a particular Providence for upholding the Ante and Postdiluvian Longaevity will be forc'd to relapse here for any thing that can be made out from Authentick History or Reason in the Case Not but we have several Instances of late date of Persons who have liv'd two or three Hundred Years and upwards But this has not been successively as in the Patriarchs and there is odds betwixt three or four Hundred Years and near a Thousand And whereas the Author urges for a general Longaevity among the Antediluvians as well as for some time after the Flood we do not find it authoriz'd by Scripture And that it was granted only to the Patriarchs and some few others by a particular Providence and this through the means of a certain Panacaea well known to the Mystae I am satisfi'd according to what is written of it by the foremention'd Adept Philosopher But leest instead of open reasoning I seem to obtrude Mystery on the World which by some may be interpreted vain Ostentation I refer the Reader to the Book it self where he may read at least what is written and if hapily he does not fully apprehend what is said he may believe or reject what he thinks good CHAP. V. IN this Chapter the Author treats concerning the Waters of the Primitive Earth what the state of the Regions of the Air was then and how all Waters proceeded from them How the Rivers arose what was their Course and how they ended He applies also several places in Sacred Writ to confirm this Hydrography of the Earth especially the Origin of the Rainbow He says then that the Air being always calm and equal before the Flood there could be no violent Meteors there nor any that proceeded from extremity of Cold as Ice Snow and Hail nor Thunder neither nor could the Winds be either impetuous or irregular in that smooth Earth there being one ev'n Season and no unequal action of the Sun But as for watery Meteors or those that rise from watery Vapours more immediately as Dews and Rains there could not but be plenty of those in some parts or other of the Earth the action of the Sun being strong and constant in raising them and the Earth being at first moist and soft and according as it grew more dry the Rays of the Sun would pierce more deep into it and reach at length the Great Abysse which lay under the Earth and was an unexhausted storehouse of new Vapours He adds but the same Heat which extracted these Vapours so copiously would also hinder them from condensing into Clouds or Rains in the warmer parts of the Earth and there being no Mountains at that time nor contrary Winds nor any such Causes to stay them or compress them we must consider how they would be dispos'd off To this he says as the heat of the Sun was chiefly towards the middle part of the Earth so the copious Vapours rais'd there being once in the open Air their Course would be that way where they found least resistance to their motion which would be towards the Poles and the colder Regions of the Earth for East and West they would meet with as warm an Air and Vapours as much agitated as themselves which therefore would not yield to their progress that way So that the regular and constant Course of the Vapours of the Earth would be towards the extreme parts of it which when arriv'd in those cooler Climates would be there condenst into Dews or Rains continually This Difficulty he says for finding a Source for the Waters in the Primaeval Earth was the greatest he met with in the Theory which being thus clear'd he finds a second Difficulty viz. how those Waters should flow upon the even surface of the Earth or form themselves into Rivers there being no descent or declivity for their Course And he has no way to explain this but by giving an oval Figure to that Earth in which the Polar Parts he says must have been higher than the Aequinoctial that is more remote from the Center by which means the Waters that fell about the extreme parts of the Earth would have a continual descent toward the middle parts of it and by vertue of this Descent would by degrees form Channels for Rivers to pass in through the temperate Climates as far as the Torrid Zone And here he meets a third Difficulty viz. What Issue the Rivers could have when they were come thither To this says he when they were come towards those parts of the Earth they would be divided into many Branches or a multitude of Rivulets and those would be partly exhal'd by the heat of the Sun and partly drunk up by the dry sandy Earth For he concludes as those Rivers drew nearer to the Equinoctal parts they would find a less declivity or descent of Ground than in the beginning or former part of their Course for that in his suppos'd oval Figure of the Earth near the middle part of it the Semidiameters he says are much shorter one than another and for this reason the Rivers when they came thither would begin to flow more slowly and by that weakness of their Current suffer themselves easily to be divided and distracted into several lesser streams and Rivulets or else having no force to wear a Channel would lie shallow on the ground like a plash of Water As for the Polar parts of the Earth he says they would make a particular Scene by themselves the Sun would be perpetually in their Horizon which makes him think the Rains would not fall so much there as in other