over will be smooth and even as the Surface of Liqours constantly of it self is But if on the contrary the quantity of dry solid or earthy Parts be vastly greater than of the liquid or fluid ones the Surface will be rugged and uneven by the different degree of the Immersion of the different Columns thereof in that dense Fluid or Abyss upon which the Orb is plac'd Corollary 1. In the former case all the Corpuscles will obtain their proper place the Fluidity freely permitting their passage according to their respective specifick Gravity But in the latter they must take their places rather according as they chanc'd to be before situate than according as their specifick Gravity would of it self determine them The case of that part of the Lemma and of this Corollary being almost the same with that before mention'd where the Dust of Gold Silver or Brass with Sand Gravel or Saw-dust are suppos'd to be let fall uncertainly upon a Fluid heavier than the whole mixed Mass taken together For those Columns where the Gold and other Metallick Dust were predominant sinking farthest and those where Sand or the other lighter Particles were so not so far into the Fluid the upper Surface must be uneven and withal the several Species of Corpuscles retain that place where they chanc'd to be at first dispos'd without any possibility of recovering any other which by the Law of specifick Gravity were due to them Coroll 2. If therefore the upper Regions of a Chaos whose quantity of Liquid is very small in comparison of its solid Corpuscles do subside into a Fluid of greater specifick Gravity than its own Columns taken together are an Orb of earth will be compos'd on the Surface of the Fluid and its different Columns being made up of Bodies of very different Natures and specifick Gravities as must happen in such a confused heterogeneous Mass as we call a Chaos particularly the Atmosphere of a Comet that Orb will sink into the Fluid in different degrees and thereby render its Surface unequal or distinguished into Mountains Plains and Vallies So that by how much any Column was compos'd of rarer more porous and lighter Bodies by so much would it produce a higher Mountain and in like manner by how much a Column was compos'd of more close fix'd dense and solid Bodies by so much would it produce a lower Valley and so vice versâ the higher any Mountain the more rare porous and light its Column and the lower any Valley the more fix'd close dense and solid its Column must needs be suppos'd Coroll 3. If therefore any Planet be immediately on its first Formation of an unequal Surface compos'd of Mountains Plains and Valleys and the order of its internal Strata be disagreeable to the Law of specifick Gravity it has exactly proper Indications to prove that the quantity of Fluids in the upper Regions was originally small in comparison of its earthy Parts and that such an uneven Orb is situate on a Fluid denser and heavier than it self Which case how exactly it corresponds to the known Circumstances of our Earth is left to the consideration of the Reader LXXIX If any of the Heavenly Bodies be plac'd near a Planet by the inequality of its Attraction of the Parts at unequal distances from it a double Tide or Elevation of the Fluids thereto belonging whether they be inclos'd within an Orb of Earth or whether they be on its Surface above must certainly arise and the Diurnal Rotation of such a Planet being suppos'd must cause such a successive Flux and Reflux of the said Fluids as our Ocean is now agitated by Thus if adbc be the Earth and biDh be a Comet or any one of the Heavenly Bodies plac'd near the same and the upper Orb of Earth be situate above a vastly large fluid Abyss the Comet or Heavenly Body will considerably more attract the nearer parts about b than it does those about the Line dc or the middle parts of the Earth by which Attraction whereever the Particles attracted are not solid fixed and unmoveable they will be elevated or raised into a Protuberance dbc In like manner the Comet or Heavenly Body will considerably more attract the middle parts near the Line dc than those more remote about a and thereby occasion their slower Motion towards it self than that of the foresaid middle parts and consequently permit them to remain farther off the Center or which is all one to elevate themselves into the opposite Protuberance dac And this Effect not depending on the Situation of the Fluid under the Orb of Earth is equally evident with respect to the Atmosphere and Ocean upon as any Abyss beneath the same and so must cause a double Tide or Elevation of the Fluids of the Globe And this double Tide by the Diurnal
in the World can stand in Competition or so much as pretend to the same Character which it so agreeably corresponds to Which will be the design of and shall be compriz'd under the following Arguments 1. The Names of these two Bodies or Systems of Bodies are exactly the same and equally agreeable to the Nature of each of them The Original Chaos by the Ancient Tradition of the Phaenicians was stil'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in English A dark and stormy Atmosphere Which Appellation the constant Character of that Mass encompassing the Body of a Comet and at the same time of the old Chaos if we suppose it to have been as fitly by Antiquity appli'd to the latter as certainly Observation being judge it is to the former is as proper a one for our present purpose as could possibly be desir'd 2. The main bulk of the ancient Chaos and of the Atmosphere of a Comet is a Fluid or System of Fluids As to the former 't is both necessary to be presuppos'd in order to the succeeding Separation and regular Disposition of the Parts and is confirm'd by all the Accounts of it But Moses himself being express I shall content my self with his single Testimony who not only calls it an Abyss but gives it the stile of Waters Darkness was upon the face of the deep and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters Now that the main part of a Comet 's Atmosphere is also a Fluid appears both by its Pellucidness a thing unusual in Bodies but such as are or once were in a fluid Condition and by those perpetual Changes and Agitation of Parts within the Regions of it which in any other than a Fluid are plainly impossible and which indeed withal have hitherto seem'd so visible and remarkable that thence men were ready to imagine the whole Mass to be nothing else but a Congeries of Vapours or Clouds uncertainly jumbled together and as uncertainly dissipated again 3. The Chaos is describ'd to have been very stormy and tempestuous of which some of the Ancient Writers take particular notice To which those frequent and violent Agitations and Changes those strange uncertain Hurries of Opake Masses hither and thither which the Phaenomena of Comets Atmospheres present us with most exactly agree 4. The Chaos was a mixed Compound of all sorts of Corpuscles in a most uncertain confus'd and disorderly State heavy and light dense and rare fluid and solid Particles were in a great measure as it were at a venture mingled and jumbled together The Atoms or small constituent Parts of Air Water and Earth to which together with Fire the name of Element has been peculiarly appli'd every one were in every place and all in a wild and disturbed Confasion This is the very Essence and enters the Definition of a Chaos in which therefore all both do and must agree And if any one carefully consider the perpetually various Visage of a Comet 's Atmosphere its vast Extent the no manner of Order or Method of its several Appearances and remember that in some Comets it has in its near approach to the Sun been scorch'd and burn'd by a degree of heat many hundred times as Intense as the Sun 's is with us in the midst of Summer he will not wonder that I assert the Parts of this Atmosphere to be in a perfectly confus'd and Chaotick Condition One might indeed as well and as reasonably expect Order and Method in the ruinous Reliques of a City burnt to Ashes or in the Smoke proceeding from the same as in several at least of those Atmospheres we are speaking of 5. The ancient Chaos just before the beginning of the six days Creation was very dark and caliginous Darkness was upon the face of the deep says the Sacred and the very same say the prophane Writers Now when we every Year see how far that small Company of collected Vapours of which a Cloud consists can go towards causing darkness on the Face of the Earth we may easily guess how thick the Darkness of the Comet 's Atmosphere must needs be when all those earthy and watery Corpuscles which flying up and down in the vast Regions thereof do now so often and so much obscure the Comet 's central Body and are here so very sensible when all these I say shall rise up and make a confus'd cloudy Orb on the more confin'd Surface of the Atmosphere of some scores if not hundreds of Miles thick as must happen in the beginning of its Formation If this be not sufficient to account