been unsuccessful and so for his Tehom Rabba or the great Abysse of Moses which he has also much urg'd and for any other Passages he has quoted To come to the Author's third Proof which is from Reason and the Contemplation of the Chaos whence the Earth rose this Proof in effect is not only for making out that the Earth as it rose from a Chaos in its first state was of a different Form from the present Earth according to the Authors first Proposition but withall is partly for shewing that the Face of the first Earth was smooth regular and uniform without Mountains and a Sea as he has set forth in his second Proposition wherefore the scope of it being connected with the Motions Progress and Separations which he supposes to have pass'd in the Chaos for forming the first Earth I shall briefly state them both together as he has represented them He supposes then the Chaos as a fluid Masse or a Masse of all sorts of little Parts or Particles of the Matter of which the World was made mixt together and floating in confusion one with another Hence he says there follows an impossibility that this Masse should be of such a Form and Figure as the Surface of our present Earth is Or that any Concretion or consistent State which this Mass could flow into immediately or first settle in could be of the said Figure He proves the first of these Assertions because a fluid Mass always casts it self into a smooth and spherical Surface He proves the second Assertion because when any fluid Body comes to settle in a consistent and firm State that Concretion in its first State of Consistence must be of the same Form that the Surface was when it was liquid as when Water congeals the Surface of the Ice is smooth and level as the Water was before And hence when he has consider'd the broken condition of the present Earth both as to its Surface and inward Parts he concludes that the Form of it now cannot be the same with that it had originally which must have been smooth regular and uniform according to his Second Proposition And to make this clear he sets forth the Motions and Progress which he supposes must have pass'd in the Chaos and how it settled it self in the said Form when it became an habitable World 1. First therefore he presents us with a Scheme which represents the Chaos as is before express'd viz. as a spherical and fluid Masse containing the Particles of all the Matter of which the World is compos'd mixt together and floating in confusion in it 2. The first Change which he conceives must happen in this Masse must be that the heaviest and grossest parts would subside towards the middle of it and there harden by degrees and constitute the interior Parts of the Earth while the rest of the Masse swimming above would be also divided by the same Principles of Gravity into two orders of Bodies the one like Water the other volatile like Air and that the watery part would settle in a Masse together under the Air upon the Body of the Earth composing not only a Water strictly so call'd but the whole Masse of Liquors or liquid Bodies belonging to the Earth and these Separations in the Body of the Chaos are represented to us in a second Scheme 3. The liquid Masse he says incircling the Earth being not the mere Element of Water but a Collection of all Liquors belonging to the Earth some of them must be fat oily and light others lean and more earthy like common Water Now these two kinds mixt together and left to themselves and the general action of Nature separate one from another when they come to settle which these must be concluded to have done the more oily and thin parts of the Masse getting above the other and swimming there as he represents in a third Figure 4. Next he considers that the Masses of the Air and Waters were both at first very muddy and impure so that they must both have their Sediments and there being abundance of little terrestrial Particles in the Air after the grossest were sunk down these lesser also and lighter remaining would sink too tho more slowly and in a longer time so as in their descent they would meet with that oily Liquor on the watery Masse which would entangle and stop them from passing farther whence mixing there with the unctious substance they compos'd a certain Slime or Fat soft and light Earth spread on the Face of the Waters as he shews in a fourth Figure 5. He says that when the Air was fully purg'd of its little earthy Particles upon their general descent they became wholly incorporate with the oily Liquor making both one Substance which was the first Concretion or firm and consistent Substance which rose upon the Face of the Chaos and fit to be made and really constituted an habitable Earth which he sets before us in a fifth Figure and which I have also subjoyn'd where A is the first Sediment of the Chaos B the Orb of Water or the Orb of the Abysse C the Orb which made the first habitable Earth 6. Having thus represented the Rise of the Earth from the Chaos he adds that whereas the Antients generally resemble the Earth to an Egg he thinks the Analogy holds as to those inward Envolvings represented in the Figure of the Earth and that the outward Figure of the first Earth was likewise oval it being a little extended toward the Poles which he represents to us in a sixth Figure and which I also here insert where as the two inmost Regions A B represent the Yolk and the Membrane that lies next above it so the exterior Region of the Earth D is as the Shell of the Egg and the Abysse C under it as the White that lies under the Shell This is the Author's Theory of the Earth in reference to the Composition of it as it settled from the Chaos in its first State which he says he has all along set forth according to the Laws of Gravity And this must now be consider'd by me First then If I should allow that the first Earth was form'd from a Chaos according to those Separations the Author has represented it would no way answer his chief End for which he gave it this Construction viz. The Capacity of causing a Deluge as I shall make appear in my Considerations on the next Chapter But tho I might be free to allow it as for any Deluge to be thence caus'd yet in other respects I must not do it because I take upon me to maintain that the World from its first Existence had Mountains a Sea and the like as it has now And both in reference to the Author's Argument from Reason viz. That all fluid Bodies and any first Concretion on them must keep to a sperical Figure whence he concludes the Earth on its first Concretion from the Chaos to have taken it and
