not novv spend time in vievving the parts and materials of your Poeticall castle till you have brought it to perfection and then I vvill take a survey of every particular 4. I had said that a bigger body as a mill-stone vvill naturally descent svvifter then a lesse as a pebble stone the cause of this You will not have to be ascribed to the bodies bignesse but to the strength of naturall desire which that big body hath to such a motion Answ. You make a shevv as if you did ansvver our argument but in effect you ansvver nothing for if I should aske you vvhy a mill-stone falls faster then a pebble you will answer because it hath a stronger desire to fall but if I aske againe why it hath a stronger desire you answer because the bigger a thing is the stronger is its desire c. and is not your opinion now all one with mine in effect that it is the bignesse that is the cause of this swiftnesse now the same reason is appliable to bodies moving circularly for though they were in their proper scituations yet there is in them as great a desire to move about the center as there is in elementary bodies to move to and from the center therefore the greater the body is the greater desire it hath to move according to your opinion Againe I said that the winde will sooner move a great ship then a little stone you answer This is not because a ship is more easily moveable then a little stone but because a little stone is not so liable to the violence from whence its motion proceeds This answer is as wise as the former for why is not the stone as liable to the violent cause of its motion as the ship but because it is not so big therefore the ship is more easily moveable then the stone because by reason of its bignesse it 's more liable to the violent cause of its motion And when you say That I cannot throw a ship as farre as a stone I grant it but this will onely argue want of strength in me but not want of aptitude for a swifter motion in the ship then in the stone if I had strength to sling the one as well as the other A bigger bullet out of the same peece will flie farther and swifter then a lesser 5. I brought some instances to illustrate the possibility of the heavens swiftnesse as the sound of a cannon twenty miles off of the sight of a starre in a moment of the light passing suddenly from East to West of the swiftnesse of a bullet carried by the powder to these you answer That the passage of a sound is but slow compared to the heavens motion that the species of sound or sight are accidents and so is the light that the disproportion is great betwixt the heavens motion and the swiftnesse of a bullet Answ. Let the sound and light and species be what they will be they are moved and if they be accidents they cannot be moved alone but with the subject in which they are inherent therefore if there be such swiftnesse in the motion of these what need we doubt of the swiftnesse of the heavens and if accidents can be so swiftly moved with and in their subjects much swifter must be these heavenly substances having no resistance whose matter is so pure that it is a great furtherance to their motion and though there be great disproportion betwixt the bullets motion and the heavens swiftnesse yet the motion of the one serves to illustrate the swiftnesse of the other And yet I take not upon me as you doe peremptorily to tell how swift the heavens are and though I said that the light was an accident yet I said also that it was corpori simillimum that it comes very neere to the nature of a body neither did Aristotle prove the light to be no body because of its swiftnesse as if no body were capable of that swiftnesse for then he should contradict himselfe as you use to doe but he meanes that no sublunarie body had so swift a motion It had been folly to illustrate the swiftnesse of the bullets motion by the motion of the hand in the watch for there by many other motions far swifter then this to expresse the bullets motion but of sublunary motions there be none swifter then those I alledged to illustrate the motion of heaven 6. You would have the earth to be both the efficient and finall cause of its motion But indeed it is neither the one nor the other for if it move at all it must be moved by another mover then it selfe and God made the heavens not for the earth but for man so the diurnall and annuall motions have man for their finall cause and heavenly movers for their efficient 2. You say That nature is never tedious in that which may be done an easier way This I will not grant you for nature doth not still worke the easiest but the most convenient way but I deny that the earths motion is either more easie or more convenient then that of heaven for a light body such as heaven is is more easily moved then a heavy and it is more convenient that the foundation of our houses should remain firme and stable then moveable as I said I could tell you how laborious and tedious nature is in the perfecting of mans body and of many other things therefore she doth not take still the most compendious way 3. You say It is not likely that the heaven should undergoe so great and constant a worke which might be saved by the circumvolution of the earths body How tender hearted are you are you afraid that the heavens will grow wearie and I pray you is not heaven sitter to undergoe a great and constant worke then the earth so small so dull so heavy so subject to change a great worke is fit for a great body and a constant work fit for that body that knoweth no unconstancy 4. You are deceived when you say That the heaven receiveth no perfection by its motion but is made serviceable to this little ball of earth The perfection of heaven consisteth in its motion as the earths perfection in its rest neither was heaven made to serve this ball but to serve him who was made Lord of this ball 5. Your Similies of a mother warming her childe of a Cooke rosting his meat of a man on a tower of a Watch maker are all frivolous For a mother turneth her childe and a Cook his meat to the fire because the fire cannot turne it selfe to them the motion is in them not in the fire so he that is on a tower turnes himselfe round to see the countrey because the countrey cannot turne it selfe about him If you had proved to us that the heaven cannot move but that it is the earth that moveth then we should yeeld that the earth did foolishly to expect the celestiall fire to turne about her but
will be counted idle and none of the Planets But that the Earth may be a Planet is as true as that the Sun may be a burning stone that there may be a man in the Moon that there may be an infinite number of Suns and worlds that the Stars and Planets may have had their first originall and being from the Earth which have been the extravagant conceits of giddy headed Philosophers But I remember what Aristotle saith of some may-bees or possibilities 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that which may be may not be and never shall be and so the Earth may be a Planet that is it neither is not ever shall be a Planet But now let us leave your title and examine the substance of your following Discourse The CONTENTS of this Book CHAPT I. IN the Preface and first Chapter is shewed 1. The vanity and falshood of this new opinion 2. The Fathers concerning their judgement of the Antipodes cleared and vindicated and the Philosophers condemned 3. Job defended and explained 4. Pythagoras deciphered and his opinions condemned 5. Some Pythgoreans touched and censured Numa was not of this new opinion nor Pythagorean 6. This opinion hath few followers and how condemned by the Colledge of Cardinals 7. What is to be thought of those who have revolted from the truth of our opinion 8. The Church the Scripture sense and reason must be beleeved in this point of the earths stabilitie c. 9. This new opinion how and when an heresie CHAP. II. 1. Wee must beleeve the Scripture not our owne phansies 2. The Scripture never patronizeth a lye or an errour nor doth it apply it selfe to our capacity in naturall things though it doth in supernaturall mysteries 3. We must sticke to the literall sense when the Scripture speaks of naturall things 4. Some particular Scriptures vindicated from our adversaries false glosses as namely Psal. 19 of the Suns motion like a Gyant and Bride-groom of the ends of heaven and of his heat Eccles. 1. of the Suns rising and setting Jos. 12. of the Suns standing still of the midst of heaven how over Gibeon and how no day like that Isa. 38. of the Suns returning ten degrees of the greatnesse and meaning of this miracle neither known to the Gentiles The testimony of Herodotus concerning this CHAP. III. 1. The Scripture doth not speake according to vulgar opinion when it calls the Moone a great light for so it is 2. Nor when it speakes of waters above the Heavens for such there are 3. Nor when it calls the Starres innumerable for so they are 4. Nor when it mentions the circumference of the bâ—asâ—n Sea to be thirty cubits and the diameter tenne for so it was Why the lesser number is sometime omitted 5. Nor in saying the earth is founded on the waters which is true 6. The right and left side of heaven how understood and how the heaven is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and of the Intelligences 7. The Scripture speaketh properly in attributing understanding to the heart The Galenists opinion discussed 8. Of ova aspidum and the Vipers egges how understood 9. The Aspe or Adder how hee stops his eare 10. Of the North and South winde in Scripture 11. The Sun shall be truely darkned the Moon turned to blood and the starres shall fall c. 12. Of the windes whence they come c. 13. The sea the onely cause of springs 14. The thunder is truly Gods voice 15. The 7. Stars CHAP. IIII. 1. Many Philosophicall points are handled in Scripture 2. The heavens how round in the opinion of the Fathers 3. Wee must have a reverend esteem of the Fathers 4. How the seas not overflowing the land may be esteemed a miracle 5. The works of Nature may be called miracles CHAP. V. Divers Scriptures vindicated from false glosses as Eccles. 1. 4. by which is proved the earths immobility and heavens motion 2. How the earth is eternall and renewed 3. The Scripture speaketh not plainly and ambiguously in the same place 4. The Scripture useth Metaphors 5 How the earth stands out of the water 2 Pet. 3. 5. by which its immobilitie is proved 6. What is meant 1 Chron. 16. 30. c. by these words The world is established c. 7. What is meant Psal. 90. 2. by the earth and the world 8. How the heavens Prov. 3. 19. are established and the Moon and Starres Psal. 89. 37. c. 9. How the heavens 2 Sam. 22. 8. bath foundations 10. What are the pillars of heaven in Job 10. of the ends sides and corners of the earth in Scripture 11. What is meant Isa. 51. 6. by the planting of the heavens 12. How the earth is established 13. What Job meanes by the earth moved out of its place CHAP. VI. 1. The earth is in the middle and center of the world and why 2. Hell is in the center or middle of the earth 3. The earth lowest and basest how 4. Every thing is made questionable by some 5. Aristotle defended 6. The earth is in the center because in the midst of the equinoctiall Horizon c. 7. The imagination must be conformable to the things not these to it the vanity of imagininary circles 8. Astronomers reproved and their vanity shewed chiefly about the bignesse of the stars 9. The earth is the least cirle therefore the center how understood CHAP. VII 1. The Starres have not their light because the Sun is in the center nor hath the Sun lesse light being out of it 2. Why the Earth in the center 3. The Sun is not the center because the Planets move about him 4. The center is not the most excellent place neither are the best things next it or in it 5. There is an harmony amongst the Starres though the Sun be not in the center CHAP. VIII 1. How the eye is deceived and how not and that if the earth moved we should see it 2. Motion and rest how the objects of the eye and of the common sense 3. If the earth moved the clouds would but seeme to move as well as the sunne 4. How the eye can be deceived in the motion of a lucid body 5. The naturall motion of the foundation cannot keep buildings from falling 6. The heavens fitter for motion then the earth 7. Rugged bodies not fittest for motion 8. The sight hindred by the motion of the subject medium and object 9. One simple body hath but one naturall motion proved 10. Essentiall properties more chiefly in the whole then in the parts the earth is heavy in its owne place how bignesse how a hinderance to motion of the earths ineptitude to a swift motion 11. The magneticall qualities of the earth a fiction 12. Similitudes no prooses the seas ebbing and flowing what 13. The whole earth moveth not because the parts move not round 14. Absurd phrases and the spots about the sunne censured 15. That the earth turnes about the moone is ridiculous 16. Some observations to prove
ship and of the moving of the oares they will not hold for it is true that though the banks seeme to move yet it will not follow that my friend doth but seem to walke or the oares seeme to move when as they move truely the reason is because the motion of the ship is no hinderance to the sight of that motion of my friend or of the oares being so neer to my eye although that same motion of the ship is a hinderance both to the sight of the earths stability as also of the motion of such things as be afar off for a horse a great way off on the shore running will seeme to me a bush moving with the trees and bankes even so the motion of the earth may as well delude my eye in the moving of the clouds as of the sunne 3. I said that the eye could not be still deceived in its sight or judgement of a lucid body which is its prime and proper object Your answer is That the deceipt is not concerning the light or colour of these bodies but concerning their motion which is neither the primary nor proper object of the eye Answ. The motion of the sunne as you take it is no wayes the object of the eye for it is non ens in your opinion What is apparent is not quod videtur non est a seeming motion is no motion and therefore no object 2. I said that a lucid body was the eyes object the light it selfe objectum quo or the cause that bodies are discernable by the eye now what probability is there that the eyes which were made to looke upon these lucid bodies should be still deluded or can be seeing their motion is rather the object of the eye then their light as is said albeit motion be a common object I see their motion I see their lucid bodies but their light I see not properly their light is the cause or meanes by which but not the objectum quod or thing that I see 4. We say that our high buildings would be hurled down if the earth did move You answer That this motion is naturall and therefore regular and tending to conservation Answ. Earth-quakes are naturall motions which neither are regular nor tend to conservation the motion of windes haile raine thunder c. are naturall and yet doe much hurt therefore the naturality of the earths motion cannot preserve our buildings from falling But you say If a glasse of beere may stand firmely in a ship moving swiftly much lesse will the naturall and equall motion of the earth cause any danger in our buildings Answ. There is no proportion betweene a glasse of beer and a high building nor is there between the motion of a ship and of the earth for the ship moves upon the plaine superficies of the water being carried by the winde or tide the earth moves circularly and with an incredible celerity as your side say You should compare the earths motion to the motion of a wheele or great globe and then set your glasse of beer upon it whilst it is whirling about but you need not feare the fall of your high buildings though the heaven whirle about except you meane to build castles in the aire or to raise your house as high as the tower of Babell I thinke your buildings in the moone cannot stand upon such a whirling foundation 5. I perceive by your Interjection ha ha he that you are a merry gentleman indeed you cannot answer for laughing but Per resum multum c. I doubt me you are troubled with a hypochondriacke