parts of the Frigid Zones where he makes their chief Seat and Receptacle whence sometimes as they flowed they would swell into Lakes and toward the end of their Course parting into several streams and Branches they would water those parts of the Earth like a Garden Having examin'd and determin'd of the state of the Air and Waters in the Primitive Earth he considers some Passages in Holy Writ which he conceives represent them of a different Form from the present order of Nature and agreeing with what he has set forth First he tells us that the Rainbow mention'd by Moses to have been set in the Clouds after the Deluge makes out that those Heavens were of a different Constitution from ours And secondly that St. Peter says the Antediluvian Heav'ns had a different Constitution from ours and that they were compos'd or constituted of Waters c. He urges concerning the Rainbow that it was set in the Clouds after the Deluge as a Confirmation of the Promise or Covenant which God made with Noah that he would drown the World no more that it could not be a Sign of this or given as a Pledge or Confirmation of such a Promise if it were in the Clouds before and with no relation to this Promise He adds much more concerning the Nature of Signs giv'n by God mention'd in the Scriptures which I think too tedious and
competent as would be expected for such a Work The Sun doubtless supposing as the Author does that in the Antedilunian World it always kept in the Aequinox there being no Rains Cold nor changes of Seasons would heat dry and cleave the Earth in some parts especially in the Torrid Zone considerably but withal it must be consider'd how far the action of the Sun could penetrate for producing the effect propos'd it s known that if a Wall be heated red hot on one side it still continues cold on the other It s also a known Experiment that a good Thermometer plac'd in a subterraneous Grotto of an ordinary depth scarce varies perceivably in the hottest day of Summer and the coldest day of Winter how then shall the Sun penetrate three miles and three quarters deep into the Earth for so deep the Author seems to suppose his Orb of Earth to have been as I shall by and by shew and heat an Abyss of waters lying under it so as to rarifie it into vapours Qui queat hic subter tam crasso corpore terram Percoquere humorem calido sociare vapori Praesertim cùm vix possit per septa domorum Insinnare suum radiis ardentibus aestum And indeed Heat being not essentially in the Sun but an effect of the light by whose beams its imparted to us where Light is excluded Heat also must of course The Grotto where no operation of the Suns Heat is found has an open passage into it for the Suns operation if it could there exert it whereas the Author supposes the Antediluvian Earth to have been one continued substance without so much as a Cavern in it Again we must consider of what nature the Torrid Zone must have been and the Author in his second Book concludes it a sandy Desart if so Sand is not inclinable to cleave but soon fills up any Cleft made in it as I believe may be observ'd in all the sandy Desarts now extant and if Rocks are suppos'd under the Sands certainly horizondal beds of Rocks as all must have then have been are not liable to the Suns penetration at least by any perceivable Heat and indeed let the nature of it be what it might it comes much to the same thing and every Man who has us'd himself underground knows how little the Sun has to do with its Heat there Now tho the continued Equinox Heat then suppos'd may seem to aggravate the matter there must have been at least a vicissitude of days and nights and those still of equal length so that the Earth would be always cool'd in the night as well as heated in the day Moreover tho the Author supposes his Antediluvian Rivers to terminate as they came to the parts on each side the Torrid Zone being partly exhal'd by the Sun and partly absorpt in the Sands yet their waters must necessarily have pass'd in the Sands under Ground through the parts of the Torrid Zone which would soon fill up any clefts there made by the Sun I say the Waters must have pass'd so because his Antediluvian Earth must have been porous to percolate waters to all parts otherwise its impossible the Inhabitants in the temperate Zones should have been supply'd with waters to serve their necessary uses by Wells for no Man can indulge Fancy so far as to think the Antediluvian Rivers could have been so thick and near enough each other to afford a convenient supply for the Inhabitants of all the parts of the habitable Earth Men think it now very burthensom to fetch water a mile or two as in some places they are forc'd to do by their Situation remote from Waters and I hope it will not be said that the Rivers were then within a mile or two or ten or hundreds sometimes of each other As to the Comparisons brought in by the Author of the Aeolipile and the Egg which are broken when the moisture within them is rarified and turn'd into vapours by the heat of the fire I answer that when it shall appear to us that the Sun could cause an Heat in the waters of the Abyss proportional to what the others have when broken we may consider more of it mean while such an effect is so far from falling within my Conception that I look upon