so as to the Separations he supposes to have pass'd in the Chaos I have many things to say Not to stand therefore with the Author for allowing a Chaos and that it was a fluid Masse and of a circular Figure tho I know no reason why a Man should admit a Postulatum which if the Authority of Moses may be set by as the Author does I see no ground for unless it be to serve a turn for trying whether a natural Explication may be given of a Deluge which I judg miraculous and to reason with those who seem to have held gradual successive Changes to have pass'd in the Chaos in order to the forming of the World The main Error as I conceive on which the Author has grounded his whole Theory for the Composition of his Earth as it rose from a Chaos is that he has here consider'd the Chaos not as a strongly fermented Masse which it must necessarily have been from the infinite variety of seminal Principles of a contrary Nature therein contained as all Antiquity has represented it and from this fundamental Error has concluded that in the Separations and Settlements of the Chaos all things pass'd according to the common Laws of Gravity observ'd in the subsiding of unfermented Bodies no respect being had to those Effects which must necessarily have been produc'd by the said Ferments Can any Man cast his Eye on the Contrariety of Natures which appears betwixt Superiors and Inferiors and what we find in the Animal Vegitable and Mineral Kingdoms which every where occur to us and not presently thence conclude from the consideration of a Chaos where all these are suppos'd to have been confusedly mixt that the same Contrariety must have been there and that turbulent and violent Commotions were thence rais'd in it To go no further than Ovid who has represented the Nature of a Chaos as well as any of the Antients where he speaks of it he says Congestáque eodem Non bene junctarum discordia semina rerum And mingled there The jarring Seeds of ill-joyn'd beings were And beneath quia corpore in uno Frigida pugnabant calidis humentia siccis Mollia cum duris sine pondere habentia pondus ' cause in one Masse The cold things fought with hot the moist with dry The soft with hard the light with contrary Indeed as he affirms the World to have risen from the Chaos he immediately subjoyns Hane Deus melior litem natura diremit God and prevailing Good broke off this Strife But how far this jarring Discord was taken away according to what we may reason from second Causes and what Effects must have been produc'd by them upon the framing of a World must be consider'd by us It must not then be thought that when the Chaos came to be separated in order to the framing of a World all the homogenious Bodies or pure Elements were rang'd by themselves a pure Element being a pure Chimaera no such thing in Nature Indeed if such a Separation had been made whereas there was a Mutiny before in the Chaos this would have establish'd a Peace but such a Peace that no habitable World nor any Animal Vegitable or Mineral Productions could then have been The Elements then upon the separation of the Chaos must have been mixt and blended together according to such Proportions as to be able to produce such Effects as the prime Author design'd them for therefore when we consider his design was a World should be produc'd qualifi'd for the Production Support and Propagation of those varieties of Species we find in Nature and withal reflect what the Quantities and Qualities of those Elements were and are which chiefly concern us in this Discourse viz. The Earth and Waters we shall soon find how this habitable Earth and the Sea thence arose All the Water which the Author does account for in Nature as I shall have occasion to set forth in the sequel does not amount to enough to make an Orb of Water to cover the Earth as it lies in an even Convexity with the Sea a quarter of a Mile deep and what is this to the vast Body of the other Element the Earth Not comparably so much as a Sheet of the thinnest Paper laid on a Globe of three foot diameter adds in thickness to that Globe Indeed notwithstanding this disproportion if the Earth when it first settled from the Chaos had been an homogenious Body without any Principle of Motion in it arising from Ferments through the Contrariety of Natures therein contein'd the Waters must have cover'd it as Moses seems to intimate it did Gen. 1. but when those Ferments quickned by the ordinary concourse of the first Cause not to insist here on a miraculous fiat came to exert their Force can we think that less Effects could be wrought than the production of Mountains and a Sea Channel such inconsiderable Nothings to the Body which produces them the greatest Mountains on the Earth being no more in proportion to the Earth than the slightest Dust on a Globe of three foot diameter is in proportion to that Globe as the ingenious French Author of a late Book entituled De L'Origine des Fountaines has well made appear where he has likewise shewn that the little Protuberances on an Orange which are usually compar'd to the Mountains of the Earth are each of them a thousand times greater in proportion to that Fruit than any Mountain on the Earth is in proportion to that Globe We find that many very small vegetable Seeds contain a protrusive Principle in them able to raise Bodies by degrees containing many Tuns weight and can we doubt but the primigenial Earth fermented with the Seeds of all things in it had a force able to produce the Effects mention'd And tho the Author seems to smile at those who have held that Mountains have been cast up as Mole-hills or produc'd as Wens on the Body of Man I know not whether it may be so easie to shew a Disparity and why the one is not as possible and as probable as the other for if the vastness of the Body will afford it and there be a proportional mover neither of which I think any Man has reason to question in the Earth I know not why the Earth may not be judg'd better able to produce the one than the Mole or Man's Body the others I well know that all Antiquity I mean it of those who held the World had a gradual beginning from a Chaos abets this Theory as I have stated it and the feign'd Story of the Gyant Typhoëus if it contains any natural deduction relates here Typhoëus being that Enormontick Spirit if I may so call it or that protrusive Impetus still reigning in the Chaos through Ferments Winds and Inflamations and causing the present Unevenesses in the Earth and the retiring of the Waters into a Sea-Channel till at length all things being set in their apt State Jupiter or a meet temperies of
Spring-Tides the whole will be overflown He farther tells us that as Fires and Waters bear sway o'er earthly things their rise and ruine being from and by them it was the Opinion of Berosus that Deluges and Conflagrations will happen thro the Courses of the Planets and that a Conflagration shall happen when all the Planets which now keep different courses shall meet in Cancer being so plac'd that it shall pass in a direct line through them all and that a Deluge shall happen when the said Planets shall so meet in Capricorn the one making the Summer Solstice and the other the Winter Signs of great Power being the Points for the Changes of the Year And Seneca receives these Causes also one Cause being too little for so great a Ruin He adds whether the World be an Animal or a Body Nature governing it as Trees and standing Corn From its beginning there was included in it whatsoever it ought to act and to undergo to its end as in the Seed is comprehended the whole state of the future Man so that the Child yet unborn has the Law of a Beard and grey Hairs the Lineaments of the whole Body and of the succeding Age being there in little and conceal'd So he says the Origine of the World contain'd as well the Sun and Moon and Courses of the Planets and the Rise of Animals as those things with which earthly things are chang'd In these was an Inundation which happens by the Law of the World no otherwise than Summer and Winter And he says all things will help Nature for the performance of her Constitutions but the Earth it self will afford it the greatest cause to drown it which will be resolv'd into Moisture and flow by a