melancholy or with the spirit of blinde Democritus take heed of risus Sardonius But let us see what it is that tickles you I had said that though this circular motion of the earth were naturall to it yet it was not naturall to townes and buildings for these are artificiall To this you answer not but by your interjection of laughter which is a very easie way to solve arguments and so fooles will prove the best disputants I hope you doe not thinke that townes and buildings are naturall bodies or that the motion of the earth is naturall to them and if you thinke that artificiall things are priviledged from falling by the naturall motion of a naturall foundation you speake against reason and experience for a ship is not priviledged from sinking because the foundation on which it is carried moves naturally and high buildings must needs be weakned by motion let it be never so equall and regular hee that thinkes otherwise deserves to be laughed at I have read of moving Islands but without buildings you were best goe build there 6. I said that the aire could never be quiet about us but that there would be a continuall and forcible motion of it from East to West if the earth did move with that celerity you speak of to this you answer That the aire is carried along with the same motion of the earth But this will not help you for the carrying of the aire about with the earth cannot hinder the forcible motion of it nor can we be so senselesse as not to feele it Doth not the whirling about of a great wheele move the aire about it and if you stood by you should feele it But you are very witty in your words following If the motion of the heaven say you which is a smooth body be able to carry with it a great part of the three elements c. much more may our earth which is a rugged body be able to turne the aire next to it You should rather say If the earth which is but a small dull low and heavy body can carry the aire about with it much more may the heavens doe this which are vast agil active and high bodies for we finde that the superiour bodies are more apt to work upon and to move the inferiour then to be moved by the inferiour as the inferiour parts of the little world of mans body are moved by the head so it is in the great world Againe the heavens in respect of their agility activity subtlety come neerer to the nature of spirits then the earth which is a dull heavy lumpish body not apt to be moved much lesse to move Is it the earth that moves the aire or the aire that moves the earth in earth-quakes Is it the earthy and heavy part of mans body that moves these aereall substances in the nerves which we call animall spirits Or are not these rather the movers of our grosse bodies Your argument is just such another as this if the winde or aire be able to move about the weather-cocke much more may the tower or steeple which is a rugged body move it But that rugged bodies are more apt to move or to be moved then smooth bodies I never heard before I have observed that the smoother the bowle is the swifter it runneth why did David choose five smooth stones to sling if rugged ones
you had spake within compasse If one should say that a little wheele and a great mill-stone may be moved according to the proportion of their bodies so likewise may the hill Athos or Atlas be turned about he would be counted ridiculous and yet there is a farre greater proportion between a mill-stone and those hills then between an Eagle and the Earth 7. Though the magnitude of the earth make it incapable of so swift a motion yet this doth not make the heaven much more incapable as you say For it is the magnitude joyned with the heavinesse of the earth that makes it incapable of such a motion but the heavens are not heavy though great A cloud which may be a mile or two about hath a greater magnitude then a pebble small stone and yet you see with what facility the cloud is carried whereas the stone is not moved though it were high in the air but with the motion of descent 8. As for the swiftnesse of the earth's course which exceeds not you say the celerity of clouds driven by a tempestuous winde of a cannon bullet which in a minute flies foure miles c. These I say are the phansies of a crasie braine in a dream you are the onely darling and favourite of Nature who both knowes the Earth's motion and how much it can runne in a minute It seemes this incredible swiftnesse of the earth hath made your head giddy that you know not what you write and how can it be otherwise for if you be carried 240. miles in an houre and your pen whilst it is forming almost every letter foure miles in a minute your braines flie as fast as the bullet out of the cannon If this be true I doe not think that either you know what you write or where you are nay you could not write at all nor were it possible for you to live or for your lungs and heart to move or draw breath Your subsequent discourse of the Earths magneticall property is grounded as indeed all your Book upon ridiculous suppositions and on such grounds do you raise the structure of your Babel or bables 1. You suppose that the lower parts of the Earth do not consist of such a soft fructifying soyl as in the surface because there is no use for it But what if I should suppose the contrary that it doth consist of a fructifying soyle and that there be people there aswell as in your Moone I doubt not but I could prove it with as good reasons as you do your world in the Moon 2. You suppose it consists of a hard rock is substance because these lower parts are pressed close together by the weight of the heavy bodies above them What if I should suppose the contrary that the softest ground is in the lowest parts as being farthest from the Sun which hardneth the earth therefore they that dig deep into to the bowells of the earth finde it still softer and softer the deeper they goe And wee know that many fruits and heavy bodies are hard and stonie without but soft within the earth then is not like a cheese that by pressing groweth hard 3. You suppose that this rockie substance is a load-stone But what if I should suppose it to be a diamond which is more likely both because it is the more precious stone and Nature commonly layeth up the most precious things within her most inward parts and because it is harder for according to your doctrine the pressing close of heavy bodies is the cause of hardnesse 4. It 's probable you say that this rockie substance is a load-stone because the earth and load-stone agree in so many properties What if I should say that they disagree in many more properties and that therefore this cannot be the load-stone But what an Argument is this the earth and loadstone agree in many properties therefore the lower part of the earth consists of load-stones as if you would say A man and an horse agree in many properties therefore the lower part of a man consists or is made up of a horse or thus The elementary and our culinary fire agree in many properties therefore the inmost or lower part of the one consists of the other 5. You say well that what hath all the properties of the load-stone must needs be of that nature but because you are not well read in the Master of syllogismes you inferre that the inward parts of the earth consist of a magneticall substance which is the conclusion without an assumption which should have been this but the lower parts of the earth have all the properties of the load-stone which wee deny Now let us heare how you prove it The difference you say of declination and variation in the mariners needle cannot proceed from it selfe being the same every where nor from the heavens for then the variation would not be still alike in the same place but divers according to the severall parts of heaven which at severall times happen to be over it therefore it proceeds from the earth which being endowed with magneticall affections diversly disposeth the motions of the needle I answer the Earth may have a disponent vertue to alter the needle and yet not be a load-stone so the heavens are the causes of generation corruption alterations c. in the world and yet they are not capable of these qualities the Moon causeth the sea to ebbe and flow doth shee therefore partake of the like affections or hath shee the properties of the sea The load-stone disposeth the motions of the yron will you therefore inferre that the load-stone hath the properties of yron 2. If the variation as you say of the needle be divers according to the severall parts of heaven passing over it it must follow that the needle must vary every minute and scruple of an houre even here where we live seeing every scruple or minute divers parts of the heaven are still passing over it 3. If the Inclination or motion of the needle towards the North is caused by the heaven not by the earth why should not the variation and declination of it be caused by the heaven likewise You are driven to hard shifts when you are forced to flie to similitudes for want of proofs to strengthen your weak and absurd assertions for similitudes may illustrate they cannot prove 2. Because you cannot shew any similitude of the earth's motion with such things as you are acquainted you are forced to borrow similitudes from those things with which you are not acquainted rather then you will seeme to say nothing You flie beyond the Moon Saturne and Iupiter must serve you at a dead life but I know not upon what acquaintance This is your conceit A bullet or any part of the earth being severed from the whole observes no lesse the same motions then if they were united to the whole whereas Jupiter Saturne c. doe constantly and regularly move on in their courses hanging in the
Pererius explaines himselfe in another place that that is only time properly and principally which is measured by the motion of the primum mobile because the motion of the heaven is the first and the cause of all other motions and because it is the least as being the swiftest and it is most certaine and uniforme universall and known to all so that if the earth did move which as yet you have not proved yet these conditions cannot agree with the earths motion time which is measured by other motions is not properly and formally but materially and improperly so called so it is false that the earths motion is the cause of time which Pererius never affirmed or dreamed of 4. You will have the heavens subject to other vanities besides that of motion as first unto many changes witnesse the comets seen amongst them and then to that generall corruption in the last day when they shall passe away with a noise c. Answ. If changes be vanity to how much vanity is your world in the Moon subject which so often changeth 2. Though the heavenly bodies were subject to other vanities as you say yet these will not exempt them from the vanity of motion 3. How comets which are Gods extraordinary workes and denouncers of his judgements are vanities I understand not 4. That the Apostle speaks of comets in that place is your part to prove either by reason or authority 5. That comets which are seen onely by us in the aire are discerned by you amongst the heavenly bodies is no wonder seeing you can discern a world in the Moon 6. St. Ambrose on that place sheweth that the vanity to which the heaven is subject is the continuall toile of their motion and that it expects rest that it may be delivered from servile work 7. If the heavens be subject to the vanity of corruption as you say tell us whether you speak properly and philosophically or metaphorically If philosophically you are absurd for every fresh-man can tell you that heaven is not capable of generation and corruption if metaphorically you speak impertinently for by the passing away of heaven is meant onely the abolition of imperfect qualities and a perfecting of it to a more glorious estate 8. The heavens you say are subject to that generall corruption in which all creatures shall be involved in the last day But you cannot tell us what that corruption shall be and so you speak at randome you doe not mean I hope that the heavens shall be involved in the same corruption with snakes rats toads and other such kinde of creatures You say that there is not such invincible strength in my arguments as might cause me triumph before hand But I say there is so much vincible weaknesse in your answers that makes me think that the refutation of them deserves neither triumph nor ovation so that my strife with you is but pugna nullos habitura triumphos neither did I purpose to make you any reply had not some friends solicited me to vindicate the truth and my owne credit which seemed to be somewhat eclipsed by the unwholsome fogs and misty discourses of your Book I said that the heaven was called AEthera ab 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from its continuall motion and the earth Vesta quòd vi suâ stat from its immobility You say they were so called because it was then the common opinion that the heaven moved and the earth stood But now because you are of another opinion it 's fit that the names be changed aswell as the nature let the heaven now be called Vesta and the earth AEtherae or let heaven be called Terra quòd perenni cursu omnia terat and the earth should be called coelum à caelando so let all things and arts be confounded Grammar aswell as your Logick Philosophy and Astronomy 2. If heaven and earth have their Etymology from what they seeme to be not from what they are then the like may be said of other things Fire is called focus à fovendo from cherishing the sea is called mare quasi amarum because it is salt or bitter not that these things are so but because they seem to be so the like may be said of other Etymologies 3. For your conceit of the Hebrew word Erets from Ruts because it runs is but a running motion of your head The Hebrews who were better skilled in their owne language then you are derive Erets from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because it continually desires to beare fruit as Munster sheweth in Genes c. 1. You object to your selfe How are two distinct motions conceiveable in the earth at the same time and you answer you selfe that it is easily apprehended considering how both these motions tend from West to East as you instance in a bowle Answ. How the earth should have two distinct circular motions is not conceiveable by us nor demostrable by you Your similie of the bowle is a poor demonstrastration and indeed false for it running on the superficies of the ground hath not two circular motions as you should have shewed but onely one such motion or rowling the other as it moves from your hand to the mark is the motion of projection or rather the bowles motion is indeed but one being a mixed or compounded motion neither doth it move with two distinct circular motions in the same place the same time as you will have the earth to doe but it runs from one place to another neither is it naturall but violent and though it were true that the bowle had two distinct circular motions in the same place at the same time yet it will not prove that the earth is either capable or we conceiveable of these two motions considering the disproportion that is between the vast and heavy earth and a small light bowle You conclude this Chapter singing the triumph before the victory for you say that we may gather some satisfaction out of it but indeed we can gather none neither are we a whit the wiser for it but leave it with as great discontents and as little satisfaction as they did Sibylla's cave who came to consult with her intricate Oracles Inconsulti abeunt sedemque odêre Sibyllae Chap. IX 1. The earth cannot be the cause of its owne motion 2. The vasinesse and thicknesse of the heavin no hinderance to its motion 3. The matter of the heavens and their smoothnesse no hinderance to their motion 4. Bignesse helps motion 5. The heavens swistnesse illustrated by other motions 6. The earth neither the finall nor efficient cause of its motion the heaven fitter for motion because greater and more constant nature worketh not still the most compendious way some idle similitudes refuted 7. Bodies having the same properties have not alwayes the same motion motion belongs to the noblest creatures 8. The smoothnesse subtilty and purity of bodies no hinderance to their motion the aire moves the water the circular motion of the fire naturall