it in Nature impossible And as to the Doctrine of the Ancients concerning the Mundane Egg 's breaking I shall consider it in the second Book tho I may so far take notice of it here that whereas the Author here intimates as tho the Ancients by mentioning the Mundane Egg 's breaking referr'd to a Deluge its being caus'd that way the contrary is manifest to us for we know it was a general Opinion amongst the Ancients that the World had been renewed by many Deluges and Conflagrations whereas if one Deluge had been caus'd by such a disruption of the Earth any second or third Deluge had been impossible But what is most urg'd is that the generality of Earthquakes arise from like Causes and often end in a like effect viz. a partial Deluge or Inundation of the Place or Country where they happen To this I answer that tho some Philosophers assign the Causes of Earthquakes after this manner viz. That the strugling of Vapours rais'd and rarify'd by the Sun in the Earth sometimes cause a Disruption the Earth thereupon subsiding into Caverns whence Waters flow forth c. yet it would be hard to expect that Men should generally so far acquiesce in this Cause as to allow it a fair ground to build an Hypothesis of this weighl upon When as a great if not the greatest part of Philosophers assign other Causes for Earthquakes and those perhaps more probable Some will have Earthquakes to be caus'd only by certain Conjunctions of the Planets some by the Motion of Comets near the Earth others by subterraneous Fires or Ferments which truly produce Heats and Vapors within the Earth the Sun having nothing to do in it more than by a remote and general Causality others will have them produc'd by the Motion of subterraneous Waters others again by certain Moulderings or Founderings in certain Caverns of the Earth and other Causes are assign'd for them Lastly When the Author comes to the main Difficulty as he calls it viz. The finding of Waters sufficient to make an universal Deluge which after some time should so return into its Channels that the Earth should become again habitable both which he says are as easily effected according to his Explication set down before by me as they are impossible any other way I confess I greatly admire at this his Assertion and the Explanation he gives for those Effects The first thing we should have expected from the Author in reference to this Point is that he should have signified to us of what Depth he supposes his Abysse to have been and what Thickness he allows to his Orb of Earth for unless we will reason by rote it must be
that we cannot but embrace it Whereas on the contrary Hierom and others censure those as Triflers and Dreamers who so addict themselves to the Allegory that they will not withal allow a plain Historical Sense in that Narration they grounding themselves on this That unless an Historical Truth be held in those things which are deliver'd in the Scriptures by way of an Historical Narration nothing would be certain in them Whereas the Author says we may observe that tho the Fathers Opinions be differently express'd they generally concenter in this that the Southern Hemisphere was the Seat of Paradise and that this seems manifestly to be the Sense of Christian Antiquity and Tradition so far as there is any thing definitive in the Remains we have upon that Subject I find not that this is made out by him for doing which he distributes the Christian Authors and Fathers that have deliver'd their Opinion concerning the Place of Paradise into three or four Ranks or Orders and endeavours to shew that tho they express'd themselves differently yet duly examin'd that all conspire and concur in the foremention'd Conclusion In the first place he reckons those who have set Paradise in another World or in another Earth which he concludes must have been beyond the Torrid Zone in the other Hemisphere In this number he places Ephrem Syrus Moses Barcephas Tatianus and of later date Jacobus de Valentia To these he adds such as say that Adam when he was turn'd out of Paradise was brought into our Earth or into our Region of the Earth for this he says is tantamount with the former and this seems to be the sense of S. Hierom and of Constantine in his Oration in Eusebius and is positively asserted by Sulpitius Severus And again those Authors that represent Paradise as remote from our World and inaccessible as S. Austin Procopius Gazaeus Beda Strabus Fuldensis Historia Scholastica for what is remote from our World he says is to be understood to be that Anticthon or Antihemisphere which the Antients oppos'd to ours I must confess I have not many of the Authors here quoted by me my poor Country Study not affording them But on a Consideration of what the Author has quoted from them and what I find quoted from them by others we may discern how far they concur in that Doctrine which he here ascribes to them and to proceed in order as the Author has set them down I find the Opinion of Ephrem quoted by Ralegh from Barcephus thus Ephrem dicit Paradisum ambire terram atque ultra oceanum ita positum esse ut totum terrarum orbem ab omni circumdet regione non aliter atque lunae orbis lunam cingit Now he that can make Sense of this may unless he will expound it according to Plato's Fable of his Aethereal Earth