continued consumption the tainted parts as in Bodies ulcerated by degrees bringing the rest to a general Colliquation Here we plainly see what the grounds of the Stoicks and others were for admitting Deluges and Conflagrations They having observed that particular Bodies on the Earth had a beginning and decay and were again renewed by their Seeds thence by Analogy concluded that the same Order must pass as to the whole World and again having consider'd that Fires and Waters bore the sway o'er earthly things and that the one prevail'd in the Summer the other in the Winter they thence imagin'd that besides ordinary Summers and Winters whereby the ordinary Changes are wrought on the Earth there would happen some great periodical Revolutions in the Heavens causing so great a Predominancy of Fires and Waters here below that they would cause general Changes over the whole face of the Earth at once Bede speaking of these Changes says it was the opinion of all the Philosophers that earthly things received their Periods sometimes by a Deluge and sometimes by a Conflagration because the Waters being plac'd under the Fountain of Heat it happens that the Moisture encreases by degrees and overpowers the Heat till being detain'd by no bounds it diffuses it self over the Earth and drowns it which Moisture at length being dry'd by the Heat of the Sun and Drought of the Earth the Heat encreases in its turn and over-powers the Moisture till being diffus'd over the Earth it burns it He adds there are some that say these things happen through the general Elevation and Depression of the Planets for if all the Planets are elevated together being remov'd from the Earth more than they ought they consume less of the Moisture whence the Moisture encreasing it diffuses it self o'er the Earth and causes a Deluge If but one two or three of them are elevated without the others the Moisture thereby does not abound for what increases by their remoteness is dry'd by the nearness of the others but if all are depress'd together they burn the Earth and cause a Conflagration doing too much by their nearness as by their remoteness they did too little Many others who write of these Mundane Changes word themselves much after the same manner Whence we find the Antients did not barely rely on Tradition for these Changes but had such grounds as they conceiv'd rational for admitting them Now if it shall be said that the Causes they have assign'd are not competent for such Changes possibly it may be because they sought for Causes which were not in Nature to be found For those Antients either supposing the Deluge of the antient Ogyges to have been general or having heard that some other Deluge had been affirmed so to have been and finding by marine Bodies dug in Mountains that the Waters of the Sea had been there they attempted to assign Causes for an universal Change at one effort whereas those Causes upon examination were found either to have been assign'd gratis without any solid ground or to answer only partial Changes Hence Aristotle and the soundest Reasoners well seeing the slight Presumptions on which this Opinion was grounded derided the Stoicks Epicureans and others who maintain'd it For first Aristotle knew they had no sound Records for making out that any such Change had happen'd in Nature And secondly he having well weighed the Rotation of the Elements and what past in particular Bodies found that what flow'd from the later receded from them which must cause a decay but whatever flowing there were in the Elements it still return'd into them so that nothing was lost or decay'd as to the whole nor so much to any chief part as to cause a total Dissolution And since no Man that I know of has hitherto assign'd a Cause able to work a general Change in the Earth at once I should be inclin'd according to natural Principles to follow his Opinion a general Change being to be ascribed to Miracle for ought I know till some Prophet shall come to help us out As for what has been said by the Sibylls and antient Magi among the Gentiles concerning these Changes I speak not of what has been prophetically deliver'd of them in Sacred Writ which I judg refers to a miraculous hand we know they were Persons chiefly concern'd in the Politick Government of their times and being greatly skill'd in Adept Philosophy as some of our Prophets also transcendently were they knew how to adapt the great Phaenomena of the Earth to the Microcosm and moral World and there is a Mystery in what they intimate as to these Changes which I think not fit here to explain but may note that those who are seen in the Promethean Arcanum Astrologicum and have heard the seven-Reed Pipe of Pan know on what grounds the above-mention'd Astrological Causes for Deluges and Conflagrations were originally introduc'd and whither they tend The antient Druids of our Nation who were the most famous for Adept Philosophy of any Men of these parts of the World nay and as Pliny says the Persian Magi may seem to have had their rise from them and who govern'd all here in their Sacrifices which they thought most acceptable to their Gods were wont to make
as being the upper Orb. The Author ascribes the cause of the Deluge to the Violence of the Commotion of the Abysse upon the fall of the Earth into it and to represent to us what this Commotion must be he supposes a Stone of a vast weight carried up a Mile or two in the Air and let fall and tells us to what a vast height Waters must then be conceiv'd to fly But I cannot allow this Instance to be fairly brought in If a Painter be to draw a Ceiling-Piece in a Room of an high roof we may allow him to draw the Picture of a Man there suppose much bigger than the natural that it might deceive our Eye to its advantage when viewing it at that distance it takes it in a proportion to the Life But to suppose a Rock an Island or a Continent as he says two Miles high in the Air and to conceive how high Waters would be thrown upon their fall into the Sea why shall this be done to deceive our Reason When the Antediluvian Earth is suppos'd before not to have been suspended in the Air but couch'd close on the Face of the Abysse as is represented by him in his Scheme of the disruption of the Earth Fig. I. p. 135. it being quite a different thing for a Body couch'd on the Face of Waters to subside in them and for it to fall into them from an height Again when part of the Orb of Earth subsided into the Abysse there was no room for the Waters of the Abysse to diverge whereas when any Weight is thrown into a River or the open Sea the Waters may fly off every way And indeed I think it manifest enough that upon the subsiding of any part of such an Orb of Earth in a manner all the Waters that could rise thereupon upon must have been contain'd either in the Chasms or hollow places of its broken parts and that never any could come to make a Deluge on the higher parts of the Earth Besides it 's absolutely contrary to Moses's Narration to make a Deluge by such flights of Water in the Air Moses telling us how the Waters rose and fell gradually and that they exceeded the highest Mountains fifteen Cubits the Author's Explication of it being so forc'd and unnatural that perhaps in so plain a Text it was not fit to be put upon so great a Prophet But to put the matter beyond dispute supposing the Proportions before laid down to the Orbs of the Abysse