inferre that our soules are superfluous because a naturall power resulting from the matter of our bodies and intrinsecall to them will serve the turne as well But indeed such excellent bodies as the heavens did require a more excellent forme then sublunary bodies doe for these are content with an informing form but the heavens stood in need of an assisting forme and how can we conceive that out of such pure and simple materials as the heavens are there should result a naturall power to move them circularly orderly constantly perpetually If our grosse and decaying bodies are moved with reasonable soules which though they be internall formes result not from the power of the matter much more should the heavens be regulated by Intelligent spirits and not by any naturall power 4. This naturall power of moving must be either the forme brought out of the matter which is done by generation but in heaven there is no generation because there is no privation of an other forme or any appetite in the matter to it or else this power must be a forme brought into the matter but no forme is introduced into the matter except the reasonable soule therefore there is no informing forme in heaven and consequently there can be no other movers but Angels This Argument I urged against Carpenter but you winked at it and said nothing 5. You say That Intelligences being immaterials cannot immediately worke upon a body What is this to the purpose If they work upon bodies it 's no matter how they worke wee know that our soules worke upon our grosse bodies and so doe the Intelligences upon the heavens we know that spirits work upon muteriall substances immediately or else there would be no working at all and it is ridiculous in you to disable the Angels from working or moving because they have no instruments or hands to take hold of the heavens What hands hath your soule when it works on your body What hands hath the winde when it moves the clouds 6. You have no reason to insult so over the Schoole-men who affirme that the faculty whereby the Angels move their orbes is their will for what faculty else can you imagine in them Doth not your soule worke upon your body by the will so that albeit there be many instruments by which the soule moveth the body yet the prime faculty by which it moveth is the will so that if you suspend your act of willing a motion you must needs stand still and on the contrary your onely willing to move the hand or foot is sufficient as the chiefe medium or faculty to move them And so it is with the heavens saving onely that there are no subordinate organs by which the Angelicall will doth move the heavens but when you say that there was no need of Angels since this might be as well done by the will of God You speake idlely for so you may say that there is no need of our soules to move our bodies since this might be as well done by the will of God Angelicall and humane wills are subordinate and serviceable to the will of God but not excluded by it For in him we live and move and yet we live and move by our soules too And as impertinent is your other question How the orbes are capable of perceiving this will in the Intelligences or what motive faculty have they of themselves to inable them to obey Answ. The orbes are as capable to perceive the will of the Angels as your body is to perceive your will or as those bodies were which the Angels of old assumed and by them conversed with the Patriarchs and as those bodies had a motive faculty to obey the Angels will so have the heavens much more Keplar's opinion that the Planets are moved round by the Sunne and that this is done by sending forth a magneticke vertue and that the Sun-beames are like the teeth of a wheele taking hold of the Planets are senselesse crotchets fitter for a wheeler or miller then a Philosopher This magneticke vertue is a salve for all sores a pin to stop every hole for still when you are reduced to a non-plus magneticke vertue is your onely subterfuge like AEneas his target Unum omniae contra tela Latinorum If you had told us that the North starre had a magneticke vertue because the needle touched with the magnes looketh towards it some silly people perhaps would have beleeved you and yet the magneticke vertue is in the needle not in the star but that in the Sunne there should be a magneticke vertue it hath no show of probability This vertue you say may hold out to as great a distance as light or heat But if this comparison hold it will follow that there is no such vertue in the Sunne for that light which is in the aire is not in the Sunne neither is that heate which wee feele caused by the Sunne in the Sunne but your following words are admirable That if the Moone may move the sea why may not the Sunne move the earth As if you would say If the North-winde shake the woods why may not the South-winde shake the mountaines Or according to your doctrine if the earth can move the Moone why may not Venus or Mercury move the Sunne or why may not the Sunne move the Firmament You conclude well That your Quare's are but conjectures and that no man can finde out the workes of God from the beginning to the end and yet you have found out that which God never made to wit a rolling Earth a standing Heaven a world in the Moone which indeed are not the workes of God but of your owne head for his workes are incomprehensible his wayes past finding out Trouble not then your selfe too much in these things which in this life you cannot understand learne to know your selfe that wee may know you too and by the knowledge of your selfe strive to know God the knowledge of whom is life eternall I will give you good counsell in the words of Hugo Nosce teipsum melior es si te ipsum cognoscas quaem si te neglecto cursus siderum vires herbarum c. Coelestium omnium terrestrium scientiam haberes multi multa sciunt seipsos nesciunt quum summa Philosophia sit cognitio sui CHAP. X. 1. The idle and uncertaine concetes of Astronomers concerning the celestiall bodies 2. The appearances of the Sunne and other Planets cannot be so well discerned by the earth if it did move 3. The excellency of Divinity above Astronomy and an exhortation to the study of it THis proposition is full of suppositions fraughted with figures and characters which more affect the eye then satisfie the minde neither doe they demonstrate the motions of the earth but the motions of your head The pictures in Ovids Metamorphosis adde not the more credit to his fictions neither doe these figures to you phansies wee will beleeve no more then you can demostrate
THE New PLANET no PLANET OR The EARTH no wandring STAR Except in the wandring heads of GALILEANS HERE Out of the Principles of Divinity Philosophy Astronomy Reason and Sense the Earth's immobility is asserted the true sense of Scripture in this point cleared the Fathers and Philosophers vindicated divers Theologicall and Philosophicall points handled AND COPERNICUS his Opinion as erroneous ridiculous and impious fully refuted By ALEXANDER ROSSE In answer to a Discourse that the Earth may be a PLANET LACTANT do falsâ Sapientiâ lib. 3. cap. 24. Quid dicam de iis nescio qui cum semel aberraverint constanter in stultitia perseverant vanis vana defendunt nisi quòd eos interdum puto aut joci causâ philosophari aut prudentes scios mendacia defendenda suscipere quasi ut ingenia sua in malis rebus exerceant vel ostentent LONDON Printed by I. Young and are to be sold by Mercy Meighen and Gabriel Bedell next to the middle-Temple-gate 1646. To the Right honourable GEORGE Lord BERKLEY Baron of Berkley c. My Lord THey who have been long at sea when they come on shore think that the Earth moveth as the Sea did till their brains be settled even so these men who have been lately travelling in the new found world of the Moon which swiftly moveth about the Earth think when they come down hither that it is the Earth which moveth This false imagination I have endeavoured to remove in this Book which now comes abroad under your Lordships Name the reason of my dedication is because I understand by your Lordship that the Gentleman who came down a while agoe from the Moon with newes of a late discovery there is of this opinion and one who hath relation to your Lordship which indeed I knew not till now that the Book is almost printed my other reason is for that I am bound in a dutifull recognition of your Lordships respects to scholars in generall and to me in particular which sheweth that not only are you noble by extraction but by your affection also and disposition to learning which is now so much slighted yea vilified by such as are either ignorant or wicked the one slight learning because they know it not ignoti nulla cupido and like the Fox in the Fable disparage the grapes because he could not reach them the other raile against learning as the mad Africans do against the Sun and how can Owles and Bats love the light which manifest their deformity Can theeves and cut-throats whilst they are penetrating the works of darknesse abide the light of a torch The infernall ghosts tremble to see any light trepdiant immisso lumine manes But your Lordship being de meliore luto knowes the worth of learning and therefore loves it which that you may long know love and live shall be the wish of Your Honours most humble servant to command ALEXANDER ROSS To the READER GOod Reader there is a namelesse man come down from the Moone who brings us strange newes of a late discoverie to wit of a world found there This man of the Moone goeth about to perswade us in a booke which he hath set out come lately to my hands that the world ever since Adam hath been in a dreame in thinking that the heavens move and the earth rests He tells us another tale to wit that it is the earth that moveth and the heavens stand still He lieth in ambush and from his darke lurking place shoots abroad his arrowes so that we can no more see him then if he were in the Moone still but it is a cowardly part to hide himselfe and from the cloud in which he is wrapt to let fly his darts against me and that Book which a few yeares agoe I wrote in Latine in confutation of this new phantasticall Chimaera My case is like that of Volscus in the Poet who knew not whence those darts came that killed Sulmo and Tagus Saevit atrox Volscus nec teli conspicit usquam Authorem nec quo se ardens immittere possit I might be thought luctari cum larvis to fight against shadowes as AEneas did going down to hell If I should make any reply to a namelesse disputer but I am advised however to answer him least he should sing iò triumphe and not to suffer by silence my reputation to be wounded the truth prejudiced and the Scriptures abused with his idle glosses Therefore here I present to thee the weaknesse and vanities of this mans conceits as far as the shortnesse of time and my other studies and affaires would permit me which I pray thee accept in good part and so farewell The PREFACE THe title of this new book is a may be that the Earth may be a Planet but I say that may not be For a Planet is a wandring starre and the Earth is not a starre in its essence nor a wanderer in its motion And indeed you wrong our common mother who so many thousand yeares hath been so quiet and stable that now she should become a wonderer in her old age but if she may be a Planet tell us whether she may be one of the seven Planets who are called Errones in Latine not for that they have an erroneous but because they have a various motion or whether she may be an eighth Planet that so wee may make up our week of eight dayes for why should not mother Earth have one day of the week aswell as the other Planets to carry her name And so let there be dies terrae aswell as dies Solis Lunae Earth day aswell as Sunday or Moonday and whereas the Planets are moved according to the motion of the spheares you had done us a pleasure if you had told us the spheare in which the Earth moveth Againe if the Earth be a Planet and each Planet hath its period of time for finishing its course Saturne 30. yeares Iupiter 12. Mars 2 c. What is the time which you will allot to the Earth for the accomplishing of her annuall motion If it be true that the lower the Planet is the swifter it is in its annuall motion as the Moon in 27. dayes and 8. houres doth finish her course which Saturne ends not but in 30. yeares space doubtlesse this Earth-planet being the lowest of all must in a very short time expire its annuall race Moreover if the Earth be the eight Planet Sol who is the King of this planeticall Common-wealth cannot have his throne in the midle as Antiquity and Truth too have placed hiw for hee shall have three on his one hand and four on the other and so cannot impart his light equally to all And whereas every one of the Planets hath his office in this Reipublick to wit Saturne the Counceller Iupiter the Judge Mars the Captaine Venus the Steward Mercury the Scribe or Chancellour and the Moone the Messenger Wee must needs finde out some office for the Earth otherwise she
that the earth turnes about the clouds refuted 17. Of a mixed motion of the place medium and space 18. Of the motion of comets 19. My nine arguments defended 1. That the earths motion would make it hot 2. The aire purer 3. A sound 4. Heaven hath all things fit for motion 5. Of similar parts and the whole 6. The sunne is the heart of the world 7. It workes by motion 8. The earth is the firme foundation 9. The authority of Divises the heaven called AEther the earth hath not two distinct motions CHAP. IX 1. The earth cannot be the cause of its owne motion 2. The vastnesse and thicknesse of the heaven no hinderance to its motion 3. The matter of the heavens and their smoothnesse no binderance to their motion 4. Bignesse helps motion 5. The heavens swistnesse illustrated by other motions 6. The earth neither the finall nor efficient cause of its motion the heaven sitter for motion because greater and more constant nature worketh not still the most compendious way some idle similitudes refuted 7. Bodies having the same properties have not alwayes the same motion motion belongs to the noblest creatures 8. The smoothnesse subtilty and purity of bodies no hinderance to their motion the aire moves the water the circular motion of the fire naturall how 9. Of Intelligences how and why they move the heavens 10. Magneticke vertue an idle conceit CHAP. X. 1. The idle and uncertaine conceits of Astronomers concerning the celestiall bodies 2. The appearances of the Sunne and other Planets cannot be so well discerned by the earth if it did move 3. The excellency of Divinity above Astronomy and an exhorlation to the study of it The new PLANET no PLANET The CONTENTS 1. The vanity and falshood of this new opinion 2. The Fathers concerning their judgement of the Antipodes cleared and vindicated and the Philosophers condemned 4. Pythagoras deciphered and his opinions condemned 5. Some Pythagoreans touched and censured Numa was not of this now opinion nor Pythagorean 6. This opinion hath few followers and how condemned by the Colledge of Cardinals 7. What is to be thought of those who have revolted from the truth of our opinion 8. The Church the Scripture sense and reason must be beleeved in this point of the earths stabilitie c. This new opinion how and when an heresie CHAPT I. I Had shewed how unreasonable it was that an upstart novelty concerning the Earth's motion should thrust out a truth of so long continuance and universality as this of the Earth's immobility You answer That wee must not so doat upon antiquity as to count that Canonicall which is approved by the consent of the Ancients To this I answer 1. Make it appeare that your opinion of the Earth's motion is true and ours false and we will prefer yours though new 2. If you can make it appeare that your opinion is any waies usefull or advantageous wee will admit it 3. Suppose that both your and our opinion were but conjecturall and that there were but an equall probability in both yet you must not prefer nor equall your opinion to ours because we have antiquity and consent of all times of all nations of so many holy wise and learned men for