for this thick Darkness on the Face of the Abyss 't will I imagine be difficult to solve it better 6. Our upper Earth the Product of the ancient Chaos being in all probability founded on a dense Fluid or Abyss as will appear in the Sequel the main part of the Fluid of that ancient Chaos by consequence must have been such a dense and heavy one as is here mention'd And indeed 't is in it self but very reasonable if not necessary to allow the inferior Parts of a fluid Chaos to have been compos'd of much denser and heavier Masses than the superior or than Water the main visible Fluid of our Globe For if we consider the matter in any sort according to the Law of specifick Gravity all heavy Fluids must at least as certainly be near the Center as like heavy Solids and 't is but mechanical to allow that in a confused Fluid in some measure as well as exactly in a digested one the Fluids contain'd in the inner Regions must be much heavier than those at or near the outer Surface thereof But besides 't will be hard to account for the confus'd moving state of the earthy Parts or which is much the same the fluidity of the intire Chaos without allowing a much greater quantity of Fluids in it than what we now see with us the Waters of our present Earth and those of a Density and Gravity fit to retain their Posts as well nearer the Central as the superficiary Parts And that on this account of the Comet 's Atmosphere's fixed and dense Fluid 't is peculiarly adapted to the foresaid Description of the Chaos is evident by what has been already observ'd of the same to which I refer the Reader for satisfaction 7. Whereas very many and very considerable Phaenomena of Nature which Dr. Woodward has excellenty observ'd as well as ancient Tradition require and suppose a Central Fire or internal Heat diffusing warm and vigorous Steams every way from the Center to the Circumference of the Earth and whereas 't is very difficult on the common Hypotheses or indeed on any hitherto taken notice of to give a Mechanical and Philosophical Soultion of the same If we will but allow the Proposition we are now upon and that the Earth in its Chaotick State was a Comet a most easy and Mechanical Account thereof is hereby given and
the Phaenomena of Nature rendred plain and intelligible For a Comet besides its thinner fluid Atmosphere consisting of a large dense solid central Body and sometimes approaching so near the Sun that the immense Heat acquir'd then tho' sooner failing in the thinner and expos'd Atmosphere will not do so in the central Solid under very many thousands of Years nothing can better suit the case of our present Earth than to allow a Comet 's Atmosphere to have been her Chaos and the Central Body of the Comet the Source and Origin of that Central heat which our Earth appears still to inclose within it 8. The bigness of Comets and their Atmospheres agrees exactly with the supposition we are now upon For tho' the Atmospheres are 10 or perhaps 15 times in Diameter as big as the Central Bodies which yet have been formerly observ'd to be near the Magnitude of the Planets and thereby of a much larger capacity than this Argument supposes yet if from that thin rare expanded state in which they now are they were suppos'd to subside or settle close together and immediately rest upon the Central Body as on a Formation they must do the intire mass would make much such Bodies in Magnitude as the Planets are As Astronomers from the observations made about them must freely confess So that when to all the other inducements to believe these Atmospheres to be the same Masses of Bodies we call Chao's from one of which all Antiquity Sacred and Prophane derive the Origin of our Earth it appears that the Magnitude is also exactly correspondent I know not what can be alledg'd to take off or weaken the force of them Which general conclusion might be confirm'd by some other similitudes between them and the Planets observable in the succeeding Theory or probably deduc'd from their Phaenomena which I shall not at present insist particularly upon So that on the whole matter upon the credit of the foregoing Arguments united together and conspiring to the same Conclusion I may I think venture to affirm That as far as hitherto present Nature and Ancient Traditions are known 't is very reasonable to believe that a Planet is a Comet form'd into a regular and lasting constitution and plac'd at a proper distance from the Sun in a Circular Orbit or one very little Eccentrical and a Comet is a Chaos i. e. a Planet unform'd or in its primaeval state plac'd in a very Eccentrical one And I think I may fairly appeal to all that the most Ancient History or Solid Philosophy can produce hereto relating in attestation to such an Assertion Especially considering withal 9. Lastly That there is no other pretender no other Mass of Bodies now known or ever related to have been known in the whole System of Nature which can stand in competition or so much as seem to agree to the description of the Ancient Chaos but that which is here assign'd and pleaded for Now this I am secure of and all will and must grant They cannot but be forc'd to confess that the Atmosphere of a Comet set aside they have no other Idea of the Nature and Properties of that Mass of Bodies call'd a Chaos but what profane Tradition with the concurrence of the Holy Books afford them without any visible instance or pattern in Nature Which acknowledgement join'd to the remarkable correspondence of the particulars before-mention'd and the no objection of any moment as far as I see to be produc'd to the contrary is I think a mighty advantage in the present case All that can reasonably be requir'd farther is that the Phaenomena of the Earth to be superstructed on this foundation and deriv'd successively through the several Periods to the consummation of all things prove coincidents to this Hypothesis and confirm the same Which being the attempt of the following Theory must be by no means here pretended to before-hand but left to the Impartial Judgment of the Reader when he is arriv'd at the end of his Journey and digested the whole Scheme From the intire and conjoint View whereof and not from any particulars by the way occasionally reflected on a prudent and well-grounded Sentence is to be pass'd upon it and upon several of the prior Conclusions themselves also However when here is a known and visible foundation to depend on and the Reader is refer'd to no other Chaos than what himself has seen or 't is probable may in a few years have opportunity of seeing it must be at the least allow'd a fair and natural procedure and of the consequences whereof every thinking and inquisitive Person will be a proper Judge The reasonings proceeding without begging any precarious Hypothesis at first of the nature of that old fund and promptuary whence all was to be deriv'd or sending the Reader to the utmost Antiquity for his Notion thereof to which yet in the most Authentick accounts of the Primitive Chaos now extant I fear not to appeal and submit my self II. The Mountainous Columns of the Earth are not so dense or heavy as the other Columns This Proposition will also I imagine be new and unexpected to very many but I hope the following Arguments which I shall very briefly propose will demonstrate it to be no unreasonable or precarious one 1. Mountains are usually Stony and Rocky and by consequence lighter than the main Body of the Earth For tho' Stone be somewhat heavier than the uppermost Stratum or Garden Mold as some stile it yet 't is considerably lighter than that beneath the same For if we compare its weight with that in the bottom of our Mines which is alone considerable to our purpose our upper strata as will hereafter appear being generally factitious or acquir'd at the Universal Deluge we shall be forc'd to own the necessity of the consequence of the present Argument The Specifick Gravity of Stone is to that of Water as 14 to 51 3. but the Specifick Gravity of the Earth at the bottom of our Mines is to that of Water as 3 to 1 sometimes as 4 to 1 nay sometimes almost as 5 to 1 and therefore to be sure considerably Denser and Heavier than Stone So that were the Mountainous Columns of the Earth intirely made up of Stone they would without the consideration of those empty Caverns they inclose be plainly the lightest parts of the whole Earth 2. Those very Dense and Heavy Corpuscles of Gold Lead Silver and other such like Metals and Minerals are mostly if not only found in the Bowels of Mountains Now when the Gravity of these Bodies is so great that in a regular formation they ought to have seated themselves one would think much nearer the Center than they now are to account for such their position it must be suppos'd that the Columns under them and the Earth among them were lighter and rarer than the Neighbouring Columns did afford that upon the whole the intire Compositum or Mass taken together may be