and the Earth we find a Mile and three quarters of the Orb of Earth missing for if the Sea be allow'd but two Miles in depth as learned Men generally judg it to be and that the Abysse there ends on the first Sediment of the Chaos as the Author supposes we have then in Nature but as much Earth as will make an Orb of two Miles in thickness as I shall shew beneath and what then is become of the other Mile and three quarters Earth The next thing we have to consider is this notwithstanding all the Suppositions of the Author before set down when we come to view the Schemes he has given in his Book we find that contrary to his said Suppositions in all of them he has represented his Abysse-Orb thicker than his Orb of Earth so that counting the more large extent of the Orb of Earth as being the upper Orb and the thickness of the Abysse Orb which lies under it we may judg them to be of equal contents in their Dimensions as you may see in the Scheme before given you And I believe a Reader who should peruse his Book cursorily not finding the Proportions of his two Orbs clearly stated and perhaps not minding the Suppositions before set down which the Author was forct by the necessity of the Argument to make on several occasions when he came to view this Scheme of his or the others would have concluded that the Author really suppos'd his two Orbs of the Proportions he here represents as indeed it is but a blind Put upon our Eye as well as our Reason if he did not Now tho I must declare I cannot comprehend how this can stand with the Author's Suppositions as I conceive they are before set down I am content to suppose as all his Schemes seem to import that the Orbs of the Earth and of the Abysse were in their Contents of equal Dimensions and we shall examin what thereupon could follow in order to a Deluge I suppose then that the Antediluvian Earth contain'd an Orb of two Miles deep or as much as would make two Miles deep if it were coucht on the bottom of the Abysse as it then was on the surface of it and that the Orb of the Abysse contain'd two Miles in depth likewise for I suppose here with the Author as before that the two Orbs together made four Miles in height This being suppos'd when the Earth broke and made a Deluge I ask what became of the two Miles Water The Author tells us that the Sea contains a quarter of a Mile depth in Water over half the Globe of the Earth and says that if the Earth should disgorge all the Waters it has besides in its Bowels it would not make half an Ocean and he tells us again and again that all the Waters of the Abysse are contain'd in the Sea and in the Caverns of the Earth What then is become of the other Mile and three quaters Water Having thus demonstratively refuted as I conceive the Author's whole Hypothesis both according to the Proportions he seems to have given to his Orbs in his Schemes or to have otherwise intimated them to have been in his Work I shall urge the matter a little farther and plainly shew it impossible either for the Author or any Man else to assign any Proportions whatsoever to such Orbs that a Deluge and the Form of the present Earth should be thence caus'd supposing only as the Learned generally do that the Sea is two Miles deep in its deepest part where the Author will have his Abysse to end on the first Sediment of the Chaos For then I say first I conceive Men will generally agree with what the Author has before laid down viz. That there is in Nature but Water enough to make an Orb of a quarter of a Mile depth on the first Sediment of the Chaos And secondly As to the Proportion which must be allow'd to the Orb of Earth it 's manifest to us that since it 's two Miles from the level of the Sea to the deepest part of it and since it 's all Earth in all parts of the Globe to that depth except what the Waters in the Sea and in the Caverns of the Earth do amount to which is but enough to make an Orb but of a quarter of a Mile depth round the Earth a good part of which Orb will also be countervail'd by that part of the Earth which is above the level of the Sea it
it 's said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Orpheus stil'd Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Deum Naturam and the ancient Latins us'd Naturus as well as Natura they gave it therefore an Hermaphroditical Figure but still with many Breasts the Types of Mountains Secondly The very learned Joannes Reuchlin tells us that the whole Ornament of Nature is from the admirable variety of things found in it And D. Hakewill tells us he ever conceiv'd that Variety and Disparity in that Variety serving for Ornament Use and Delight might thereby serve to set forth the Wisdom Power and Goodness of the Creator no less than his greatest and most glorious Works We shall therefore consider of what use Mountains are for promoting that Variety of which we are sufficiently put in mind by the learned D. Brown in his judicious Account of his Travels p. 89. where he says thus Tho Austria be more Northern than Stiria or Carinthia the Heats are there much greater for there may be as much difference as to the temperature of air and as to heat and cold in one Mile as in ten degrees of Latititude and he that would cool and refresh himself in the Summer had better go up to the top of the next Hill than remove into a far more Northern Country And beneath In the hot Country of Arabia Travellers complain much of the Cold they suffer in passing the Hills The Mountains of Italy and Spain are cover'd with Snow and Ice all the Summer so is Mount Atlas when in Great Britain there is no such thing Hence it 's easie to find of what Importance the Elevations of Mountains are for diversifying Effects on the Earth for it 's manifest that the Sun that Father of Generation joining with the central or seminal Mover in the Earth does not only diversifie Effects here by his gradual Approaches according to the Rectitude of his Rayes on either side the Aequator But does it rather in a greater measure according to the various Reflexions of his Rayes through the various Sites and Elevations of the Earth whence the Atmosphere must be greatly varied in deep Valleys on the tops of Mountains and in their various Acctivities according as they regard several Faces of the Heavens Earth and Seas And since in respect of Elevations as I have quoted from Dr. Brown there may be as much difference as to the Temperature of the Air in one Mile of height as in ten Degrees of Latitude I wonder the Antediluvian Earth is suppos'd without this Advantage the Beauty of Nature consisting in diversify'd Effects and it being evident that nothing can diversifie so much as such Varieties of Elevations Is it that the suppos'd Richness of the Antediluvian Soil could have supply'd all this We answer that such a rich and fertile Soil is no way proper for many of Nature's Productions which delight rather in such Soils as are generally most barren The learned Poet knew this when he said Nec verò terrae serre omnes omnia possunt Fluminibus salices crassisque paludibus alni Nascuntur steriles saxosis montibus orni Littora myrthetis laetissima denique apertos Bacchus amat colles aquilonem frigora taxi c. All Soils produce not all things here below Willows delight in Rivers Alders grow In muddy Marshes and the Wild Ash stands On rocky Mountains Myrtles on the Sands Beside the Sea the Vine loves open Hills The Yew the