us which you want in this respect then if both our opinions were put in the balance yours will be found too light though you should adde to the scale that heavie Prussian Copernicus 4. Though there were no hurt in your opinion yet wee may not entertaine it for the world is pestered with too many opinions already and a great many might be well spared 5. But whereas your opinion is false absurd and dangerous as we have partly shewed and will shew afterwards wee were mad to receive it having neither truth reason sense consent antiquity or universality to countenance it 6. That which you call the preserving of Philosophicall libertie is indeed the loosing of the reines to exorbitant wits to run headlong into every kinde of absurdity 7. Wee doe not inslave our selves to the opinion of any one man as you suppose we doe but we are of the opinion of all men of all times and nations You inslave your selfe to one man and is guilty of that which you accuse in us Quis tulerit Gracchos 8. Wee condemne not your opinion because it is new but because not true A new falshood a false novelty and such a new deformed brat is to be choaked in the infancy Principiis obsta kill the Cockatrice in the egge 9. You say it 's but a novelty in Philosophy but I say it intrencheth upon Divinity for Divinity tells us that the standing of the sun and moving of the earth are the miraculous workes of Gods supernaturall power your new Philosophy tells us that they are the ordinary workes of Nature and so this scope being granted you may turn Divinity into naturall Philosophy and confound the works of God and of Nature 10. You tell us That Antiquity consists in the old age of the world not in the youth of it What Antiquity Of the world then you speak not properly as you say you doe but tautologically the worlds old age consists in its old age If you mean that your opinion is not new but old because the world is old you speak absurdly for old opinions are so called not because they were found out in the youth or in the old age of the world but because they have continued a long time in the world and so new opinions are new though found out in the old age of the world Opinions have no relation to the ages of the world but to their owne continuance Are you older then your great Grand-father because the world is older now than it was when hee lived 11. You are the fathers you say in such learning as may be increased by experiments and discoveries and of more authority then former ages Why doe you not tell us plainly that you are fathers of learning as well as in learning but indeed you are not the fathers of learning you are onely fathers of your new discoveries and fresh experiments that is of new fond and savourlesse phansies and why you must be of more authority then former ages I see no reason Shall not Iuball and Tuball-Cain the inventors and fathers of their Arts be of as great authority as you that are the fathers of such mishapen monsters though they lived in the infancy and you in the old age of the world Why should I rather credit you in telling us of a world in the Moon and of the Earth that it is a planet then those wise men of former ages who never dreamt of such idle and ridiculous conceits You say Truth is the daughter of time so say I but errors heresies falshoods are times daughters too We see how fruitfull this later age of the world is of new and frivolous opinions But how much are you beholding to old mother Time who hath bestowed
her eldest daughter Truth upon you having past by so many worthy Suitors in all ages this is a transcendent favour you are homo perpaucorum hominum and have been wrapped in your mothers smock 12. In leaving us to our liberty to accept or reject your opinion I perceive you have no great confidence in your new married wife Times daughter you mistrust your cause and the validity of your arguments and that you have imployed your pen more to shew your wit then to evince our understanding 2. You will not have this Philosophicall doubt decided by common people for they judge by their senses nor yet by the holy Fathers for they were ignorant you say in this part of learning Aristotle you have already disabled for his works are not necessarily true and I say it is not fit that you should be Judges in your owne cause Whom then will you name for Judges seeing Scriptures Fathers senses Peripateticks are rejected reasons and arguments you have none I think you must be faine to call for some of your people out of the Moon Iuno Lucina fer opem But in calling of the Fathers ignorants in this part of learning you doe them wrong for they were neither ignorant of Philosophy nor of Astronomy they condemned the idle opinions of both amongst the rest that of the Antipodes For although I deny not the Antipodes yet the Philosophers opinions concerning them were vaine as That they inhabited that Region to which the sun riseth when it sets with us 2. In that they could not tell how these people came thither seeing the vast ocean beyond the straight of Gibraltar was not navigable and they confessed that it could not be passed 3. The reasons which they alledged to prove Antipodes were not demonstrative nor experimentall but meerly conjecturall so that the Fathers could receive no satisfaction from their reasons 4. They held that those Antipodes were another race of men then these of this hemisphere and that they had been there perpetually and that they neither could nor ever should know what kind of men they were 5. They did waver in their opinion sometimes saying that the westerne people were Antipodes to us sometimes the Southerne people sometime confounding Antipodes and Antichthones 6. They would necessarily inferre from the roundnesse of the earth that the lower hemisphere was dry earth and inhabitated with people the consequence of which S. Austine denies 7. They held that the opposite earth to ours had an opposite motion Of these and other vaine opinions concerning Antipodes you may see in Pliny Austine Macrobius Lactantius c. It was not then out of ignorance or peevishnesse but upon good grounds and reasons that they denyed Antipodes as the Philosophers esteemed of them Otherwise S. Austin knew and acknowledged there might be Antipodes 2. What though the Fathers or Aristotle had been ignorant in this point must therefore their authority in other points be slighted must their failing in one or two points of Philosophy lessen their credit in all Philosophicall truths What if they had been ignorant in some one point of Divinity must we therefore reject their authority in other points The Apostles were ignorant of the day of Judgement and of some other points yet wee beleeve them never a whit the lesse in all other points 3. There is odds between denying of Antipodes and denying the motion of the Earth and standing of the Sun For the reasons which Philosophers brought to prove Antipodes were neither experimentall nor demonstrative nor any waies satisfactory but for the stability of the earth and motion of heaven wee have both sense reason authority divine and humane consent antiquity and universality as is said and what can be wanting to confirme a truth which wee have not to confirme this 4. You say That Solomon was strangely gifted with all kinde of knowledge then would I faine know why hee did not plainly tell us being so great a Philosopher that the Earth moved and that the Sun stood still but quite contrary proves the transient vanity of humane affaires from the earth's stability and constant motion of the sun 3. Iob you say for all his humane learning could not answer these naturall questions which God proposeth to him as Why the sea should be so bounded from overflowing the land What is the breadth of the earth What is the reason of snow or haile raine or dew yee or frost which any ordinary Philosopher in these daies might have resolved Answ. You would make Iob who was both a King and a Priest a very simple man if wee would beleeve you But how know you that Iob could not answer God Mary because hee sayes of himselfe That hee uttered that he understood not things too wonderfull for him which hee knew not But Good Sir these words are spoken of the secret waies of Gods providence and of his hid and unsearchable judgements which are these wonderfull things that Iob knew not nor understood for his judgements are a bottomlesse depth his waies are past finding out and they are not spoken of naturall causes of meteors I pray were there not haile and snow raine and dew yce and frost in those daies and did not hee know that these meteors were generated of vapours as well as you or what should be the cause of his stupidity and of your quicknesse of apprehension Alas how doe wee please our selves in the conceits of our supposed knowledge whereas indeed wee have but a glimmering insight in Natures works a bare superficiall and conjecturall knowledge of naturall causes Doubtlesse Iob was not ignorant but modest in acknowledging the insufficiency of Philosophicall reasons and therefore thought it better to be silent then to shew his folly in superficiall and vaine answers For both Astronomy and naturall Philosophy are arts of Diviners rather then Disputers and Philosophy is but opinion saith Lactantius and even in those things which Philosophers bragge that they found out they are opinantes potiùs quà m scientes carried with opinion rather then knowledge saith S. Austine which I have found by long experience Iob knew that though humane and Philosophicall reasons would seem plausible enough to man yet that God to whom only truth is known would check him and account his wisedome but folly to speak with Lactantius If hee had answered God that the sea is bounded from overflowing the land because the drienesse of the earth resisteth the moisture of the sea which is the reason of Philosophers God would have shewed him the folly of his reason by the daily flowing of the sea on the dry lands and by the many inundations of the sea over whole couutries I doubt not but if God had asked you the causes of clouds and raine you would have answered him that they were generated of moist vapours elevated into the aire and there dissolved or squized by heat or cold but then why be there no clouds nor raine in Egypt seeing the
Sun elevates vapours out of Nilus So you will tell me that hail or snow are generated of moist vapours condensate by cold into that form but then why in the hottest countries even under the line are the greatest showres and biggest haile So might I reason with you of the other Meteors but that I will hasten to be rid of this taske having other imployments 4. I had said that there was no credit to be given to Pythagoras whom you make a patron of your opinion because he was both a sorcerer as Saint Austin sheweth and the father of many monstrous absurdities as I have shewed out of Theodoret. You would salve his credit by telling us that all men are subject to errours and I deny it not but it is one thing for a man to fall into an errour accidentally and an other thing to broach a multitude of errours A man may speake a lie by chance and that shall not derogate from his credit but if he use to lie I will scarce beleeve him when hee speakes truth That Pythagoras was a witch his name sheweth from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 either because hee spoke as Apollo Pythius did falsly and obscurely or because he was possessed with the Pythian Spirit or the Devill who deluded the Gentiles who appearing and deceiving them in the forme of the Serpent Python which hee was said to kill was called Pythius His causing of an Eagle to flie to him by certaine conjuring words and being at the same time in two severall places at Thurii and Metapontii with many other such like conjuring tricks shew what he was Pliny saith that he went to Egypt and many other places to learne Magicke the Pythagoreans would kill no Serpents so highly they honoured them Saint Austin saith out of Varro that Pythagoras was much addicted to Hydromancie and Necromancie and to consult the infernall Spirits by bloud And Tertullian deciphers him to be a notable impostor who to make people beleeve his doctrine of transanimation hid himselfe seaven yeares under ground macerating his body with hunger thirst nastinesse hazarding his health and life with damps and filth to confirme a grosse lie Quomodo credam non mentiri Pythagoram qui mentitur ut credam He that will with swearing lying and deceiving trickes perswade us that he was in Hell and that he had been Aethalides Euphorbus Pyrrhus and Hermotimus would make small bones to broach such monstrous opinions as of the motion of the Earth and immobilitie of the heavens out of ambition to get him a name And this is the goodly Patron of your opinion Dignum patella operculum The man of eminent note and learning as you call him highly esteemed for his divine wit and rare inventions Againe when you say that many of his absard sayings are to be understood in a mysticall sense why will you in a literall sense understand his sayings of the Earths motion and Heavens immobilitie 5. I had said that indeed Pythagoras was not the Author of this opinion for no ancient writer ascribes it to him you reply that many ancient Authors ascribe it to the Pythagorean Sect. For proofe whereof in stead of many authors you bring one as if one were a multitude and that one is Aristotle Answ. There is a difference betweene Pythagoras and Pythagoreans betweene the Scholar and the Master I spake of Pythagoras Aristotle of the Pythagoreans The Scholars oftentimes broach opinions which the Masters never knew it is ordinary in all Heretickes and Sectaries to father opinions on the first founders and on other learned men which they never knew nor dreamed of That impure sect of the Nicolaitans fathered their opinions on Nicolas the Deacon The Arians would have made the world beleeve that Origen Dionysius of Alexandria and Lucian the Martyr had been the authors of their impieties The Donatists alledge Saint Cyprian for the author of their separation from the Catholick Church and the mad-headed Circumcellions called themselves Donatists Therefore when you say that it appeares by Aristotles testimony that Pythagoras thought the Earth to be one of the Planets you are deceived for he speakes not of Pythagoras but of the Pythagoreans of which number you are one not onely for affirming the Earth to be a Planet but also in holding transanimation for you make no difference betweene Pythagoras and his disciples thinking as it seemes that the soule of Pythagoras which had beene in so many bodies before was now entred into the bodies of the Pythagoreans 2. I said that Pythagoras held that the heavens by their motions made a musicall harmonie which could not consist with the earths motion you say it may consist but you doe not prove how it may tell me for what end doth the Heaven move Is it not for the benefit of the Earth But if the earth move to receive its benefit from the Heaven surely the Heaven moveth to no end or purpose Againe you would faine escape by telling us That Pythagoras meant by the musicall concent i. the proportion and harmony that is in the bignesse and distance of the Orbes You tell us so but how shall we beleeve you This saying of his is not reckoned amongst his symbolicall speeches and if it be symbolicall why not that saying of the Earths motion Is not that also mysticall 6. You set down seaven or eight men of speciall note as you say for their extraordinary learning and for this opinion Answ. If this opinion makes men to be of speciall note then you must needs be a noted man or shall be hereafter when you are come downe from the Moone or freed from the cloud that inwraps you for you are of this opinion but you might have spared your labour for these men were Pythagoreans and I told you before that Pythagoreans were of this opinion but few of these were noted men for their extraordinary learning they were obscure men and very little spoken of in old Histories Aristarchus the Tyrant Aristarchus the Poet and that rigid Aristarchus the Grammarian and censurer of Homer were noted men but not your Aristarchus the Mathematician So Philolaus Nicetas Syracusanus Ecphantus and Lysippus have little said of them as for Heraclides Ponticus he was a man noted more for his ambition then for his learning in that he affected to be a god causing his friends to convey his dying body out of the way and a dragon to be laid in his bed that the world might thinke he was now a dragon and that he should be worshipped in that forme and indeed he shewed himselfe to be that which he desired to be to wit a beast and not a man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Diogenes Laertius speakes of him As for Plato it is not certaine if he were of your opinion and if he had been the matter is not great And as for Numa Pompilius he was not Pythagoras his scholar for he lived