of the Antediluvian Year being nearly determinable of which hereafter 't is I think but fair reasoning to conclude That that Hypothesis which does so certainly argue Art and Contrivance Order and Providence is to be prefer'd to another which seems to infer the clean contrary or at best only leaves room for a possibility thereof as 't is in the present case I do by no means question but these uncertain Eccentricities and various Position of the Aphelia of the Planets with all other such seemingly Anomalous Phaenomena of Nature happen'd by a particular Providence and were all one way or other fitted to the state of each Species of Creatures Inhabiting the several Planets according as their respective Behaviours or Circumstances in their several Generations requir'd of which the succeeding Theory will be a pregnant instance But my meaning is this That before any good or bad actions of Creatures when every thing was just as the Wisdom of God was pleas'd to appoint when each Creature was compleat and perfect in its kind and so suited to the most compleat and perfect state of external Nature 't is highly probable that the outward World or every such state of external Nature was even uniform and regular as was the temper and disposition of each Creature that was to be plac'd therein And as properly suited to all their necessities and conveniences as was possible and reasonable to be expected Such a state 't is natural to believe obtain'd through the Universe till succeeding changes in the Living and Rational requir'd proportionable ones in the Inanimate and Corporeal World 'T is most Philosophical as well as most Pious to ascribe only what appears wise regular uniform and harmonious to the First Cause as the main Phaenomena of the Heavenly Bodies their Places and Motions do to the degree of wonder and surprize but as to such things as may seem of another nature to attribute them intirely to subsequent changes which the mutual actions of Bodies one upon another fore-ordain'd and adjusted by the Divine Providence in various Periods agreeably to the various exigencies of Creatures might bring to pass 5. It being evident that multitudes of Comets have pass'd through the Planetary System that in such their passage they were sometimes capable of causing nay in very long periods must certainly without a Miracle have caused great alterations in the same and that the nature and quantities of the present Eccentricities or Anomalies are no other than what must be expected from such Causes 't is very reasonable to allow these effects to have really happen'd and that consequently all might be as I here contend it was originally orderly uniform and regular and particularly the Planetary Orbits uniform concentrical and circular as I am here concern'd to prove If any one of us should observe that a curious Clock made and kept in order by an excellent Artist was very notably different from the true time of the day and took notice withal of a certain rub or stoppage which was very capable of causing that Error in its Motion he would easily and undoubtedly conclude that such an Error was truly occasion'd by that visible Impediment and never design'd at first or procur'd by the Artist The application of which resemblance is too obvious to need a Comment and naturally enforces what I am now contending for 6. 'T is evident that all the little Planets about Jupiter move in Orbits truly Circular without the least sensible degree of Eccentricity On which account the present Hypothesis appears to be far from contrary to the frame of Nature nay to be no other with regard to the Primary than is de facto true in this Secondary System And from that so remarkable a parallel may the more easily be believ'd to have once been the case of this also 7. 'T is evident that in case the Comets Attractions were the cause of the Eccentricity of the Planets they would usually draw them also from the Plains of their former Orbits and make them inclin'd or oblique to one another So that where the Orbits are Eccentrical 't is probable according to the present Hypothesis the Plains must be different and oblique to each other and where the Orbits are Circular the Plains of the several Orbits must be as they were at first or in probability coincident Now this is really observable in the two Systems last mention'd The Plains of the Circular Orbits about Jupiter being nearly if not exactly coincident and those of the Eccentrical ones about the Sun being oblique to each other Which Observation is no inconsiderable Argument that originally the Planetary Orbits were exactly Circular as well as that at the same time they were every one in the same common Plain or in Plains coincident to one another Which last mention'd Hypothesis to Speak a word or two of that by the way tho' I look upon it as not unlikely and such an one as several of the foregoing Arguments might be apply'd to and do plead for yet I shall not insist farther upon it here Both because the following Theory does not directly depend upon it in any part and because the moving in different Plains does not cause any ill effects or notable inconveniences in the System of Nature as we have shewn the Eccentricity does and so cannot with the same clearness and force be urg'd against its being the Original Workmanship of God as I have above discours'd in the other case Only this I may say That seeing the Planetary Orbits are still almost in the same Plain seeing the Comets Passages are capable of causing such little obliquity nay were they originally in the same Plain in length of time by the fore-mention'd Attraction they must without a Miracle have been drawn from their common Plains and been obliged to revolve in those different from each other as they now do and seeing withal that Eccentricity and Obliquity as uniformity of distance from the Center and coincidence of the Plains go together in the World as has been just before noted this Hypothesis of the Original coincidence of the Planetary Plains is an opinion neither improbable nor unphilosophical and only a little less evident than what this Proposition was to prove viz. That the Primary Orbits of the Planets were perfect Circles but otherwise very much a-kin and exceeding correspondent thereto they at once receiving light from and affording light to one another mutually VIII The Ark did not rest as is commonly suppos'd in Armenia but on the Mountain Caucasus or Paropamisus on the Confines of Tartary Persia and India This Proposition is proved by these following Arguments 1. This Mountain agrees to the place where the First Fathers after the Deluge Inhabited which any part of Armenia does not 'T is evident from Scripture that the first removal of the Fathers after the Flood there mention'd was from the parts on the East of Babylon It came to pass as they journeyed from the East that they found
the former pretty well agreed upon among the latest Chronologers and capable of a much more satisfactory Proof than from so great Differences before thereto relating one would be ready to imagine as upon a little enquiry I easily found Indeed the Archbishop has made the matter so plain that one cannot but wonder how former Chronologers came so strangely to be mistaken and 't is perhaps one of the most difficult things to give a good account of that is readily to be pitch'd upon I once intended to have here not only given the Canon of the several Periods but confirm'd the same from the Scripture and answer'd the principal Objections made against any parts thereof as well from the said Archbishop's incomparable tho' imperfect Chronologia Sacra as from such other Observations as having been since made especially by the very Learned Sir John Marsham who has intirely and evidently clear'd what the Archbishop principally labour'd at without success the Chronology in the Book of Judges give farther light and strength to the same Accounts But this would perhaps be too much like a Digression and somewhat foreign to my main Design so I forbear and only set down the Chronological Canon according to which I reckon from the Creation to the present time as follows I. From the beginning of the Mosaick Creation till the Creation of Adam 291 2 Days to a Month till the Deluge Y. M. D. 0005 06 11 II. From the Creation of Adam till the day when the Earth began to be clear of the Waters or the Autumnal Equinox in the Year of the Deluge 1656 05 14 III. From the Autumnal Equinox in the Year of the Deluge till the departure of Abraham out of Haran 301 2 Days to a Month since the Deluge 0426 06 15 IV. From Abraham's departure out of Haran till the Exodus of the Children of Israel out of Egypt 0430 00 00 V. From the Exodus of the Children of Israel out of Egypt till the Foundation of Solomon's Temple 0479 00 17 VI. From the Foundation of Solomon's Temple till its Conflagration 0424 03 08 VII From the Conflagration of Solomon's Temple till the Kalends of January which began the Christian AEra 0587 04 25 VIII From the beginning of the Christian AEra till this Autumnal Equinox Anno Domini 1696. 