cold North-Wind and Winter chills We know that many Herbs set in a fat and moist Soil lose their Nature and Vertue because they love Drought And Hippocrates tells us that Mountain Plants are of a more smart and vehement operation than others And here a learned Botanist has a large Field to expatiate in setting forth the variety of Plants according to the various Sites and Elevations of the Earth The like may be said of Animals how many Species of them are there which seem to be made for Mountains and Mountains for them Of which a Man might say as Virgil does of his Goats Pascuntur verò sylvas summa Lycaei Horrentes rubos amantes ardua dumos Goats and such other Animals delighting in such course Food which unless eaten by them would fall to nothing And as Dr. Hakewill tells us It 's observ'd that the Inhabitants of Mountains by reason of the Clearness of the Air the Dryness of the Soil and a more temperate Dyet thereby occasion'd are for the most part stronger of Limb healthier of Body quicker of Sense longer of Life stouter of Courage and of Wit sharper than the Inhabitants of the Valley And Mountains seem appointed by Providence to guard the lower Countries from the violence of blasting and fierce Winds to bridle the Fury of the enrag'd Sea to mark out the Bounds and Borders of Nations to stop the sudden Invasions of Enemies and to preserve Hay Corn Cattel Houses and Men from the danger of Land Floods which overflow the Plains by the rising of Rivers And hence as Alexander ab Alexandro acquaints us many of the Antients paid a Veneration to Mountains extended on the Sea-Coast as to a Deity the Sea being thereby kept from over-flowing the Land Again the Author having excluded Mountains from his Antediluvian Earth he excludes Metals and Minerals of course for no Mountains no Mines nor Minerals And it will be hard to give an Instance in natural History of any Mines in level Countries unless some Fragments of Metalline Ores are carry'd thither by a Torrent from some adjacent Mountain For Metalline-Ores lie not in Horizontal Beds as they are all in level Countries but in Beds either standing perpendicular to or some degree rais'd above the Horizon the Reasons of which I may set forth in some other Tract The Author speaking of these Mineral Productions in the Sixth Chapter of his Second Book says thus As for subterraneous things Metals and Minerals I believe the Antediluvians had none and the happier they no Gold nor Silver nor courser Mettals the Use of these is either imaginary or in such Works as by the Constitution of their World they had little occasion for And Minerals are either for Medicine which they had no need of farther than Herbs or for Materials to certain Arts which were not then in use or were supply'd by other ways These subterraneous things Metals and metalick Minerals are factitious not original Bodies coaeval with the Earth but are made in process of time after long Operations and Concoctions by the Action of the Sun within the Bowels of the Earth And if the Stamina or Principles of them rose from the lower Regions that lye under the Abysse as I am apt to think they do it does not seem probable that they could be drawn through such a Masse of Waters or that the Heat of the Sun could on a sudden penetrate so deep and be able to loosen and raise them into the exterior Earth I have intimated before
Form and State compared with ours There being little new in this Chapter I have the less to consider in it neither will it concern me here to mind whether others have duly explain'd the Form of the Earth or not I shall therefore only take notice of one Passage here because it relates to what I have elsewhere urg'd where the Author argues against some Divines who say that God Almighty made the Mountains and Sea-Channel immediately when he made the World which Point he states as follows Let us consider the Earth in that transient in complete Form which it had when the Abysse encompass'd the whole Body of it We both agree that the Earth was once in this state and they say it came immediately out of this State into its present Form there being made by a supernatural Power a great Channel or Ditch in one part of it which drew off the Waters from the rest and the Soil which was squeez'd and forc'd out of this Ditch made the Mountains Against this he urges as follows If the Mountains were taken out of the Channel of the Sea then they are equal to it and would fill it up if they were thrown in again But these Proportions upon examination will not agree for tho the Mountains of the Earth are very great yet they do not equal by much the great Ocean the Ocean extends to half the surface of the Earth and if you suppose the greatest depth of the Ocean to answer the height of the greatest Mountains and the middle depth to the middle sort of Mountains the Mountains ought to cover all the dry Land to make them answer to all the capacity of the Ocean whereas we suppos'd them upon a reasonable Computation to cover but the tenth part of the dry Land and consequently neither they nor the Sea-channel could have been produc'd in this manner because of their great disproportion to one another And the same thing appears if we compare the Mountains with the Abysse which cover'd the Earth before this Channel was made for this Channel being made great enough to contain all the Abysse the Mountains taken out of it must also be equal to all the Abysse but the aggregate of the Mountains will not answer this by many degrees for suppose the Abysse was but half as deep as the Ocean to make this Calculus Answer all the dry Land ought to be cover'd with Mountains and with Mountains as high as the Ocean is deep or doubly high to the depth of the Abysse because they are but upon one half of the Globe Now whatever may be said of that Opinion of the Divines which I do not take upon me here to maintain the Reasoning which the Author here urges against them is no way conclusive but contrary to his own Assertions and suppositions If he will be just to the Divines in allowing the whole Acclivity of the Earth with the Mountains to have been then taken out of the Sea Channel and plac'd where they are For then I say he has suppos'd that the Sea covers half the Globe of the Earth and allows it as I conceive two Miles deep in the deepest part as it is esteem'd in the computation of the most Judicious and that there is a general declivity from all Shoars to the bottom of the Sea in all its parts tho that declivity be not every where even but sometimes interrupted and the depth of the bottom of it be various So again He has suppos'd in the second Chapter that the whole Earth being as it were a Mountain above the Sea there is a general Acclivity in it from the Sea-shores to its Mediterranean Mountains and that this general Acclivity makes a Mile in height to the foot of the said Mountains and that some of those Mountains are raised a Mile or more from the foot of them to their Summit which makes an height proportional to the Deepest parts of the Sea Hence I say according to the Authors own suppositions if all the rise of the Earth above the level of the Sea taking both the general acclivity of it with the Mountains were par'd off and turn'd upside down into the Sea-Channel they must of necessity fill it the highest Mountains answering to the deepest parts of the Sea and the general acclivity of the Earth