us to beleeve the truth of this assertion and yet you spurning at Scripture sense and reason as if your phansie were instar omnium would have our judgements senses Scripture Church and all regulated by your absurd dictates therefore it is an unreasonable thing in you to desire that the holy Ghost should not be Judge of his owne assertions in naturall truths and that there should be more credit given to your conceits which you call industry and experience then to Gods own words Indeed this travell hath God left to the sonnes of men to be exercised with as a punishment for their sins to toile and labour all their dayes about shadowes imaginations and indeed meer nothing groping at the doore of knowledge like blinde Sodomites all their dayes and cannot finde it so that they who have spent their whole life in Astronomie may with Saint Peter say on their death bed Master We have laboured all night but have caught nothing Thus with Martha they are busie about many things and neglect that one thing which is onely necessary 2. It is but a conceit of yours to say That the Scripture accommodates it selfe to the vulgars conceit in saying the Sunne riseth and falleth c. I warrant you if the vulgar should conceive that the heavens were made of water as the Gnostickes held or that the Sunne and Moone were two ships with the Manichees or that the world was made of the sweat of the AEones with the Valentinians or whatsoever other absurd opinion they should hold you would make the Scripture say so and to accommodate it selfe to their conceits The stability of the Earth and motion of the Heaven are absurd and false opinions in your conceit and yet the Scripture affirmes them You are as unapt I know to beleeve that the Sunne moves as others are that it stands still therefore it 's a wonder you do not begin to call the Scripture authority in question that affirmes the Suns motion seeing you say men would be apt to doe so if the Scripture had said the Sunne standeth c. How shall the Scripture please both parties if it say the Sun moveth your side will except against it if it say the Sun standeth ours will be offended at it Why should the Scripture be more loath to offend us then you except it be because we are the stronger side and we have our senses to witnesse with us which you have not I wish you would conceive a more reverend opinion of the Spirit of truth who cannot lie nor will affirme a falshood upon any pretence whatsoever neither will he countenance a lie to confirme a truth or speake false in one thing that wee may conceive his meaning the better in another thing He needs not such weake and wicked helps as falshoods to make us understand his will his word is strong and mighty in operation it 's the power of God unto salvation a sharp two edged sword his hammer his scepter c. As it stands not with his truth to affirme a lie so doth it no wayes consist with the power of his Word and Spirit to helpe our understanding by a lie 3. You say That if the Scripture had said the Earth riseth and setteth and the Sunne stands still the people being unacquainted with that secret would not have understood the meaning of it Answ. What matter is it whether they had understood it or not For you tell us that these things are not necessary in themselves and that it is besides the scope of these places to instruct us in Philosophicall points Will you have the holy Ghost then speake a falshood for feare lest we should not understand the meaning of a secret which is not necessary for us to know if it be not needfull for us to know whether the Earth stands or not so it was lesse needfull for the Scripture to say the Earth standeth when it doth not stand But you doe well to call the motion of the Earth a secret for so it is a great secret hid from the wise and prudent of this world and revealed onely to such babes as your selfe But why is this a secret If it be a naturall effect it is no secret for though naturall causes doe not incurre into our senses yet the effects doe and if this be a secret effect and not sensible it cannot be an effect of nature but I thinke it be such another secret as the Philosophers stone which never was and never shall be Though it be beside the chiefe scope of Scripture to instruct us in Philosophicall points yet it will not follow that these Philosophicall tearmes are to be otherwise understood then as they are expressed There be many Geographicall Historicall and Chronologicall passages in Scripture mentioned incidently and not chiefly to instruct us in such points shall we therefore understand them otherwise then they are set downe or rather the cleane contrary way But when you say the Earths motion is beyond our reach I grant it because we cannot reach that which is not made manifest to us either by sense or reason or divine authority If you can either of these wayes make it appeare I doubt not but our understanding will reach it and if you cannot one of these wayes make it appear to us we will account it a meere nothing For idem est non esse non videri and indeed you say well out of the Glosse that God doth not teach curiosities which are not apprehended easily for your motion of the Earth is an incomprehensible curiosity And it is well said by you againe that the Scriptures authority might be questioned if it did teach naturall things contrary to our senses and therefore if any booke of Scripture should affirme as you doe that the earth moves naturally and circularly I should verily beleeve that that booke had never been indicted by the holy Spirit but rather by a Pythagorean spirit or by the spirit of Dutch beer You condemne Tertullians Heretickes for retching Scripture a wrong way and forcing it to some other sense agreeable to their false imagination and rather then they would forgoe their tenents yeelded the Scripture to be erroneous De te fabula narretur You retch the Scripture a wrong way forcing it to your false imaginations you do not indeed call the Scripture erroneous but you make it to speake one thing and meane the cleane contrary therefore you shall doe well to apply Saint Austins counsell to your selfe and doe not settle your opinion rashly on that darke and obscure conceit of the Earths motion It is true also what you alledge out of Saint Austin that the holy Ghost being to deliver more necessary truths left out to speake of the forme or figure of Heaven c. because hee would not have us spend too much time in these things and neglect the meanes of salvation but you should have done well to have subjoined the following words of that same Father to
of a Gyant if there be no motion in the winde and thunder it had been idle to give wings to the one or arrowes to the other as David doth 3. Will you make the Scripture not onely assâ—erâ— a falshood in positive tearmes but also bring similitudes to illustrate it this is to make the holy Ghost a cherither fomenter and maintainer of untruths for so it must be if the Sunne move not the Scripture shewing it doth move and declaring by similies how it doth move 4. What consequence is this The Scripture compareth the Sun to a Bridegroome and a Gyant ergo the Scripture speaking of the Suns motion speakes in reference to the false opinion of the Vulgar it is all one with this The Gospel compares Christ to a Bridegroome ergo the Gospel speaking of Christs humanity speakes in reference to the false opinion of the Vulgar 5. There is ods between positive speeches and comparisons the Sun is never called a Bridegroome in Scripture but is said to be like a Bridegroome Simile non est idem But in Scripture still the Sun is said to move and the earth to be stable in positive tearmes 6. That David in this comparison did allude to the phansie of ignorant people supposing the Sun by night to rest in a chamber is but your groundlesse conceit you might say rather that he alluded to the fiction of Poets describing Aurora to go to bed every night with Tythonus Tythous croceum â—â—â— quens Aurora cubile or to that golden bed which Vulcan made him in which he is carried through the Sea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But neither to this pleasant bed nor to that of Tythonus nor to the Vulgar conceit doth David allude but simply sets out Gods Majesty in the glory of the Sunne by a familiar example taken from the glory of a Bridegroome coming out of his chamber 7. This former part of the Psalme is interpreted by the Fathers mystically of Christ whose motion and alacrity to run his race from the wombe to the grave from heaven to earth and from earth to heaven I hope you will not say are to be understood in reference to the false opinion of the Vulgar 8. He is not compared to a Gyant in respect of his bignesse in the morning as you say no more then he is to a dwarfe in respect of his littlenesse at noone but in respect of the indefatigable swiftnesse of his motion he is compared to a mighty runner for there is no mention made of a Gyant in the Hebrew text neither was it fit to compare him to a Gyant 9. Nor doth David allude to the Vulgar opinion when he speakes of the ends of Heaven for in a round globe or circle there are no ends but he speaks with relation to the Hemisphere which you must needs yeeld hath ends for it terminates and ends in the Horizon called therefore Finitor Besides in the Hebrew Greeke and Latine texts it is not said the ends but the remotest parts of Heaven and so you cannot deny but some parts are remoter from us then other parts 10. Neither hath the Scripture any reference to the common mistake as if the Sun were actually hot when it saith nothing is hid from the heate thereof these Philosophers who deny any actuall heat in the Sun yet say the Sun is hot and I doubt not but you have said so many a time and yet you have no reference to any actuall heate in the Sun Do not you use to call cinnamon-water and such like distilled waters hot waters and yet they are actually cold Philosophers tell us that Saturne is cold and yet they doe not thinke that he is the subject of cold but the cause onely The Scripture saith That none can avoid the anger of God and yet you will not say that this passion is in God The Sunne then is hot not by any heate in him but by calefaction from him 2. When the Scripture saith The Sunne riseth and goeth downe this is not spoken in relation to the circumference which is equally distant from the Center but in reference to the Horizon as you confesse or rather to the scituation of Judea and so of other Countreys and in this respect the Sunne doth not onely seeme but doth in very deed rise and fall to the Inhabitants For doth not the Sunne truely ascend when he comes to your meridian and truely descend when he removes from it Doth he not truly ascend and descend to those who have him for their Zenith in their meridian Astronomers tell us that there is a true and reall rising and falling of the Starres as well as an apparent and then are they not truely said to rise and fall when they doe truely ascend above and descend beneath the Horizon If the Sunne doth not truely ascend and descend then the shadowes doe not truly increase and decrease and so our Sun-dialls doe not truely shew us the hours of the day but in shew onely and in appearance but wee see that the shadow still decreaseth as the luminous body ascendeth and encreaseth as that descendeth Virgils Tytirus can tell you so much Majoresque cadunt altis de montibus umbrae Et Sol discadens crescentes duplicat umbras 3. Joshua saith That the Sunne stood still in the midst of heaven Now Heaven you say hath no midst but the Center and so this is also spoken in reference to the Vulgar opinion Answ. By the Center either you must understand the Earth or the Sunne the Earth indeed is in the midst of the world but not in the midst of Heaven for it is not there at all if it were Christ needed not to ascend to Heaven being in the midst of it when he was on the earth Wicked men then would have the best of it for as they have the largest possessions on earth so should they have the largest shares in heaven If by the Center you meane the Sunne then you speake in reference to the Vulgar opinion for the Center is in the midst of Heaven the Sunne is the Center therefore the Sun is in the midst of Heaven and so Joshua saith 2. By the Heaven he doth not understand the whole celestiall Globe but the Hemisphere and so this having its Horizon or outmost limits and extreames must also have its middle and what can that else be but the Meridian passing through the Zenith Thus then it is demonstrable that whatsoever is equally distant from the extreames is in the midsts but the Sun being in the Zenith or Meridian is equally distant from the extreames therefore the Sun being in the Zenith is in the midst of Heaven 3. The Hebrew Doctors tell us that when the Sun stood still hee was then in the Summers solstice being the Tropicke of Cancer from which Judea is not farre distant and so in that regard also Joshua might truly say that the Sunne was in the midst of Heaven being then over their heads 4. If it be
a vulgar opinion to say that the Sunne is in the midst of Heaven then all the chiefe learned both in Divinitie Philosophie and Poetrie speake as the Vulgar doe for they use the same phrase hence came the word Meridian Meridies Mid-day Mid-night If the Sunne were not every day in the midst of Heaven how should the Artificiall day be divided into equall parts Therefore Clavins tells us that the Meridian is called by Astronomers the midst of Heaven the line of the midst of Heaven c. And the Prince of Poets speakes both of the Sunne and Moone in the midst of Heaven Iam medium Phoebus conscenderat igneus orbem Phoebe Noctivago curra medium pulsabat Olympum 5. I would know of you if all Vulgar opinions be false That I hope you will not say If then the Vulgar speake sometime truth why may not the Scripture speake truth with the Vulgar or why should truth be of lesse esteeme because vulgar it should be otherwise for Bonum quo communius eo meliús It is ridiculous to think with you that the Sun was over Gibeon only in appearance and vulgar conceit For indeed the Sun was truly over Gibeon although he was no more over that then over other places Suppose you were in Pauls Church and divers others were there too is the roofe of that Church over your head only in appearance and vulgar conceit because it is over other heads as well as yours or because it is much larger then your head Or must that phrase be thought improper the roofe is over your head 2. The figure Eclipsis is frequent in Scripture when there some words wanting in a phrase which are to be supplied as 2 Sam. 6. 6. Vzza put forth to the Arke is understood his hand So 2 Chro. 10. 