1695 08 26 Sum of all 5705 00 00 From the first day of the Deluge till the 28 th of October in this same Year 1696. 4044 00 00 This Canon agrees with the Archbishop's in every thing but that for exactness I make use of Tropical or natural Solar Years instead of Julian ones to which accordingly I proportion the Months and Days I add those five Months fourteen Days which his Hypothesis forc'd him without ground to omit between the Creation and the Deluge and I give the primitive Years of the Creation their place which having been taken for short Days of twenty four Hours long were not hitherto suppos'd to deserve the same All which being observ'd I refer the Reader who desires farther satisfaction to the Archbishop himself where he may find the particulars of the several Periods clear'd to him X. A Comet descending in the Plain of the Ecliptick towards its Perihelion on the first Day of the Deluge past just before the Body of our Earth That such a Position of a Comet 's Orbit and such a passing by as is here suppos'd are in themselves possible and agreeable to the Phaenomena of Nature All competent Judges who are acquainted with the new and wonderful Discoveries in Astronomy according to the Lemmata hereto relating must freely grant But that it really did so at the time here specified is what I am now to prove 'T is true when upon a meer Supposition of such a passing by of a Comet I had in my own mind observ'd the Phaenomena relating to the Deluge to answer to admiration I was not a little surpriz'd and pleas'd at such a Discovery It gave me no small Satisfaction to see that upon a possible and easy Hypothesis I could give so clear an Account of those things which had hitherto prov'd so hard not to say inexplicable and could shew the exact coincidence of the particulars with the Sacred History and the Phaenomena of Nature I thought to be able to proceed so far was not only more than had been yet done more than was generally expected ever would be done but abundantly sufficient to the best of purposes to clear the Holy Scriptures from the Imputations of ill-disposed Men and demonstrate the Account of the Deluge to be in every part neither impossible nor unphilosophical But proceeding in some farther Thoughts and Calculations on the said Hypothesis I to my exceeding great Content and Admiration found all things to correspond so strangely and the time of the Year by several concurring ways so exactly fix'd agreeably to the Sacred History thereby that as I saw abundant Reason my self to rest satisfi'd of the reality as well as probability of what I before barely suppos'd so I thought the producing the Particulars I had discover'd might afford evidence to the minds of others and go a great way to the intire establishing the certainty of that of whose great probability the Correspondence of the several Phaenomena of the Deluge had before afforded sufficient satisfaction But before I come to the Arguments to be here made use of themselves give me leave by way of Preparation to shew what sort of evidence such Assertions as this before us when good and valid are capable of and how great or satisfactory it may be in any other and so may be expected to be in the present Case 'T is evident That all Truths are not capable of the same degree of evidence or manner of Probation First Notions are known by Intuition or so quick and clear a Perception that we scarce observe any Deduction or Ratiocination at all in our Assent to them Some principal Metaphysical Truths have so near a Connexion with these that the manner of reasoning or inferring is scarce to be trac'd or describ'd a few obvious and quick Reflections enforcing our hearty acquiescence Among which the best of Metaphysicians Mr. Lock in his Essay of Humane Understanding very rightly placesthe Being of God Purely Mathematical Propositions are demonstrated by a chain of deductions each of which is certain and unquestionable So that on a clear view of the truth and connexion of each Link or Member of the intire Argumentation the Evidence may still be look'd on as infallible Propositions in mixt Mathematicks as in Opticks Geography and Astronomy depending partly on abstract Mathematick Demonstrations and partly on the Observations of the Phaenomena of Nature tho' not arriving to the strict infallibility of the evidence with the former sort are yet justly in most cases allow'd to be truly certain and indubitable History is all that we commonly can have for matters of fact past and gone and where 't is agreed upon
began to revolve but that he made use of the Attraction or Impulse of some other Body yet in this case without considering that one of those Powers at least is nothing but a Divine Energy the Lines of each Bodies motion the quantity of force the proper distance from the Sun where and the exact time when it happen'd to name no other particulars here must have been so precisely and nicely adjusted before-hand by the Prescience and Providence of the Almighty that here will be not a much less remarkable Demonstration of the Wisdom Contrivance Care and Goodness than the other immediate Operation would have been of the Power of God in the World 3. The Formation of the Seeds of all Animals and Vegetables was originally I suppose the immediate Workmanship of God As far as our Micrometers can help us to discern the Make and Constitution of Seeds those of Plants evidently and by what hitherto appears of Animals too are no other than the intire Bodies themselves in parvo and contain every one of the same Parts and Members with the compleat Bodies themselves when grown to maturity When therefore consequently all Generation is with us nothing as far as we can find but Nutrition or Augmentation of Parts and that agreeably thereto no Seed has been by any Creature produc'd since the beginning of things 'T is very Just and very Philosophical to conclude them to have been originally every one created by God either out of nothing in the primary Existence of things or out of praeexisting Matter at the Mosaick Creation And indeed since the Origin of Seeds appears to be hitherto unaccountable by the mechanical Laws of Matter and Motion 't is but reasonable to suppose them the immediate work of the Author of Nature which therefore I think the wariest Philosopher may well do in the present case 4. The Natures Conditions Rules and Quantities of those several Motions and Powers according to which all Bodies of the same general nature in themselves are specifi'd distinguish'd and fitted for their several uses were no otherwise determin'd than by the immediate Fiat Command Power and Efficiency of Almighty God 'T is to be here consider'd That tho' the Power of mutual Attraction or Gravitation of Bodies appears to be constant and universal nay almost essential to Matter in the present constitution of the world the intire Frame of that System in which we are if not of all the other Systems so strictly depending thereon yet the other Laws of Nature on which the particular qualities of Bodies depend seems not to be so but mutable in themselves and actually chang'd according to the changes in the figure bigness texture or other conditions of the Bodies or Corpuscles with which they are concern'd Thus the Cohaesion of the parts of Matter and that in some with less but in others with the greatest and most surprizing firmness the Fermentation of several heterogeneous Particles when mixt together the Magnetism of the Loadstone with the various and very strange Phaenomena of that wonderful Fossil the Elasticity of certain Fluids and Solids the contrary obstinate inflexibility and resistance of others the different Density of several collections or masses of Fluids while yet the greatest part of their contained space is Vacuity not to be considerably increas'd or diminish'd without the destruction of the speoies All these and many other Phaenomena shew That there are various Rules and Laws of Matter and Motion not belonging to all as that of Gravitation does but peculiar to some particular conditions thereof which therefore may be chang'd without any damage to the Law of Gravity In the impressing and ordering of which there is room for if not a necessity of introducing the particular and immediate efficacy of the Spirit of God at first as well as of his continual concurrence and conservation ever since When therefore in a full agreement with the ancient Traditions 't is said by Moses That the Spirit of God moved on the face of the waters We may justly understand thereby his impressing exciting or producing such Motions Agitations and Fermentations of the several Parts such particular Powers of Attraction or Avoidance besides the general one of Gravity of Concord or Enmity of Union or Separation and all these in such certain Quantities on such certain Conditions of Bodies and in such certain distinct Parts and Regions of the Chaos as were proper and necessary for that particular Course and Disposition of Nature which it seem'd good to the