The Author in his Latin Copy quotes also this Passage tho exprest in somewhat different terms and explains it thus That in the Paradisiacal Earth the Ocean compass'd about the Body of the Earth and the Paradisiacal Earth compass'd about the whole Ocean as the Orb of the Moon does the Moon so that he judges that Form of the Earth to be here intimated which he has before given it where the Abysse compass'd about the Body of the Earth and the Paradisiacal Earth the Abysse or the Ocean Now if this were so it 's manifest that Ephrem in that Passage could not relate to one Hemisphere more than to the other which was the only thing the Author had to make out But to be more plain in this matter the Book which Barcephas ascribes to Ephrem and that falsly as I conceive and whence he quotes his Opinion is call'd Parva Genesis or De Ortu Rerum the foregoing Passage well suiting with others quoted from a Book of that Title which I guess to be the same and if so I should have the worse Opinion of Barcephas for quoting so frivolous and I think I may say so impious a Pamphlet Ralegh derides that Parva Genesis for the miserable Stuff thence often quoted by Cedrenus and a Man may be as well satisfi'd of it by what we find thence quoted in Glycas who in the first part of his Annals says But that little Book De Ortu Rerum tells us that Adam took of the Tree of Knowledg and eat without Circumspection no way urg'd thereto by the Words of Eve but that he found a certain Disquiet in his Mind from Tiredness and Hunger But it 's best to bury these things in silence since they deserve an eternal silence And there he cites several other ridiculous Passages from him and concludes that every Man that understands the Scriptures looks upon them as so And again he quotes this Parva Genesis in the third Part of his Annals and rejects it in like manner saying that he knows not who was the Author of it whereas when on occasion he quotes Ephrem he does it with much reverence I have given a Character of this Book because the Author instances it in several places lamenting its loss and seems chiefly to rely on it in the Point under debate Barcephas indeed in one Passage which the Author quotes from him intimates Paradise to have been in the other Hemisphere But withal he says that it was beyond the Ocean and intimates it to be still in being so that unless the Author will receive these Traditions from him I know not why he should urge the other But I shall say more of Barcephas beneath As for Tatianus tho he distinguishes the Earth of Paradise from ours saying that to be of a more excellent make unless he had been more particular in pointing forth the place where it lay I know not why it should be concluded that he thought it in the other Hemisphere When Jacobus de Valentia places Paradise in the other Hemisphere he says it 's because it lies under more noble Stars than ours Now we know this ground to be notoriously false for that all Astronomers hold the Stars of this Hemisphere more noble than those in the other And as Mr. Gregory observes in his learned Notes on some Scripture Passages our Hemisphere is the principal and far more excellent than the other we have more Earth more Men more Stars more Day and which is more than all this the North Pole is more magnetical than the South according to what the learned Ridley says he observ'd viz. That the Pole of the Magnet which seats it self North is always the most vigorous and strong Pole to all intents and purposes If Hierom opposes Paradise to our Earth I know not why it should imply more than some Excellency of that Soil more than of ours Neither do the Passages of Sulpitius Severus or Constantine seem to me to have any force As for Austin and others that held Paradise remote from our World we know their Opinion relates to a suppos'd high elevated situation of Paradise and
Ancients and yet in the present form of the Earth we find no such thing nor any foundation for it I cannot believe that this was so universally receiv'd upon a slight presumption only because it lay under the Course of the Sun if the Sun had the same Latitude from the Equator in his Course and Motion that he has now c. he instances several of the Ancient Philosophers Astronomers and Geographers who held that Zone uninhabitable and adds that some of the Ancient Philosophers whom he also names held that the Poles of the World did once change their Situation and were at first in another posture from what they are now till that Inclination happen'd c. and concludes that these Opinions of the Ancients must refer to that State of things which he has represented in his Antediluvian World To this I answer that it seems no wonder it should be the common receiv'd Opinion among the Ancients that the Torrid Zone was uninhabitable for navigation being not come to its perfection America undiscover'd and no trading establish'd by Land to those parts of Africa that lye under the Torrid Zone and the great heats found in the neighbouring Climates to it might naturally induce such a belief in them so that we may allow it to have past as a negative Tradition among them for that no Man had attempted a discovery but to conclude that this was a positive Tradition among them deriv'd from Antediluvian times on a suppos'd differing position