11. I with Scorpions is understood will chastise you So here Sun stand still in Gibeon is understood while we are fighting and so the words must be rendered Stand still whilest we are fighting in Gibeon for not onely the city but its territories where Ioshua's army was are called by the same name So Moon in the valley of Ajalon is understood goe not downe These words There was no day like that before it or after it you say are not to be understood absolutely but in respect of the vulgar opinion because there be longer dayes under the Pole Answ. Ioshua spoke not this with any reference to vulgar opinions but to the Climate in which he lived and where the miracle was shewed it was the longest day that ever was in those parts and what reason had he to except the dayes under the Poles being nothing to his purpose When Christ saith There be twelve houres in the day his words cannot be understood absolutely for there be more houres where the Horizon hath any obliquity and the higher the Pole is elevated above the Horizon the more houres have the dayes in Summer yet his words are true in sphera recta and in those Countreys that are under and neere the Line And what will you conclude from this that because these and such like phrases are not to be understood absolutely therefore this phrase the Sun moves is not to be understood absolutely But I will reply These phrases are true in respect of the Climate they were spoken of ergo this phrase also the Sun moves is true in regard of the Climate it is spoken of If then Judea be the place where the Earth is stable and the Sun moves your opinion is quite overthrown by the force of your own instance for if the Earth be immoveable in any Climate and the Sun moveable we have that which we desire it lieth on you to shew how and why the Sun should move there and not elsewhere why and how the earth moves here and not there 2. These words of Ioshua's perhaps have no reference to the length of the day although the vulgar Translation read it so but rather to the greatnesse of the miracle the Heavens hearkening to the voyce of a mortall man Ioshua acknowledgeth That never any such day was before or since that the Lord hearkned to the voyce of a man For so the Hebrew and Greeke read it 4. The Scripture saith That the Sun returned ten degrees in the dyall of Achaz this you will have to be understood of the shadow only So I perceive the Sun and the shadow light and darknesse is all one with you Take heed of the woe denounced against them that call light darknesse and darknesse light Why may you not in other places aswell as in this by the Sun understand the shadow as At Ioshua's command the Sun stood still that is the shadow stood Wee shall shine as the Sun that is wee shall be dark as the shadow 2. You mince the miracle and the power of God too much for is it not as easie for him to make the Sun goe back as to make the shadow returne Wherein is his absolute Soveraignty seen and his transcendent puissance but in the obedience of all creatures even of the Sun Moon and Stars to his commands St. Austin disputing against the Gentiles sheweth them That Nature is not the supreme guider of all things and hee instanceth in the standing and going back of the Sun His Argument had bin of no force had not the Sun moved at all as you think 3. If the shadow moved onely without the Sun then either that shadow moved it self which is ridiculous to think or it was moved by the motion of the dyall or of the gnomon and index of the dyall Now if the dyall or gnomon was moved by God or an Angel tell us where you read it Why might it not as well be turned about with a mans hand or by some engine and so this would have bin a suspected miracle or else the shadow returned according to the motion of some other luminous body so this were to multiply miracles needlesly for 1. that light must be created for that purpose 2. It must have a particular motion of its own 3. It must be a greater light then that of the Sunne otherwise the shadow had not beene discernible 4. It must either be united to some other light or else vanish all which was needlesse is it not safer then to adhere to Gods word from which when we wander we fall into many by-wayes And whereas you tell us That the miracle is proposed onely concerning the shadow I answer we are not to consider so much what is proposed as what was effected God useth to effect more then he proposeth and to performe more then he promiseth 2. You say There would have been some intimation of the extraordinary length of the day as it is in that of Ioshua I answer there was no such reason why the length of this day should be mentioned because this day was much shorter then Ioshua's in respect it fell out in the winter solstice whereas that of
that this miracle hapned when Hesiod flourished you faile in your Chronologie for Hesiod was above a hundred yeares before this miracle was effected if you will beleeve Gentbrard and the other Chronologers You are a wise Philosopher to tell us that the shadow as well as the heat and beames is the effect of the Sunne Can darknesse be the effect of light a privation is a defect not an effect if the shadow were an effect at all it should be the effect of the darke and condensate body but not of the luminous Take heed that the light which is in you be not darknesse for then how great will that darknesse be CHAP. III. 1. The Scripture doth not speake according to vulgar opinion when it calls the Moone a great light for so it is 2. Not when it speakes of waters above the Heavens for such there are 3. Nor when it calls the Starres innumerable for so they are 4. Nor when it mentions by circumference of the brasin Sea to be thirty cubits and the diameter tenne for so it was Why the lesser number is sometime omitted 5. Nor in saying the earth is founded on the waters which is true 6. The right and left side of heaven how understood and how the heaven is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and of the Intelligences 7. The Scripture speaketh properly in attributing understanding to the heart The Galenists opinion discussed 8. Of ova aspidum and the Vipers egges how understood 9. The Aspe or Adler how hee stops his eare 10. Of the North and South winde in Scripture 11. The Sun shall be truely darkned the Moon turned to blood and the starres shall fall amp c. 12. Of the Windes whence they come c. 13. The sea the onely cause of springs 14. The thunder is truly Gods voice 15. The 7. Stars IN this Proposition you goe about to shew us That the Scripture in naturall things conformes it selfe to our conceived errours and that it speakes of things not as they are in themselves but as they appeare And yet the testimony of Vallesius which you bring to help you overthrowes you for Whatsoever saith hee is in Scripture concerning Nature is most true as proceeding from the God of Nature from whom nothing could be hid If the Scripture expressions of naturall things be most true then they cannot agree with our erroneous conceits for truth and errour agree like light and darknesse and you confesse your selfe that all naturall points in Scripture are certain and infallible but in that sense say you wherein they were first intended and that is the sense that you give for you only are acquainted with the first intended sense of the holy Ghost and so wee must take it upon your bare word that that onely is the true sense which your side delivereth and I pray you what heresie may not be maintained by Scripture this way for heretickes will also say That all things in Scripture are true certaine and evident in that sense which was at first intended but when it comes to the point it is the sense which they themselves have invented obtruded The first instance which you bring for proof of your assertion is from the Moon which is called in Scripture One of the great lights and yet by infallible observation say you may be proved to be lesse then any visible starre Answ. Other Astronomers will prove as strongly as you can that Mercury is the least of all starres shall wee beleeve you or them 2. Though I should yeeld that the Moon were a small starre in bulk will it follow that therefore it is a lesser light Must the light be intended as the body is extended I have seen a fire yeeld lesse light then a candle Mercury which you say is bigger then the Moon hath not the hundreth part of that light which is in the Moon so that if Mercury and the Moon should change places yet the light of the Moon would not appeare much lesser nor the light of Mercury much bigger the eie which is the light of the body is not the clearer because the bigger there is not so much light in an Oxe eie as in an Eagle's Divines hold That the light which was created the first day was no other then the light of the Sun diffused over the hemispheare the whole hemispheare is much bigger I hope then the body of the Sun and yet the world I think was not more enlightened the first day then the fourth when that diffused light was contracted and compacted in a narrower compasse 3. To what end should there be so much light in each starre exceeding the light of the Moone They received their light not for themselves but for us except you will say there be innumerable worlds which must be enlightened aswell as ours but wee receive by many degrees more light from one halfe of the Moon then wee doe from all the starres together Surely God made nothing in vaine but in vain hath the starres so much light if man for whom they were made receive no sight nor benefit from this light 4. Astronomicall positions concerning the magnitude and heighth of each starre on which they ground their darke conjecture of light are toyes and fictions of their owne heads they make false Maximes and on these they build confused Babels of their owne conceits yeeld to them that they have the semidiameter of the earth and then Graeculus esuriens ad Coelum jusseris ibit Every smatterer will exactly tell you the height and bignesse of each starre Haud secus ac si oculo rubricam dirigat uno 5. I will tell you what St. Austine saith of this Question and of the Astronomers of his time Let them saith hee talk of heaven who have but small interest in heaven wee confidently beleeve that these lights are greater then others which the Scripture commends to be such Let them give us leave to trust our owne eyes it is manifest that they give more light to the earth then all the rest do c. The Scripture then and our owne senses assure us that these are the great lights If you say that each starre is a bigger light in it selfe then the Moon I will beleeve it when I see it or have talked with one of your world in the Moon who perhaps can informe us better then any reason you can bring to evince us 2. Wee grant that Moses tells us of waters above the firmament but we deny that this is in reference to an erroneous conceit as you say but rather wee hold That it is an erroneous conceit to forsake the true fountaines of knowledge to digge crackt cisternes to preferre any opinion to the plaine text of Scripture What a forced exposition is it to call clouds and raine below in the aire and which are oftentimes lower then the tops of hills to call these I say waters above the heaven of which the Psalmist speaks whereas these waters are so farre below
the heaven And how can any conceive that the second day there was raine below in the aire and that God by the Firmament did separate that raine from the waters of the sea And though I should yeeld that the aire is called heaven sometime Synecdochically and that raine or clouds being in the aire may be said to be in heaven yet I cannot yeeld that therefore they are above the heaven for to be above and to be in differ much therefore I hold with the ancient Doctors of the Church That there be waters above the heaven which is no more incredible saith St. Austine that there may be waters in the upper part of the great world then that there may be waters in a mans head which is the upper part of the little world If wee look saith St. Ambrose 1. On the greatnesse and omnipotency of God in creating the world 2. On his ordinary power in preserving the world sustaining all things by the word of his might by which he holds up the sea that it may not drown the low land 3. On his miraculous power in causing the waters of the Red-sea to stand upon an heap and Iordan to goe back which miracle he made visible that thou mayst beleeve these things which are invisible then why should wee doubt of these waters which be above the heavens If any aske mee what is the nature use or end of those waters and how they are there St. Austine shall answer for me Quomodo aut quales ibi aquae sint c. how or what kind of waters these be is uncertain but that there be waters there wee doubt not because greater is the authority of this Scripture then the capacity of all humane wit 3. When the Scripture speaks of innumerable starres you say that is to be understood according to the vulgar opinion but I say that it is the opinion of the best Learned that they cannot be mumbred even Clavius whom you cite for you confesseth That though Astronomers have reduced the most conspicuous starres to the number of 1022. yet that there are multitudes of starres besides these that cannot be told Hoc nunquam negabo saith hee I will never deny this and hee saith also That God so enlarged Abraham's sight that hee made him see all the starres of heaven If then you looke in a cleare winters night towards the North if you look on the milkie way if you consider the Stars towards the South pole not discernable by us you must confesse that the Scripture speakes properly and not according to vulgar opinion when it saith That the Starres are innumerable therefore saith Saint Austin Whosoever brags that he hath comprehended and set down the whole number of the Starres as Aratus and Eudoxus did Eos libri hujus contemnit authoritas the authority of Scripture contemnes them But when you tell us That the Israelites did farre execed the number of the Starres that is nothing to our purpose besides wee can easily answer that God did not compare Abrahams carnall seed to the Starres but his spirituall seed His carnall seed is compared to the sand and dust and so writes Saint Austin Againe when you have found out the true number of all the Starres then tell us whether they or Abrahams seed be greatest in number 4. You prove that the holy Ghost speakes not exactly of naturall secrets for he sets not downe the exact measure or proportion of Solomons brasen sea Answ. I had thought that a brasen vessel had been the worke of art and not a secret of nature that Geometricall proportions are secrets of nature is a maxime onely in your Philosophie 2. I had said that Iosephus held this sea not to be perfectly round You reply That then the disproportion will be greater and that Scripture which calls it round is to be beleeved before Iosephus I answer that I alledged not Iosephus to preferre him in my beliefe to the Scripture but to shew that there could not be an exact proportion betweene the diameter and the circumference in a vessell not exactly round and yet the Scripture doth not say it was exactly round but onely round Every thing that is called round is not of an exact round figure an egge is called round The Rainbow is said to be round about the Throne And the hills to be round about Ierusalem And children to sit round about the table c. Which you will not say are to be understood of an exact round figure But indeed I know not how to please you if I alledge Scripture you answer that Scripture speakes not exactly of naturall secrets that it accomodates it selfe to the errours of our conceits that it speaks according to the opinion of the vulgar c. If I alledge Iosephus or any other Author then you tell us that Scripture is to be beleeved before Iosephus so that you are more slippery then any eele 3. I had said that the Scripture for brevities sake in numbering used onely to mention the greater number and to omit the letter as Iacobs family were seaventy soules which indeede were seaventy five and many other such passages I alledged You answer that this confirmes your Argument For the Scripture is so farre from speaking exactly of Philosophicall secrets that in ordinary numbering it doth conform to common customs Answ. 1. Shew us that this kinde of numbering was the common custome 2. Will it follow The Scripture doth not exactly number sometimes for brevities sake ergo it never speakes exactly of Philosophicall points 3. If this consequence be good then it will follow that you never speake exactly of Philosophicall points for you sometimes in mentioning of numbers omit the lesser number as when you say seaventy Interpreters whereas there were seaventy two Lastly I answer that there is great oddes betweene an historicall narration of the measure of a vessell as it was taken by the work-men who are not still exact Geometricians and a plaine and constant affirmation of a Philosophicall truth He that wrote the Bookes of the Kings sets down the circumference of the brasen sea to be thirty cubites and the diameter to bee ten for so doubtlesse the measure was taken by the work-men but when the Scripture saith The earth is immoveable it records this as a Philosophicall or Theological maxime and not as an historicall passage Concerning the ends and sides of the earth and of heaven we will speake anon 5. That the earth is founded on the waters is not the opinion of common people but rather the contrary for they are led by sense as you use to say and their sense shewes them that the seas are above the earth and reason will teach them That a lighter body cannot be the foundation of a heavier But you bring a ridiculous reason why some thinke the earth to be upon the water Because when they have travelled as farre as they can they are stopped by the