Divine Spirit to introduce and on which this future frame of things here below was ever after to depend 5. The Ordering of all things so that in the space of six successive Solar Revolutions the whole Creation should be finish'd and each distinct Day 's work should be confin'd to and compleated in its own distinct and proper period is also to be ascrib'd to the particular Providence and Interposition of God That every thing followed in its own order and place As that the Seeds of Vegetables on the Third those of Fish and Fowl on the Fifth and those of the Terrestrial Animals on the Sixth Day should be every one plac'd in their proper Soil and fitly dispos'd at their proper time to accompany and correspond with the suitable disposition of external Nature and just then to germinate and fructify when the order and process of the other parts of the Creation were ready for and required the same Every thing here does so suit together that the plain footsteps of particular Art and Contrivance are visible in the whole conduct and management of this matter Which therefore is not to be deriv'd from meer Mechanical Laws of Brute Matter but from a Supernatural and Divine Providence 6. But principally The Creation of our First Parents is to be esteem'd the peculiar Operation of the Almighty and that whether we regard the Formation of their Bodies or the Forepast Creation and After-Infusion of their Souls 'T is Evident from the Mosaick History of the Creation that Our First Parents were on the very same Day in which they were made in a State of Maturity and Perfection and capable of all Humane Actions both of Mind and Body Now if they like the other Animals had been produc'd in the usual Time and Process of Generation and come to ripeness of Age and Faculties by degrees afterwards That were plainly impossible This Creation therefore must have been peculiar and the immediate Effect of a Divine Power And this is noless agreeable to Philosophy than suitable to the Dignity of the Subject and for the Honour of Mankind It has been already observ'd that the Seeds of Plants and Animals must be all ow'd to have been all the immediate Workmanship of God and that they contain every individual Part or Member of the intire Bodies in parvo and that by consequence Generation is nothing else but Nutrition or Augmentation Since therefore God by his immediate Power Created the
distinct Regions The lower and larger whereof would be a collection or system of dense and heavy Fluids or a vast Abyss immediately encompassing the central solid Body The higher and lesser would be a collection or system of earthy watery and aery Parts confusedly mix'd together and encompassing the said Abyss in the same manner as that did the central Solid And this I take to be the state of Darkness which the Proposition we are upon mentions And that the Chaos particularly the Face or upper Regions of it were at this time in such a dark and caliginous Condition will easily appear For all those Opake or Earthy Corpuscles which before rov'd about the immense Regions of the Atmosphere and frequently even then obscur'd the Central Solid to any external Spectator were now crouded nearer together and instead of flying up and down in or possessing an Orb of 40000 or 50000 Miles in thickness were reduced to a narrower Sphere and confin'd within a space not perhaps in Diameter above the thousandth part of the former and must by consequence exclude the Rays of the Sun in anotherguess manner than before We cannot but observe in our present Air That the very same Vapours which when dissipated and scatter'd through the Atmosphere whose extent yet is not great freely admit the Rays of the Sun and afford us clear and lightsome days when they are collected into Clouds become opake Masses and are capable of obscuring the Sky and rendring it considerably dark to us In the same manner 't is easy to suppose that those Opake and Earthy Masses which in those vaster Regions would but in a less degree and in some places exclude the Beams of the Sun must when collected and crowded closer together on the surface of the Abyss exclude them in a degree vastly surpassing the former must occasion an entire darkness in all its Regions and particularly in those upper ones over which they were immediately collected And if from the former comparison we estimate how few Vapours collected into a Cloud with us will cause no inconsiderable degree of darkness and allow as is but reasonable a proportionably greater degree of darkness to a proportionably greater number of Earthy and Opake Corpuscles crowded to gether we shall not doubt but all manner of communication with the Heavenly Bodies and the External World must be intirely interrupted and the least imaginable Ray or Beam of Light from the Sun excluded not only from the lowest but even all excepting the very highest Regions of this superior Chaos Which state of Nature belonging to this time immediately preceding the Hexameron is not amiss represented by the Theorist's Second Figure which is accordingly here delineated V. The Visible part of the First Day 's Work was the Production of Light or its successive Appearance to all the parts of the Earth with the consequent distinction of Darkness and Light Night and Day upon the face of it V. If we remember in what state we left the Chaos in the last Proposition and suffer our thoughts to run naturally along with its succeeding mutations we shall find that the next thing to be here consider'd for the Subterraneous System of dense Fluids or the great Abyss not coming directly within the Design of Moses is not here to be particularly prosecuted any farther is the Separation of this Upper and Elementary Chaos or Congeries of Earthy Watery and Aery Corpusoles into two somewhat different Regions the one a Solid Orb of Earth with great quantities of Water in its Pores the other an Atmosphere in a peculiar sense or Mass of the lightest Earthy with the rest of the Watery and the Aery Particles still somewhat confusedly mixt together For since this Upper Chaos tho' in general much lighter than the Abyss beneath consisted of parts very Heterogeneous and of different specifick gravities the Earthy being heavier than the Watery and those yet heavier than the Aery Particles 't is evident that in the same manner as this whole mixed Mass was separated from the heavier Abyss beneath must it again separate and divide it self into two such general Orbs as were just now mention'd The former consisting of the denser and solider parts such as the Earthy Claiy Sandy Gravelly Stony Strata of the present Earth with so many of the Watery Particles as either being already in those Regions must be inclosed therein or could descend from above and have admittance into the Pores thereof The latter of the less Solid Lighter and Earthy with the rest of the Watery and the Aery Particles not yet sufficiently distinguish'd from each other This process will I suppose easily be allow'd excepting what relates to the enclosing of the Watery parts within the Earth with relation to which 't is commonly suppos'd that because Water is specifically lighter than Earth it must in the regular digestions of a Chaos take the Upper situation and cover that highest Orb as that would others of greater gravity than it self 'T is also commonly imagin'd that the Mosaick Cosmogony favours such an Hypothesis and supposes the Waters to have encompass'd the Globe and cover'd its surface till on the third day they were deriv'd into the Seas Now as I by no means apprehend any necessity of understanding the Mosaick Creation in this sense so I am very sure 't is contrary to a Philosophick account of the Formation of the Chaos unless one of these two things were certain Either that the quantity of Water were so much greater than that of Earth that all the Pores and Interstices of the latter could not contain it or else that it was generally elevated into the Air in the form of Vapour and sustained there while the Earth setled and consolidated together and did not till then descend and take its own proper place The former of which is neither reconcilable to the Mosaick Creation nor will be asserted by any who knows even since the Deluge how small the quantity of Fluids in comparison to that of the Solids is in the Earth on which we live And the latter is too much to be granted in the present case by any considering person who knows that a Comet 's Vapours constitute the main part of that Tail or Mist which is sometimes equal to a Cylinder whose Basis is 1000000 Miles in Diameter and its Altitude as far as from the Sun to the Earth or 54000000 Miles as it was in the last famous Comet in 1681. represented in Mr. Newton's own Scheme Let the rarity of the same be suppos'd as great as any Phaenomena shall require For to clear this matter by a familiar Instance or Experiment Take Sand or Dust and let them fall gently into a Vessel till it be near full Take afterwards some Water and pour it alike gently into the same Vessel And it will soon appear that notwithstanding the greater specifick gravity of the Dry and Earthy than of the Moist and Watery parts whence one might imagine that the Sand or