with the other Mountains to the general declivity and other deeper parts of it Or it may be represented briefly thus The Author supposes the Sea to cover half the Globe and that taking one part with another of it it makes a quarter of a Mile depth throughout Now I believe the Author and all Men will agree that if all the Mountains taken with the general acclivity of the Earth were cast into a level they would make an Area over the other half part of the Globe a quarter of a Mile in height above the level of the Sea and consequently according to his own Hypothesis it must be able to fill the Channel of the Sea if empty For a Conclusion to this Book the Author considers the other Planets which he conceives to be of the same Fabrick and to have undergone the like fate and forms with our Earth Particularly as to Venus he says 't is a remarkable passage that St. Austin has preserv'd out of Varro which is as follows That about the time of the great Deluge there was a wonderful alteration or Catastrophe happen'd to the Planet Venus and that she chang'd her colour form figure and magnitude This the Author says is a great Presumption that she suffer'd her Dissolution about the same time that our Earth did Now First the Author seems not to have quoted Austin's Passage right saying that the Planet Venus chang'd her colour form figure and magnitude Austin's words being ut mutaret colorem magnitudinem figuram cursum Secondly This Passage I conceive has been answer'd aptly enough long since by Ralegh tho no great Philosopher where he says It is not improbable that the Flood of Ogyges being so great as Histories have reported it was accompany'd with much alteration of the Air sensibly discover'd in those parts and some unusual face of the Skies Varro in his Book de gente Populi Romani as cited by St. Austin reports out of Castor that so great a Miracle happen'd in the Star of Venus as never was seen before nor in after times for the Colour the Greatness the Figure and the Course of it were chang'd This fell out as Adrastus Cyzicenus and Dion Neapolites famous Mathematicians affirm'd in the time of Ogyges Now Concerning the Course of that or any other Planet I do not remember that I have any where read of so good Astrologers flourishing among the Greeks or elsewhere in those days as were likely to make any Calculation of the Revolutions of the Planets so exact that it should need no Reformation Of the Colour and Magnitude I see no reason why the difference found in the Star of Venus should
upon a due consideration of these things that we must conclude of what Effects could follow upon the suppos'd disruption in reference to a Deluge and the forming of the present Earth as he will have it thence and indeed if any Person proposes a Theory or an Hypothesis and the Propositions he advances to build his Doctrine upon be not either self-evident or demonstrated by him the first thing he ought to do is to lay down his Postulata that a Man may clearly see how he adjusts his Reasonings upon them But to talk of a Body to be drown'd and not to give us the Dimensions of the Body and of the Water to effect it seems to me to have neither top nor bottom in it and no more than to say such a thing must be done but God Almighty knows how We find the Author has been diligent enough in shewing what Quantities of Waters would be required to make a Deluge where he writes against the Opinions of others and it seems but Justice that he should have been as careful in setting down what Quantities would be requisit according to his own He saw there was no proper way to refute their Opinion but by a particular Examination of what Quantities of Waters would be requisite to make a Deluge according as they fancy'd it and then to shew that if such a Quantity of Waters were once brought on the Earth it would be impossible for the Earth to get rid of them again so as to make an habitable World And if he would help us to conceive how a Deluge should happen and the present Phoenomena of the Earth be solv'd consequentially to it I see not why he should be backward to assign us some possible Proportions of his Orbs of Earth and Waters in order to it unless which I cannot think he had rather involve Men in erroneous Thoughts by offering only unlimited Generals and make them fancy a possibility where there is none It 's the business of Philosophy to possess us with clear and explicit Notions of things and not to imbroil us in such as are confus'd and obscure I may allow what the Author says in his Answer to Mr. Warren That when the Nature of a thing admits a Latitude the original Quantity is left to be determin'd by the Effects and the Hypothesis stands good if neither any thing antecedent nor any present Phoenomena can be alledg'd against it But I cannot see that the Nature of this thing admits of a Latitude so that the present Phoenomena of the Earth may not be alledg'd against it And I believe if Cartes had suppos'd a Deluge to have been caus'd as the Author does on the Disruption of his Earth whereas he supposes only the Rise of Mountains a Sea and the like by it the Conceptions of which may admit of a Latitude in some more tolerable way but all Men would have justly expected he should have assign'd Proportions to his Orbs and I am so far from thinking that any Latitude assignable to Proportions of such Orbs can be here admitted that I am of opinion when any Man shall assign any Proportion whatsoever to an Abysse Orb for causing a Deluge as the Author proposes I shall always be ready to shew him either his Abysse Orb to be so shallow that the Hypothesis cannot swim in it or so deep that it must drown in it Now tho the Author has not assign'd particular Proportions to his Orbs as it might have been wisht yet he has offer'd some Suggestions by which we may guess what he would be at concerning them What therefore I have gather'd from him in disperst Notions in his Work in reference to those Proportions is as follows First He tells us in his first Book p. 77. and p. 84. and again p. 127. That all the Waters which were contained in the great Abysse are now contained in the Sea Channel and the Caverns of the Earth Secondly In this same Book p. 10. he computes the Sea to cover half the Globe of the Earth and that taking one part of the Sea with another it makes a quarter of a Mile depth throughout Thirdly In this same Book p. 15. he says that if the Earth should disgorge all the Waters it has in its Bowels it would not amount to above half an Ocean From these three Assertions we find that the great Abysse which he supposes for causing a Deluge must have contain'd only an Orb of Waters not a quarter of a Mile depth as it was couch'd on the Face of the first ediment of the Chaos which is suppos'd by him to be of a ponderous compact Substance and not containing Waters within it And so much for the Proportion of his Abysse As to the Thickness he allows to his Orb of Earth I gather it from him as follows First In his Second Book p. 273. he says that the whole primaeval Earth in which the Seat of Paradise was was really seated much higher than the present Earth and may be reasonably suppos'd to have been as much elevated as the tops of our Mountains are now Secondly He has suppos'd in this First Book p. 11. that some of the Mediterranean Mountains taken with the general Acclivity of the Earth from the level of the Sea make two