sea By the same reason if you were travelling and stopt by a river or lake you will conclude that the earth is upon that river or lake But your opinion is true in some sense for when we are stopt by the sea lake or river we get up into a boate or ship and then indeed earth is above water but I thinke you was asleep when this watrish reason dropt from your pen. I have already shewed how the earth is said to be upon the sea that is by the Hebrew phrase which wants comparatives that it is higher then the sea and that it is in some parts of it above the seas flouds and rivers that are in the concavities of the earth 6. You speake much of the right and left side of Heaven and dextro Mercurio you have conveyed a great part of your discourse out of Clavius without acknowledgement but quorsum perditio bac This waste of words might have been better spared as being impertinent For that place of Iob speakes indeed of the right and lest hand but not a word of heaven neither is there any right or lest sidein heaven nor needs there to be For the left side is more imperfect and weak then the right which cannot be said of heaven being an uniforme and every way perfect body And how can there be a right and left side where there is neither sense nor life nor distinction of organicall parts Therefore in trees and plants there is no right or left side though they have life much lesse can this be in heaven 2. Tell us what part of heaven doth the Scripture call right or left this I know you cannot tell 3. Though the Scripture should speak after the vulgar phrase in naming the right and left side of heaven doth it therefore follow that the Scripture speaketh so concerning the stability of the earth 4. Whereas you say That Aristotles opinion in this point is delivered upon wrong grounds supposing the Orbes to be living creatures and assisted with Intelligences I confesse that he calls the heaven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as having a soule or spirit which he calls Intelligence we Angel by which the heaven is moved but he doth not hereby suppose the heaven to be a living creature for the Angels are not informing sormes of their Orbes but assisting When the Angel was in the poole of Bethesda and moved the water you will not inferre upon this that the poole was a living creature whatsoever is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 animatum that is hath a soule or spirit in it is not therefore a living creature for so you may say a paire of bellowes or winde instruments of musicke are living creatures for winde breath and aire are called sometimes soules 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or anima or animus is common to them all Quicquid ignes animaeque valent Phrygias audire animas are spoken of bellowes and musicall instruments so Phrygius cornus liquida canit anima And yet I will not deny but metonymically heaven may be called a living creature as being that which giveth life to living creatures or by Analogie it may be said to live in respect of the Angel which supplies the roome of a soule not in giving life but motion to it 5. It was no wrong ground in Aristotle to say that the heavens were assisted with Intelligences seeing they cannot move themselves being simple substances neither can naturall forme give such multiplicitie of motions as are in the heavens neither are they moved by other bodies for these bodies at last must be moved by spirits neither doe naturall bodies move naturally in their place but to their place now the heavens are in their place Of this opinion were not onely the Philosophers but also the Christian Doctors heavenly bodies are moved by the ministery of Angels saith Saint Austin Origen saith that the Angels have the charge of all things of earth and water aire and fire and perhaps Saint Hierome mistooke his meaning when he attributes to Origen this errour of assisting reasonable soules to the heavens he meant the Angels And Thomas by that Spirit that compasseth the world by its motion Eccles. 1. 6. understandeth an Angel It were strange to thinke that so many Angels should be assigned by God for the earth and for inferiour officers towards men and none should have the moving of the heavens but of the Angels moving their spheares I have spoken already against Mr. Carpenter 7. The Spirit you say applies himselfe to the common tenent generally received heretofore in attributing wisdome and understanding to the heart whereas reason and discursive faculties have the chiefe residence in the head Answ. 1. How know you that this was the generall tenent in Solomons dayes From what stories of these times have you had this The word heretofore must signifie the time before Solomon I doubt me if you should be put to it you could not prove that the opinion of the understandings residence in the heart was the common tenent in the world before Solomon but I perceive you would have it to be so because Solomon placeth understanding in the heart as if the Scripture set downe no positive Doctrines but what were common tenents whether true or false 2. The word heart here may signifie the soule or minde as it doth often in Scripture and in humane writings too the soule is called heart and the heart is called soule oftentimes So in Homer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 eating their soules that is their hearts with cares And in Plutarch 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to be without reason or understanding vecordes and excordes are men whose minds are distempered So in Saint Peter By the hidden man of the heart is meant the renovation of the minde If then by the heart is understood the mind or soule you must needs grant that it is a tenent no lesse true then common that the understanding is in the heart whether you take it for a part or for a power or for a facultie of the soule 3. This was not a common tenent many yeares after Solomon for neither Empedocles nor the Epicures nor the Egyptian Philosophers nor the Arabians nor the Academicks held the understanding to be in the heart but some in the head some in the breast some in all the body Herodotus affirmed it to be in the ears Blemor in the eyes Strato in the eye-browes onely the Peripatetickes and Stoicks placed it in the heart 4. The holy Ghost attributes understanding to the heart not because it was a common but because a true tenent for howsoever Galen and his Sectaries hold the contrary yet it is certaine that the heart is the true seat of the understanding For 1. The will is in the heart therefore the understanding is there also such is the dependency of these two faculties the one from the other that the will is never without the understanding and indeed these two are but
a powerfull voice it is to shake the hearts of the proudest Atheists even of Caligula himselfe and to teach the most perverse Epicures that there is a God in heaven who ruleth and judgeth the earth No eloquence prevailed so much with Horace as this when hee was parcus Deorum cultor an Epicure it made him renounce his errour retro vela dare by which the Gentiles acknowledged there was a supreme God whom they called Iupiter and that hee had the power of thunder qui fulmine concutit orbem qui foedera fulmine sancit So the same Virgil acknowledgeth that the thunder made the people to stand in awe of God an te Genitor cum fulmina torques Nec quicquam horremus c. By this God moved the hearts of the Romanes to use the Christians kindly when by thunder hee overthrew the Marcomans and the Christian Legion from thence was called The thundering Legion It is his weapon with which hee fights against wicked men and which hee flings 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 against perjurers as Aristophanes saith all the thundering disputations of Philosophers and the small sparkes of light or knowledge which they have of naturall causes are but toyes they are no better then glow-wormes What is the croaking of frogs to the cracking of thunder or the light of rotten wood to lightning in the aire Therefore in spight of all Naturalists let us acknowledge with David that it is the Lord that maketh the thunder that this voice of the Lord breaketh the Cedars and divideth the flames of fire and shaketh the wildernesse c. Besides the thunder is called Gods voice as the winde Gods breath by an Hebraisme as tall Cedars and high mountaines are called the Cedars and Mountaines of God the voice of God is as much as if you would say an excellent voice Then whatsoever Naturalists affirme peremptorily of the thunder I will with Iob and David acknowledge God to be the onely cause and will aske with Iob The thunder of his power who can understand Quis tonitrus sonum aut quemadmedum oriatur explicandis rationibus assequi possit saith Symmachus on these words of Iob. 15. The constellation called the 7. Starres are found you say by later discoveries to be but six What if I should grant you this and more too then you desire to wit that of old they were accounted but six of some So Ovid Dicuntur septeno sex tamen esse solent So Aratus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And generally the Poets held that though Atlas had seven daughters called Atlantides from him yet one of them to wit Merope or as others say Electra hides her face but divers others hold there be seven to be seen And S. Basil tells us in plain termes that there are seven stars of these and not six as some think but let there be seven or but six what is this to your purpose Mary that the Scripture Amos 5.8 speakes of seven starres according to common opinion being but six in Galilies glasse but indeed the Scripture speaks neither of six nor seven but of a certaine constellation which the Seventy Interpreters leave out as a thing unknown to them Symmacbru and Theodotion interprete 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the old Latine hath it Arcturus which is a starre in Bootes behinde the taile of the great Beare in English we call them Seven starres and to mine eyes they seem to be so many But if in Galilies glasse there be but six it 's no wonder for you tell us elsewhere That the better the glasse is the lesse will the starres appeare It is not like then that so small a starre can be seen through it Let therefore the number of 7. remaine it is a sacred nnmber numero Deus impare gaudet CHAPT IIII. 1. Many Philosophicall points are handled in Scripture 2. The heavens how round in the opinion of the Fathers 3. Wre must have a reverend esteem of the Fathers 4. How the seas not overflowing the land may be esteemed a miracle 5. The works of Nature may be called miracles HEre you tell us of Learned men which have fallen into great absurdities whilst they have looked for the grounds of Philosophy out of Scripture which you shew by the Iewish Rabbines and some Christian Doctors Ans. As it is vanity to seek for all Philosophicall grounds in the Scripture so it is stupidity to say there be no Philosophicall grounds or truths to be found in Scripture whereas Moses Iob David Solomon and other Penmen of the holy Ghost have divers passages of Philosophy in their writings as I have shewed heretofore of divers constellations out of Iob and why may not Philosophicall truths be sought for out of Scripture seeing Philosophy is the contemplation or knowledge of divine and naturall things both which are handled in Scripture divine things principally naturall things in the second place that by naturall things we may come to the knowledge of Divinity and by this to the attainment of eternall felicity Therefore in Scripture is recorded the creation the cause qualities and effects of the creature that by these we may come to the knowledge of the Creator If the Gentile Philosophers had not found much Philosophy in Scripture they had never conveighed so much out of it as they did into their Philosophicall books as Theodore sheweth The idle opinions of many Philosophers which are grounded neither on sense nor reason as yours of the Earth's motion are not to be sought for in Scripture but Philosophicall truths which are grounded on either or both may be sought and found there and whatsoever idle conceits the Jewes have had of Scripture or their idle fables which they have grounded on it concerne us not they were a giddy headed people given over to a reprobate sense groping at noone day having their hearts fat and their eyes blinded that they may not see their seeking for Philosophicall truths in Scripture was not the cause of their foolishnesse for few or none of them were addicted to the study of Philosophy but their owne voluntary blindnesse pride stubbornnesse and contempt of Christ the internall and essentiall Word of God are the causes of their ignorance in the externall Word so that they having forsaken the truth follow lyes But as for the Christian Doctors they have not exposed themselves to errours by adhering to the words of Scripture but you are fallen into grosse errors by rejecting the words of Scripture These which you count errours are truths as That the Sun and Moon are the greatest lights That there are waters above the firmament That the starres are innumerable as wee have already shewed As for the roundnesse of the heaven though the Fathers doubt of it yet they doe not absolutely deny it Iustine Martyr doth but aske the question Whether their opinion may not be true which hold the roundnesse of the heaven St. Ambrose saith that it is sufficient for us