outward Surface too small to be therein consider'd and suppose the Atmosphere somewhat clearer than before the former figure will still serve well enough and represent the progress and state of the Earth at the conclusion of this Third Day Corollary 1. When according to our present accounts of these matters this is the only day of the Creation to which a double work and that the one quite different from the other ought to be ascrib'd and is ascrib'd by Moses The Night being peculiarly fit for the former and the Day for the latter operation which could happen on none of the other Periods This exactness of correspondence ought to be esteem'd an Evidence of the literal sense of the Writer and of his accommodation to the nature of things and a very considerable confirmation of those Hypotheses on which it so naturally depends Coroll 2. Hence arises a Confirmation of what was before asserted that the Antediluvian Earth had only lesser Lakes and Seas not a vast Ocean For when the quantity of Waters belonging to the Earth and Air at first was no more than was elevated in one half year and at once sust ain'd by the Air no one will imagine it sufficient to fill the intire Ocean alone if there had been neither lesser Seas nor Rivers to be supply'd therewith And so vice versa It having been prov'd by other Arguments that there was no Ocean but only lesser Seas before the Flood This Account which affords sufficient quantity of Water for the latter but not for the former is thereby not a little confirm'd Coroll 3. Tho' the Heat and Influence of the Sun was on this Third Day very great yet was his Body not yet Visible For since at his Rising the Earth and lowest Regions of the Air were very full of moisture while the higher Regions were very clear and bright the force of his heat would be so great as to elevate considerable quantities of Vapours on a sudden and thereby e're the lowest Air had deposited its Vapours and rendred it self transparent the Sun would anew hide himself in a thick Mist and so prevent his own becoming conspicuous which otherwise 't is not improbable he might this Day have been VIII The Fourth Day 's Work was the Placing the Heavenly Bodies Sun Moon and Stars in the Expansam or Firmament i. e. The rendring them Visible and Conspicuous on the Face of the Earth Together with their several Assignations to their respective Offices there VIII Altho' the Light of the Sun penetrated the Atmosphere in some sort the first Day and in the succeeding ones had very considerable influence upon it yet is it by no means to be suppos'd that his Body was Visible all that while Tho' we every day enjoy much more Light and Heat from the Sun than the Primitive Earth could for a considerable space be suppos'd to have done yet 't is but sometimes that the Air is so clear as to render his Body discernible by us A very few Clouds or Vapours gather'd together in our Air are able we see to hinder such a prospect for Weeks if not Months together while yet at the same time we are sufficiently sensible of his Force and Influence in the constant productions of Nature Which things being duly consider'd and the vastness and density of the Upper Chaos allow'd for 't will be but reasonable to afford a great space even after the first penetration of Light for the intire clearing of the Atmosphere and the distinct view of the Sun's Body by a Spectator on the Surface of the Earth I suppose no one will think the two first Days or Years of the' Creation too long for such a work or if any one does the particular work and state of the Atmosphere on the second Day will prevent the most probable part of such a surmise and shew the impossibility of the Sun's Appearance at that time And the same reason will in a sufficient tho a less degree prevent any just Expectations on the third Day as was observ'd in the last Corollary But now upon the coming on of this fourth Day and the Sun's descent and abode below the Horizon for an intire half year those Vapours which were rais'd the day before must fall downwards and so before the approach of the Morning leave the Air in the greatest clearness and purity imaginable and permit the Moon first then the Stars and afterward upon the coming on of the Day the Sun himself most plainly to appear and be conspicuous on the Face of the Earth This fourth Day is therefore the very time when acording to this Account and the Sacred History both these Heavenly Bodies which were in being before but so as to be wholly Strangers to a Spectator on Earth were rendred visible and expos'd to the view of all who should be suppos'd to be there at the same time They now were in the Sacred Stile placed in the Firmament of Heaven gave Light upon the Earth began to rule plainly and visibly over the Day and over the Night and to divide the Light from the Darkness as ever since they have continued to do And now the inanimate World or the Earth Air Seas and all their Vegetable Productions are compleat and the Tradition of those Chineses who inhabit Formosa and other Islands appears well-grounded and exactly true who hold That the World when first created was without Form or Shape but by one of their Deities was brought to its full Perfection in four Years Which Progress of the Creation and State of Nature is exactly represented by the Theorist's fifth and last Figure which therefore here follows IX The fifth Day 's Work was the Production of the Fish and Fowl out of the Waters with the Benediction bestow'd on them in order to their Propagation IX The Terraqueous Globe being now become habitable both to the swimming and volatil Animals and the Air clear and so penetrable by that compleat Heat of the Sun which was requisite to the Generation of such Creatures 't is a very proper time for their Introduction Which was accordingly done upon this fifth Day or Year of the Creation Those Seeds or little Bodies of Fish and Fowl which were contain'd in the Water or moist fruitful 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of kin to it were now expos'd to the kindly warmth of the Sun and the constant supply of a most gentle and equal Heat from beneath they were neither disturbed by the sudden alteration of the Temperature of the Air from the violence of Winds or by the Agitations of the Tide which was both very small in these small Seas and by reason of the absence of the Diurnal Rotation imperceptibly easy gentle and gradual these Seeds I say when invigorated with the Divine Benediction became now prolifick and in this fifth Day 's time a numerous Off-spring of the swimming and volatil Kinds arose whereby the two fluid Elements Water and Air became
refer'd in this and the like Cases LXXXIII The inward parts of the present Earth are very irregular and confus'd One Region is chiefly Stony another Sandy a third Gravelly One Country contains some certain kinds of Metals and Minerals another contains quite different Ones Nay the same Lump or Mass of Earth not seldom contains the Corpuscles of several Metals or Minerals confusedly intermixt one with another and with its own Earthy Parts All which Irregularities with several others that might be observ'd even contrary to the Law of specifick Gravity in the placing of the different Strata of the Earth demonstrates the original Fund or Promptuary of all this upper factitious Earth to have been in a very wild confus'd and Chaotick Condition LXXXIII Seeing the Sediment of the Waters was compos'd of what Earthy Matter was uncertainly brought up out of the inner Earth and of what a true and proper Chaos afforded these Phaenomena are as natural and accountable therefrom as on any other mechanical Hypothesis they must appear strange perplexing and inexplicable to Philosophick Minds LXXXIV The uppermost and lightest Stratum of Soil or Garden-Mold as 't is call'd which is the proper Seminary of the Vegetable Kingdom is since the Deluge very thick spread usually in the Valleys and Plains but very thin on the Ridges and Tops of Mountains Which last for want thereof are frequently stony rocky bare and barren LXXXIV Two plain reasons are to be given for this Phaenomenon 1. The quantity of Water and its Sediment and by consequence of Soil or fertile Earth was less over the Mountains than over the Plains and Valleys 2. After the Subsidence of the Sediment and before its entire Consolidation the Tops of Mountains were most expos'd to the fury of the Winds and Storms which wou'd therefore more easily bear away that lightest and least united Stratum which lay uppermost in those bleak places than in the more retir'd and skreen'd Plains and Valleys and by diminishing the Soil in the former and thereby augmenting it in the latter places most easily make all things correspond in this Proposition LXXXV Of the four ancient Rivers of Paradise two still remain in some