Miles in height above the said level or at least he does not there except against this Computation as he has occasion to mention it tho for his satisfaction I shall state also other Proportions to his Earth beneath to see what will follow upon it and I believe all learned Men will allow this Proportion To this I must add that tho he has not nam'd what depth he allows to the Sea I must conclude that he allows it two Miles deep as learned Men generally judg it to be where he supposes his Abysse to end part of the first Sediment of the Chaos receiving the Waters of the Sea upon it And thus we find from the top of the highest Mountains to the bottom of the suppos'd Abysse in the deepest parts of the Sea we have four Miles as we may say in view or at least agreed to by our Author and all learned Men and that whereas he allows near a quarter of a Mile to the depth of his Abysse as I have shewn before so his Orb of Earth must have been at least three Miles and three quarters in thickness All these things being thus establish'd let us now consider how a Deluge could be hence made according to the Description of Moses If I should but present a Scheme here according to those Proportions allowing a quarter of a Mile to the Abysse Orb and three Miles and three quarters to the Orb of Earth I believe any Man at first looking on it as to any Deluge to be thence caus'd must cry out Impossibility The Abysse Orb being but the twelfth part of the other without counting what must additionally accrue to the Orb of Earth from its much larger Circumference
to oppose First the Author 's main Reason for the oval Figure of the Earth seems not to me to hold good where he says in his Latin Copy since the Bulk of Waters in the first Formation of the Earth when it was yet an aqueous Globe was much more agitated under the Aequator than the Water towards the Poles where it made less Circles those Parts so greatly agitated endeavouring to recede from the Centre of their Motion since they could not wholly spring up and fly away by reason of the Air every where pressing on them nor much flow back without the Resistance of the said Air they could not otherwise disingage themselves than by flowing off to the sides and so making the aqueous Globe somewhat oval This I say is contrary to Experiment for the more rapid any Course of Waters is the more it draws all neighbouring Waters to joyn with them in their Course and forces them not to recede from them into calmer Parts where the rapidness of their Course is check'd by a slower Motion and if this should be done to some distance can it be imagin'd but their native Gravity when rais'd considerably above their level long ere they reacht the Polar Parts would make them fall back again to the lower Aequinoctial Current And the native Nitency of the Waters in both Hemispheres on each side the Torrid Zone would much more strongly repel any Waters there rais'd above their level than the Rapidness of the Aequinoctial Current could force them off Again since the Earth consider'd as a Spherical Body is allow'd to be above 7000 Miles Diameter and since to enlarge a Circle into a moderate oval Figure its Area must be made a quarter as big again at least one way of its Diameter as it was before as Mr. Warren has demonstrated it follows that the Antediluvian Earth at each Pole must have been near 900 Miles extent in the suppos'd oval State more than if it had been exactly round And since this Earth inclos'd an Orb of Waters within it I desire to know how many Miles Depth of the 900 Miles the Author allows to his Orb of Waters he must allow it Miles enough to make an oval Orb for so his Water was suppos'd to be before the Orb of Earth was form'd upon it and consequentially to what is said he cannot allow his Orb of Waters to be less than 450 Miles deep at each Pole to make any thing of an oval Now to say that any Detrusion of Waters toward the Poles by the resistence of of the superambient Air could form a Mountain of Waters at each of the said Poles about 450 Miles in Height above their Spherical Convexity seems to me a strange and unaccountable Paradox in Hydrography especially the Orb under the Abysse being suppos'd Spherical as the Author has represented it in all his Schemes so that there was nothing to bear on the Detrusion of the Waters It 's true as the Author says in his Answer to Mr. Warren we see the Waters flowing towards and upon the Shoars by the Pressure of the Air under the Moon tho it be an Ascent both upon the Land and into the Rivers but I answer this flowing is only to the Height of some few Fathoms and besides it 's maintain'd by a bulk of Waters then swoln in the Sea near as high as any protruded on the Land and carrying a Pondus able to support them But what Force shall be able to support a Body of Waters in a violent State carried 450 Miles in height above their natural tendency as they all are when past the spherical Convexity For the Author owns the Demonstration of Archimedes concerning the spherical Figure of Water to be true and says that a fluid Body be it Water or any other Liquor always casts it self into a smooth and spherical Surface and if any parts by chance or by some agitation become higher than the rest they do not continue so long but glide down every way into the lower places till they all come to make a Surface of the same height and of the same distance every where from the Center By what agitation or resistence then of the superambient Air can Waters be driven on and held together for 450 Miles ascent in the open Air so as not to diverge and fall off by their natural tendency Besides if according to what I have said before the Author allows his Abyss Orb to be 450 Miles deep at the Poles he must allow it of a depth proportional to its oval Figure in its other parts and so for his Orb of Earth and how this can stand with the proportion he seems to assign to his Orbs according to what I have set forth l. 1. c. 6. and how a Deluge according to these proportions could be caus'd and the Waters go off so as to make an habitable World may require his consideration Again since the Sun according to the Authors Hypothesis moving always in the Aequinox before the Flood would constantly have held as remote if not more from the suppos'd rainy Region than it is now from us in the depth of Winter and since we find the Mountains now which are of any considerable height even in the temperate Zones are so cold that they are generally cover'd with Snows notwithstanding the Sun shines more on them than on the Countries lying beneath them and that even in the Summer when the Sun is nearest to them and the days are much longer than the nights it follows that the two Polar Mountains in all respects must always have had Colds in the greatest excess both in regard of their great distance from the Sun and of their being Mountains and of their having little or no Day nay if it were constant Day at the Poles themselves and there were as much Day as Night in the suppos'd rainy Regions as the Author can pretend to no more there this could not protect them against continual Frosts and Snows as appears by what I have said of the Mountains in the temperate Zones I may add that as Mr. Warren has observ'd several Navigators attempting to find out a nearer Course to China have been frozen to death tho they sail'd not so far North as the suppos'd rainy Regions in the oval Earth and chose the most seasonable time for their Enterprize viz. When the Sun was on this side the Equator and the days then in those Regions were much longer than the Nights if they had any Night at all Besides what experience all other Saylers have had of the great Colds and continued Frosts and Snows in those Countries notwithstanding the Vapours of the Sea or any nearness of the Sun and length of days which might help to remit them Lastly Whereas the Author conceivs the present Earth to be also of an oval Figure we know the general Sense of Men according to all experience and observation to be contrary and that whether the Constitution