which the Heavens or Earth then had it 's more than the thing will bear neither was that Opinion of the uninhabitableness of the Torrid Zone so general in Ancient times but some Patrons of the Earth merely upon a stress of reasoning always said nay to it Thus Plutarch tells us that Pythagoras as great a Man as any among the Greeks and more ancient than any the Author has nam'd for the contrary Opinion held the Torrid Zone habitable and a temperate Region as being in the midst betwixt that of the Summer and that of the Winter and certainly Pythagoras was as likely a Man as any among the Ancients to have known such a Tradition and to have faithfully convey'd it to posterity if there had been any ground for it himself and Orpheus being judg'd by many to have been knowing in the Mosaick Cabala concerning the true System of the World Ptolomy also says many contend that the parts near the Equinoctial are inhabited as being the most temperate Region because the Sun neither stays in the vertical points but makes swift recesses according to Latitude from the Equinoctial points whence the Summer is rendred temperate neither in the Solstices is it far from the Vertex wherefore the Winters must be very mild Bede quotes this passage and adds but what those habitations are we cannot say with any likely ground for Men have not pass'd thither even to this day wherefore what is said of it may be lookt upon rather as a conjecture than a true History Tertullian also held the Torrid Zone a temperate Region and plac'd Paradise in it and so did Nicephoras according to the Opinion of Theophilus the like did Bonaventure and Durandus of later years and Avicenna among the Arabians held that Region temperate Here also it may be noted that generally those that held the uninhabitableness of the Torrid Zone held likewise the two Polar Zones uninhabitable through continual frosts there so that the Tradition of the one ought to be held as well as that of the other which would destroy the Authors Hypothesis for the source of his Waters as I have intimated before As to those Philosophers mention'd by the Author to have held that the Poles of the World once chang'd their Situation I know no reason we have to follow them in it more than a multitude of other erroneous Opinions which we find amongst the ancient Philosophers Ignonorance in Cosmography being an Epidemical distemper amongst them so that Plutarch tells us Pythagoras was said to be the first who bethought him of the Obliqueness of the Zodiack which Invention some ascribe to Oenopides of Chius The same tells us Parmenides was the first who limited the places inhabited on the Earth to wit those that are in the two habitable Zones to the Tropick Circles What wonder then that the Ancients should lie under great mistakes in things relating to that Knowledge But the Author urges in his Answer to Mr. Warren that Diogenes Anaxagoras Empedocles Leucippus and Democritus say there was once a Change of the Poles therefore it must be lookt upon as a Tradition amongst the Ancients for which they are good Testimonies But I would ask the Author whether either of those Philosophers deliver their Opinion as a Tradition among the Ancients Plutarch whence he quotes their Opinions entitles his Book The Opinions of the Philosophers and delivers this as their particular Opinion and not as a Tradition and assigns the several Reasons they went upon which are all found to be erroneous and to expect that we should receive their Opinion as a Tradition and acquiesce in it without any farther Ground seems to me altogether as unreasonable as to say that because Diagoras Theodorus Cyreneus Evemeras Euripides mentioned also by Plutarch and others of the ancient Philosophers held there was no Deity therefore this must be lookt upon as a well-grounded Tradition and fit for us to receive that there is no Deity This is too hard putting upon our Reason Well but the Author grants their Reasons are false but says it would be as injudicious to exclude them from being Witnesses or fair Testimonies of such a thing because they do not Philosophise well about that Change as if we should deny that there was such a War as the Peloponesian War because the Historian has not assign'd the true Causes and Reasons of it or to deny that a Comet appear'd in such a Year because a Person that makes mention of it has not given a good account of the generation of it nor of the Causes of its form and motion I answer That I do not exclude them from being Witnesses meerly because of the false Reasons they give for what they say but because that they neither own themselves as Witnesses neither does it any way appear that what they deliver is as they are VVitnesses but meerly from their own fancy as it may be said of Diagoras and the rest that held a non-existence of a Deity And as to the Instances of the Peloponesian War and the Comet there is a vast disparity betwixt these and the other for the Peloponesian War and the Comet are notorious Facts convey'd down to us by every Historian and Astronomer nemine contradicente as they receiv'd it from time to time from unquestionable Hands But what are those five Philosophers to the whole Body of the Philosophers both before and after them who mention no such thing Nor do those five affirm