measure but the other two do not or at the least are so chang'd that the Masaick Description does not agree to them at present LXXXV That the great Rivers wou'd still retain in great measure their old Courses has been observ'd already and seeing the Fountains and the general inequalities of the Earth on which their Origin and Channels depend were the same generally before as since the Deluge there can be no doubt thereof As to the change with reference to the other two Rivers If the Gulph of Persia were anciently free from Waters and were no other than the very Country of Eden and if the very Entrance of that Gulph into the Persian Sea were the Garden of Eden or Paradise as has been before asserted there can be no difficulty in the case The Channels of these Rivers and indeed of their Fellow-Branches too after their last Partition being now under Water and not to be enquir'd after But tho' we shou'd allow that Paradise was where 't is generally placed near Babylon and upon the Continent yet will there be no wonder at the disappearance of these two Rivers which with their Fellows are bury'd to a sufficient depth under the Sediment we have been speaking so much of before and so no more to be enquir'd after in this than in the former Case LXXXVI Those Metals and Minerals which the Mosaick Description of Paradise and of its bordering Regions takes such particular notice of and the Prophets so emphatically refer to are not now met with so plentifully therein LXXXVI The present upper Earth being as we have seen factitious and a new Crust since the Flood covering over the ancient Surface thereof those Primitive Treasures must lie too deep in the Bowels of the present Earth to be easily approach'd by us and so are entirely lost as to the use or enjoyment of Mankind LXXXVII This Deluge of Waters was a sign alinstance of the Divine Vengoance on a wicked World and was the effect of the peculiar and extraordinary Providence of God LXXXVII Tho' the passing by of a Comet and all those Effects of it in the drowning of the World of which we have so largely discours'd hitherto be not to be stil'd in the common use of the Word Miraculous tho' in no very improper Sense all such Events may have that Appellation of which before yet is there the greatest reason in the World to attribute this mighty Turn and Catastrophe of Nature to the Divine Providence and the immediate voluntary actual interposition of God and that in these ensuing Particulars and on these following Accounts which I shall be the shorter upon as having in the place fore-mention'd explain'd my Mind somewhat largely about things of this Nature 1. The Bodies made use of in this and the like Changes of Nature are originally the Creatures of God and continually preserv'd by Him and so what they are instrumental in ought most justly to be ascrib'd to the principal Cause the great Creator and Conservator of 'em all 2. All those powers of Attraction or Gravitation c. and those Laws of Motion by which these Bodies are capable of producing such Effects are alike owing to the Divine Operation Appointment and Efficacy both in their primitive Impression and continual Energy and so still the Effects themselves are to be ascrib'd to a Divine Original 3. That particular Constitution of the Earth on the Face of the fluid Abyss and other such Dispositions whereby it became subject to a universal Deluge were also the Consequents of the Divine Power and Providence in the formation of the Earth 4. That peculiar Situation or Constitution of the Orbits and Motions of Comets whereby they by reason of their passing thro' the Planetary System each Revolution are fit to cause such great Mutations in it was the Effect of the particualr Order and Disposition of God in the primary frame of the Universe 5. The Coincidence of the Plain of a Comet 's Orbit with that of the Ecliptick can have no other Foundation in Nature than a like design'd and contriv'd Appointment of God 6. The way of the Comet 's Motion from East to West contrary to that of the Planets by which the Particulars of the Deluge were in good Measure provided for cou'd also be nothing but the Effect of the same Design and Providence of God 7. The so nice and exact adjustment of the Motions of both the Comet and the Earth that the former shou'd pass just so near and impart such a certain quantity of Waters and not more or less than wou'd drown the World and just cover the highest Mountain and yet reach no farther in short as wou'd secure the Ark for future Generations and yet not leave one dry-land Animal besides alive this exactness is a most
thy hand They shall perish but thou shalt endure yea all of them shall wax old like a garment as a vesture shalt thou change them and they shall be changed I saw thrones and they sat upon them and judgment was given unto them And I saw the Souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus and for the word of God and which had not worshipped the beast neither his image neither had received his mark upon their foreheads or in their hands and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished This is the first resurrection Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection on such the second death hath no power But they shall be priests of God and of Christ and shall reign with him a thousand years c. But so much has been said on this head to omit others by the Theorist that I shall refer the Reader thither for the other Testimonies of the Holy Scriptures and the unanimous consent of the most Primitive Fathers Both which he at large and to excellent purpose some particulars excepted has insisted on XCVI The state of Nature during the Millennium will be very different from that at present and more agreeable to the Antediluvian Primitive and Paradisiacal ones Whom the heavens must receive until the time of the restitution of all things which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy Prophets since the world began See more in the Theory Book 4. Chap. 9. and in the proofs of the former Proposition XCVII The Earth in the Millennium will be without a Sea or any large receptacle fill'd with mighty collections and quantities of Waters I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away and there was no more sea XCVIII The Earth in the Millennium will have no succession of Light and Darkness Day and Night but a perpetual Day The gates of the new Jerusalem shall not be shut at all by day for there shall be no night there And there shall be no night there XCIX The state of the Millennium will not stand in need of and so probably will be without the light and presence of the Sun and Moon And the City had no need of the Sun neither of the Moon to shine in it And they need no candle neither light of the sun C. At the conclusion of the Millennium the Final Judgment and Consummation of all things The Earth will desert its present Seat and Station in the World and be no longer found among the Planetary Chrous I saw a great white throne and him that sat on it from whose face the earth and the heavens fled away and there was found no place for them BOOK IV. SOLUTIONS OR An Account of the foregoing Phaenomena from the Principles of Philosophy already laid down CHAP. 1. A Solution of the Phaenomena relating to the Mosaick Creation and the original Constitution of the Earth I. All those particular small Bodies of which our habitable Earth is now compos'd were originally in a mixed confused fluid and uncertain Condition without any order or regularilty It was an Earth without form and void had darkness spread over the face of its Abyss and in reality was what it has been ever stil'd A perfect Chaos I. THIS has been already sufficiently accounted for and need not be here again insisted on II. The Formation of this Earth or the Change of that Chaos into an habitable World was not a meer result from any necessary Laws of Mechanism independently on the Divine Power but was the proper effect of the Influence and Interposition and all along under the peculiar Care and Providence of God II. 