miraculous Effects and therefore of another nature from this here under Consideration Again it s well known that many Institutions in the Law of Moses were made directly in opposition to certain Customs among the Gentils Now whereas Iris among the Gentils was made generally the Messenger of Discord whence it was call'd Iris quasi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 why may it not be thought that in opposition to this which might have been deriv'd down from the corrupt Antediluvian times God would have the Rainbow to be his sign of Love and Concord it signifying in its Nature indifferently Rains and fair Weather as Pliny says As to the existence of the Rainbow before the Flood certainly all the Gentils were of that Opinion Juno must have been an Antediluvian Goddess who was never without her Nymph Iris she being the most diligent Attendant she had alway standing ready at her Elbow and more officiously serviceable to her than the other thirteen Nymphs that belong'd to her among other services she is said to have made Juno's Bed and was represented with Wings and a Robe of divers Colours half tuckt up to shew her readiness to obey the Commands of her Mistris on all occasions The two predominant Colours of her Robes were blew and red denoting the two great destructions of the World the blew that which happen'd by the Waters at the Deluge and the Red the general Conflagration to succeed by Fire so that the Rainbow carries a mixt signality And indeed the antient Philosophers might properly enough make her the Messenger of Discord she carrying the Types of those two contrary Elements Fire and Water and God might make her his Messenger of Peace he controuling and directing all natural Powers and re-establishing a Concord betwixt those two contrary Elements whereof she carries the Types in those Colours she bears I may note in the last place that Father Simon censures Luther of Ignorance in the style and symbolical sense of the Scriptures for saying that there was no Rainbow before the Deluge and that God created it for those very Reasons set down Gen. 9. But though there may be a known symbolical sense contain'd under the Rainbow which may far more require our attention than the Symbol it self yet I shall not here take upon me to determine how far Luther may stand affected by that Censure As for what the Author urges from the Passage of St. Peter viz. That the Antediluvian Heav'ns had a different Constitution from ours containing only watery Meteors I do not find he makes out that there were more of those watry Meteors in the Air then than there are now so that a Deluge should be thence particularly caus'd on which account St. Peter intimates that different Disposition to have been and when the Author has said all he can of it he plainly concludes in his Latin Copy That he cannot find or discover by Reason whence that Glut of Waters rose at that time or wherefore after fifteen Ages after the World was made that Immense Glut of Waters gather'd together in the Air discharg'd itself on the Earth it might have been he says from supernatural Causes And in his Answer to Mr. Warren he says the Rains that made the Flood were extraordinary and out of the Course of Nature And what is this in effect but to own that the Deluge is not explicable by humane Reason and that Miracles are to be allow'd in it but they must be the Authors own way and not as others have said which perhaps by many may be interpreted to carry more of Humour than Reason CHAP. VI. THIS Chapter contains only a review of what the Author has said concerning the Primitive Earth with a more full survey of the state of the first World Natural and Civil and the Comparison of it with the present World so that here is little new wherefore I shall note only the following Passage where the Author says I cannot easily imagine that the sandy Desarts of the Earth were made so at first immediately from the Beginning of the World To this we may reply That if the sense of one Man may be oppos'd against that of another Lucan seems of a contrary Opinion where he says Syrtes vel primam mundo natura figuram Quum daret in medio pelagi terraeque reliquit When Nature fram'd the World at its first birth It left the Quicksands 'twixt the Sea and Earth CHAP. VII HERE the Author comes to the main Point to be consider'd in this Book viz. the Seat of Paradise and says that its Place cannot be determin'd by the Theory only nor from Scripture only and then gives us the sense of Antiquity concerning it as to the Jews the Heathens and especially the Christian Fathers shewing that they generally place it out of this Continent in the Southern Hemisphere He declares that considering the two Hemispheres according to his Theory he sees no Natural Reason or occasion to place it in one Hemisphere more than in the other and that it must rather have depended on the Will of God and the series of Providence that was to follow in this Earth than on any natural incapacity in one of those Regions more than in another for planting in it that Garden Neither do the Scriptures determine where the place was As to Antiquity he says the Jews and Hebrew Doctors place it in neither Hemisphere but under the Equinoctial because they suppos'd the Days and Nights to have been always equal in Paradise Among the ancient Heathens Poets and Philosophers he finds they had several Paradises on the Earth which they generally if not all of them place without or beyond this Continent in the Ocean or beyond it or in another Orb or Hemisphere as the Gardens of the Hesperides the fortunate Islands the Elysian Fields Ogygia Toprabane as it is describ'd by Diodorus Siculus and the like As to Christian Antiquity or the Judgment or Tradition of the Fathers in this Argument he tells us that the Grand Point disputed amongst them was Whether Paradise were Corporeal or Intellectual only and Allegorical Then of those that thought it Corporeal some plac'd it high in the Air some inaccessible by Desarts and Mountains and many beyond the Ocean or in another World but nam'd no particular Place or Country in the known parts of the Earth for the Seat of it and upon the whole he brings it to this Conclusion that tho their Opinions are differently exprest they generally concenter in this that the Southern Hemisphere beyond the Aequinoctial was the Seat of Paradise And this Notion of another World or Earth beyond the Torrid Zone he says he finds among Heathen Authors as well as Christian and that those who say Paradise was beyond the Ocean mean the same for that they suppos'd the Ocean to lie from East to West betwixt the Tropicks the Sun and Planets being there cool'd and nourisht by its moisture And having quoted many of the Fathers