'T is not very easy I confess in such mighty Turns and Changes of the World exactly to determine how far and in what particulars a supernatural or miraculous Interposition of the Divine Power is concern'd and how far the Laws of Nature or Mechanical Powers ought to be extended Nay indeed 't is difficult enough in several instances to determine what is the effect of a natural and ordinary and what of a supernatural and extraordinary Providence 'T is now evident That Gravity the most mechanical Affection of Bodies and which seems most natural depends entirely on the constant and efficacious and if you will the supernatural and miraculous Influence of Almighty God And I do not know whether the falling of a Stone to the Earth ought not more truly to be esteem'd a supernatural Effect or a Miracle than what we with the greatest surprize should so stile its remaining pendulous in the open Air since the former requires an active Influence in the first Cause while the latter supposes Non-annihilation only But besides this Tho' we were able exactly to distinguish in general the ordinary Concurrence of God from his extraordinary yet would the task before us be still sufciently difficult For those Events or Actions are in Holy Scripture attributed immediately to the Power and Providence of God which yet were to all outward appearance according to the constant course of things and would abstractedly from such Affirmations of the Holy Books have been esteem'd no more miraculous than the other common Effects of Nature or usual Accidents of Humane Affairs as those who have carefully consider'd these matters especially the Historical and Prophetical Parts of the Old Testament must be oblig'd to confess Neither is it unreasonable that all things should in that manner be ascribed to the Supream Being on several accounts 'T is from him every thing is ultimately deriv'd He conserves the Natures and continues the Powers of every Creature He not only at first produc'd but perpetually disposes and makes use of the whole Creation and every part thereof as the Instruments of his Providence He foresaw and foreadapted the intire Frame He determin'd his Co-operation or Permission to every Action He so order'd and appointed the whole System with every individual Branch of it as to Time Place Proportion and all other Circumstances that nothing should happen unseasonably unfitly disproportionately or otherwise than the Junctures of Affairs the demerits of his reasonable Creatures and the wise Intentions of his Providence did require In fine he so previously adjusted and contemper'd the Moral and Natural World to one another that the Marks and Tokens of his Providence should be in all Ages legible and conspicuous whatsoever the visible secondary Causes or Occasions might be Seeing then this is the true state of the Case and that consequently Almighty God has so constituted the World that no Body can tell wherein it differs from one where all were solely brought to pass by a miraculous Power 't is by no means untrue or improper in the Holy Books to refer all those things which bare Humane Authors would derive from
second Causes the constant Course of Nature and the Circumstances of Humane Affairs to the first Cause the ultimate Spring and Original of all and to call Mens Thoughts which are too apt to terminate there from the apparent occasions to the invisible God the Creator Governor and Disposer of the whole and the sole Object of their Regard and Adoration This is I say a very proper and reasonable procedure this is usually observ'd by the Sacred Penmen who are thereby peculiarly distinguish'd from Prophane Authors and this is of the highest advantage in Morality But then it must be withal acknowledg'd That this creates great difficulties in the present Case and makes it very hard in a Philosophick Attempt of this nature to distinguish between those parts of the Mosaick Creation which are Mechanically to be accounted for and those in which the miraculous Energy of God Almighty interpos'd it self which yet if ever is certainly to be allow'd in this case where a new World was to be form'd and a wild Chaos reduc'd into a regular beautiful and permanent System This being said in general to bespeak the Reader 's Candor in the present Case and to forewarn him not to fear the most Mechanical and Philosophick Account of this Creation as if thereby the Holy Scriptures were superseded or the Divine Power and Providence excluded I come directly to the Point before us and shall endeavour to determine what are the Instances of the extraordinary Power and Interposition of God in this whole Affair That as we shall presently see how Orderly Methodical and Regular this Formation was so we may before-hand be duly sensible how Supernatural Providential and Divine it was also and so as well like Christians contemplate and adore the Omnipotent Creator in his Miraculous as we like Philosophers shall attempt to consider and remark his Vicegerent Nature in her Mechanical Operations therein For notwithstanding what has been above insisted on touching the frequency and propriety of ascribing the Effects of Nature to the Divine Power the former being indeed nothing but the latter acting according to fixt and certain Laws yet because more has been commonly and may justly be suppos'd the importance of the Texts of Scripture hereto relating because the Finger of God or his supernatural Efficiency is if ever to be reasonably expected in the Origin of Things and that in a peculiar and remarkable manner because some things done in this Creation are beyond the power of Philosophy and Mechanism and no otherwise accountable but by the Infinite Power of God himself because the days of Creation are signally distinguish'd from those following in which God is said to have rested when yet his ordinary Concurrence and the Course of Nature was continued without Interruption and must therefore be reckon'd such on which he truly exerted a Power different from the other On all these accounts I freely and in earnest allow and believe That there was a peculiar Power and extraordinary Providence exercis'd by the great Creator of all in this Primitive Origin of the Sublunary World or Formation of the Earth which we are going to account for The particular instances I shall give of the same without presuming to exclude all others are these following 1. The Creation of the matter of the Universe and particularly of that of the Earth out of nothing was without doubt originally the alone and immediate Work of God Almighty Nature let what will be meant by that Name could have no hand in this from whence at the utmost she can but date her own Birth The production of a real Being out of nothing or to speak more properly the primary bringing any real thing into Being is in the Opinion of all Men the Effect of no less than an Infinite and Omnipotent Deity I have already owned this to be the import of the first words of this Creation we are now upon In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth And I think 't is here no improper place to declare my Opinion That considering the Idea and Nature of God includes Active Power Infinite Perfection with Necessity and so Eternity of Existence when the Idea and Nature of matter supposes intire Inactivity no positive Perfection and a bare Possibility or Capacity of Existence 't is as absurd and unreasonable to attribute Eternity and Necessity of Existence to the latter as 't is rational and natural to ascribe those Perfections with a Power of Creation to the former The very Being and Nature as well as the Properties and Powers of Matter being most justly and most philosophically to be referr'd to the Author of all the Almighty Creator And altho' our imagination a poor finite limited and imperfect Faculty be unable to have a positive Idea of the manner of the Production of a real Being at first as indeed 't were sufficiently strange if so confin'd a Power of so imperfect a Creature should adequately reach the highest point of Omnipotence it self yet seeing the Absurdities following the Eternity and Self-subsistence of Matter on the other side are so enormous and the certainty of the proper Creation of Spiritual Beings nobler than Matter such as the Souls of Men are as great as 't is utterly incredible they should have been ab aeterno too for I take it to be demonstrable that Souls are immaterial I think 't is far more reasonable to rest satisfied with our former Assertion That God did truly bring Matter into being at first than its Eternity suppos'd to make only the Modification and Management thereof the Province of the Almighty And consequently the first instance of a Divine Efficiency with relation to the Subject we are now upon and the highest of all other was the original Production of the Matter of which the Earth was to consist or the proper Creation of those inferior Heavens and of that Earth which were to be the sole Object of the Divine Operations in the six days Work This particular I confess does not so properly belong to our present business the Formation of the Chaos into a habitable World but could not well be omitted either consider'd in it self as it bears so peculiar a Relation to our present purpose or with respect to that misconstruction I might with some Readers have otherwise been liable to But I proceed 2. The changing of the Course and Orbit of the Chaos into that of a Planet to omit the former Annual and subsequent Diurnal Revolutions which tho' equally from God yet do not so fully belong to this place or the placing of the Earth in its primitive Circular Orbit at its proper distance therein to revolve about the Sun was either an instance of the immediate Power or at least of the peculiar Providence of God For if we should suppose as 't is possible to do that God did not by a miraculous Operation remove the Chaos or Comet from its very Eccentrick Ellipsis to that Circle in which it now