to know that God hath placed the heaven over us like a vault and stretched it out like a curtaine or skin St. Chrysostome whom Theodoret and Theophylact doe follow deny the roundnesse of heaven as it hath relation to our climate or habitation for so the heaven is indeed as the Scripture saith a vault or skin so that albeit the whole heaven being considered with the whole earth be round yet being considered with reference to parts or climates of the earth it is not round Or wee may with St. Austine so understand the word vaults or curtaine or skin that these tearms may stand well enough with the roundnesse of heaven si sphaera est undique camera est if it be sphericall it is a round vault pellis in rotundum sinum extenditur a skin may be made round or sphericall for a round bladder saith hee is a skin so then neither the word vault skin canopy or tabernacle are words repugnant to the roundnesse of heaven neither have you such reason to insult over the Fathers as if absolutely and peremptorily they had denyed the roundnes thereof For S. Austine sheweth that the stretching out of heaven like a skin is mentioned onely to shew the power of God and with what facility hee made the heavens with more ease then wee should extend a skin and St. Hierome saith that the opinion of the earths roundnesse is the most common opinion agreeing with Ecclesiastes So when the Fathers say that the earth is founded on the seas c. they doe but follow the Scripture phrase which how to be understood wee have already shewed and will touch it againe anon 3. Suppose these were errours yet you must not take advantage from some errours in the Fathers to lessen their credit in other things they were but men and had not the perfection of knowledge which is in Angels called therefore Daemones and Intelligentiae St. Bernard saw not all things we should be sparing in raking into their errours in uncovering of their shame and like flies delighting in their soares But yet you cannot obtain your purpose in ripping up of their errours for it will not follow the Fathers erred in denying the sphericall figure of the heaven c. therefore they erred in denying the motion of the earth must it follow that because S. Cyprian erred in the point of rebaptization therefore no credit must be given to him in affirming Christs incarnation and I pray what great error was this in them to conclude from manifest places of Scripture that the seas not overflowing the land is a miracle and that they are restrained by the speciall power of God I grant that all seas are not higher nor so high as some lands but it is manifest that the sea in some places is much higher then the land as the Hollanders and Zelanders know and that their lands are not overwhelmed with the sea in a storme is a miracle and the finger of God is to be seen in restraining of them which seas when hee is angry with the inhabitants hee lets loose sometimes to the overthrow of townes and villages Camposque per omnes Cum stabulis armenta trahunt In the dayes of Sesostris King of Egypt it was by measure and observation knowne that the Red-sea was much higher then the land but we need not goe so farre the coast of our owne Island in divers places being lower then the sea will prove this to be true where we may daily see Gods power in curbing the violence of that furious creature For the Eternall knowing The Seas commotive and unconstant flowing Thus curbed her and 'gainst her envious rage For ever fenc'd our flowry mantled stage So that we often see those rowling hills With roaring noise threatning the neighbours fields Through their owne spite to split upon the shoare Foaming for fury that they dare no more 5. Why then may not this be called a miracle whereas many strange yea ordinary effects of nature are called miracles Plato called man the miracle of miracles and David saith that fearfully and miraculously he was made Doe not you know that Diana's Temple the Egyptian Pyramides and the rest of those stupendious buildings were called the seven miracles of the world not only Gods extraordinary works above nature but also his ordinary works in nature are miracles though they be not so accounted saith Saint Austin because we are so used to them For as it was a miracle to turn water into wine in Cana of Galilee so he saith that miracle is seene daily for who drawes the moisture or water from the earth by the root into the grape and makes wine but God That Gods finger is to be seen in every worke of nature the Poet doth acknowledge Deum namque ire per omnes Terrasque tractusque maris coelumque profundum A miracle is so called because it excites admiration and doe we not admire Gods power in earth-quakes prodigious births thunders lightnings and in the Eclipses of the great Luminaries therefore Saint Austin checks the vanity of Philosophers who went no higher in the contemplation of these naturall effects then to naturall causes not looking unto God the supreme cause of all Hence then it appeares that the Fathers are not mistaken in attributing the not over-flowing of the sea to a miracle howsoever as your figure sheweth the sea may seem to be and yet is not higher then some lands Neither is there any contradiction in Scripture though sometime it make the sea higher then the land and sometime lower for so it is according to the diversity of coasts and because of much moisture and water found in the bowels of the earth and in that it is encompassed with the sea it may be said that the earth is founded on the waters therefore no man can be deceived in concluding points of Philosophie from expressions of Scriptures as you say but from the misunderstanding of Scripture for what is true in Philosophie cannot be false in Divinitie for in subalternall sciences there can be no repugnancy CHAP. V. Divers Scriptures vindicated from false glosses as Eccles. 1. 4. by which is proved the earths immobility and heavens motion 2. How the earth is eternall and renewed 3. The Scripture speaketh not plainly and ambiguously in the same place 4. The Scripture useth Metaphors 5. How the earth stands out of the water 2 Pet. 3. 5. by which its immobilitie is proved 6. What is meant 1 Chron. 16. 30. c. by these words The world is established c. 7. What is meant Psal. 90. 2. by the earth and the world 8. How the heavens Prov. 3. 19. are established and the Moon and Starres Psal. 89. 37. c. 9. How the heavens 2 Sam. 22. 8. hath foundations 10. What are the pillars of heaven in Job 10. of the ends sides and corners of the earth in Scripture 11. What is meant Isa. 51. 6. by the
and the winde moveth both cannot be understood properly and in the same sense as if you would say The Scripture affirms that Angels are the sons of God and that Judges are the sons of God but not in the same sense ergo when the Scripture saith That the raven flew out of the Arke and the dove flew out of the Arke both must not be understood in the same sense but the one properly the other in appearance Our second proofe out of Scripture which you goe about to undermine is that of Saint Peter The heavens were of old and the earth standing out of the water and in the water You say That the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is equivalent to fuit but I say that this were to confound two predicaments to make the essence and accident all one the site or immobility of the earth and the essence or existence thereof cannot be one or equivalent 2. This were to commit a plaine tantology for so the words must run The earth was was out of the water if these two words was and standing be equivalent 3. The Apostles scope is not only to shew that God made all the earth as you say but that he made it thus that is standing or immoveable that he is the authour not onely of its being and essence but also of that inseparable accident of immobilitie 4. We collect not the rest and immobilitie of the earth from the bare expression of its being or creation but from its being thus made for so we may reason What God hath made to stand fast out of and in the water is immoveable but God hath made the earth thus ergo it is immoveable 5. It were ridiculous to conclude the immobility of a ship or a mill-wheele because a part of them was made to stand above and another part under the water for they were not made for that end to stand but to move But if you had brought your Simile from the rockes of the sea you had done well for God made these rockes to stand partly above and partly under the water and hee made them not to fleete with the Isles of the lake Lommond therefore they are not moveable for God hath made them immoveable and so hee hath made the earth therefore both the old and new Latine translations doe use the word consistere which signifieth constanter stare Our third Argument is taken from these words The world is established that it cannot be moved which words you will have to be spoken of the world in generall or the whole fabricke of heaven and earth but you are widely mistaken for in the Hebrew text the word holam which signifieth the whole universe of heaven and earth is not used in any of these places but the word Tebel which signifieth the round globe of the earth or the habitable world as Pagnine hath it So the Greek Interpreters in all these places use the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth the whole bulk of the world so called from its beauty Now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is alwaies used for the habitable earth so that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a Synod of men dwelling upon earth and not of Angels or stars And when the Patriarch of Constantinople assumed the title of Oecumenicus Episcopus he did not purpose for all his pride to bring the Angels and starres within the verge of his Diocesse or Episcopacy So the old Latine translation never useth the word mundus but orbis and orbis terrae and Iunius with Tremelius use the words orbis habitabilis that is the earth so that orbis is not used for mundus in any classick Author in prose but for the earth or regions and dominions of the earth as Orbis Asiae Europae orbis Romanus c. Besides in the 96. Psalme the heavens and the world as wee translate it are distiuguished in the 5. ver God made the heavens in the 10. ver hee established the world or earth We need not then to have recourse to a Synecdoche iu the three originall Tongues But you tell us That David you would have said Moses seems to make a difference between the earth and the world when hee saith Before thou hadst formed the earth and the world hee doth but seeme to make a difference but indeed hee makes none for the copulative and is put exepeticè for the disjunctive or here and elsewhere in Scripture as in Exodus Hee that smiteth his Father in the Hebrew it is Abiu ve Immo his father and his mother and in the 17. ver of the same Chapter Hee that curseth his father and his mother which the Evangelist St. Matthew rendereth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 father or mother so among profane Authors the same kind of speech is used as Natus annos 60. senex Here then God made the earth and the world that is hee made the earth or the habitable world 2. Wee may explain Moses his words here thus God made the earth the first day and then it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 earth but it was not made habitable till the third day and then it became 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a habitable world and so in this respect there is some difference between the earth and the world that is between the earth mingled with the water and separated from it Because Solomon saith That God hath founded the earth and established the heavens you inferre That the places of Scripture can no more prove an immebility in the earth then in the heavens But here also your speak at randome for the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Conen here which Arias Montanus and the old Latine translate stabilivit doth properly signifie to dispose or order and so we translate the word Conenu Ps. 37.23 a good mans steps are ordered by the Lord. This word also signifieth to prepare as David prepared a place for the Ark. Therefore the LXX Interpreters explain this word here by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hee hath prepared the heavens and Iunius with Tremelius by statuit hee hath appointed or disposed the heavens But what though wee should yeeld that the word may signifie to establish will it therefore follow that the heavens are immoveable because established No for there is the stability of nature and naturall qualites which is opposite to mutability and so the heavens are established and there is the stability of rest and so it is opposite to mobility thus the earth is established But you will say seeing the same word establish is spoken of both the heaven and of the earth how shall you know that it implyeth immobility in the earth and not in the heaven I answer well enough because the Scripture speaking of the earth saith It is established that it cannot be moved but the Scripture never speakes so of the heavens but onely that they are established not a word to shew any rest
or immobility in them Now you urge us with those places that speak of establishing of the Moon Ps. 89.37 of the stars Psa. 8.3 of the heavens Pro. 8.27 Why say you should these be counted sufficient expressions to take away motion from the earth I answer we do not count this word establish of it self a sufficient expression for the originall word is ambiguous and diversly interpreted both by the Greek and Latine and moveable things may be established the moving Tabernacle as well as the immoveable Temple But if I should tell you that though the Tabernacle be fastened or established yet it is moveable and the Temple is so stablished that it cannot be moved You cannot but say that my expression is sufficient to shew the difference of stability in the one in and the other So speaks the Scripture in plain tearms of the Earth's stability Thou hast founded or established the earth and it shall stand Thou hast laid the foundations of the earth that it shall not be moved for ever so it is in the Hebrew When a thing then is said to be so established as that it standeth fast on a sure foundation and cannot be moved wee must needs acknowledge that this is a full expression of its immobility which phrases are never spoken of the heaven or any starre wee reade that the Sun stood once but that was by miracle of any other standing in Scripture we never read So we read of the moving of the earth by earthquakes but not else Isa. 13.13 and of removing of Islands Rev. 6.14 but never of a circular motion of the earth for in that respect he hath made the earth that it shall not be moved And to tell us as you do that the earth is established so onely that it shall not be removed is both to mince the Scripture and the power of God for as it is more easie to move an heavy body then to remove it so is the power of God so much the greater in that hee hath made a body of such solidity weight and bignesse that it cannot be so much as moved farre lesse removed and if the Scripture be so carefull and punctuall in setting forth Gods greatnesse and power on so small a matter as is the moving of a little part of the earth by earthquakes doubtlesse it would not have been silent in a matter of such admiration and power as is the moving of the whole body of the earth if ever hee had moved it either by himselfe or by his Angels or by Nature his handmaid Whereas you say That fundavit cannot be taken properly as if the earth like other artificiall buildings did need any bottoms to uphold it I answer that fundare terram is not to settle the earth upon a foundation or bottome but to make it the foundation of all heavy bodies and therefore it is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fundum the bottome and fundus the foundation so that nothing hath any foundation but on and by the earth Ships floating on the water have not any foundation till they be tyed by anchors to the earth which the Poet knew when he said Anchora fundabat naves therefore not metaphorically but properly doth the Scripture speak in saying God hath founded the earth but whereas the heavens are said to have foundations 2 Sam. 22.8 by heavens there are understood the mountaines and so the vulgar Latine reads it and so in Psal. 18.8 the text hath mountaines and not heavens Mountaines are called heavens metonymically because they are in that part of heaven which we call the aire therefore by the Poets they are called Aërel montes and so all the space from the superficies of the earth upward is called heaven both in sacred and profane writings even this upper part of the earth wherein wee live is called heaven by the Poet Sed falsa ad Coelum mittunt insomnia Manes and the Inhabitants of the earth are called Superi by the same Poet Quae quis apud Superos surto laetat us inani And as hills are called heaven so heaven is called hills by David when hee saith I will look unto the bills from whence cometh my salvation By the foundation of the heavens then is meant nothing else but the foundation of the hills Now why you should call the earth an artificiall building I know not it was neither built by an artificer nor by the rules and tooles of Art your earth in the Moon may rather be called artificiall as being the work not of God nor Nature but of Copernicus the master carpenter and his workmen of which number you are one but you should doe better if with that wise master builder St. Paul you would build upon the corner stone and the foundation Christ Jesus according to the grace of God which is given to you You say well That the pillars of heaven mentioned by Job will not prove them to be immoveable for wee know that heavenly pillars are moveable as the heavens are so were these two pillars that conducted Israel through the desart and those night meteors called fierie pillars 2. By heaven may be meant the Church called oftentimes heaven in Scripture and by pillars the eminent Doctors of it So Peter and Paul were called pillars and every good man shall be made a pillar in Gods Temple 3. By the pillars of heaven may be understood the Angels called also the powers of heaven in the Gospell 4. High hills may be called pillars of heaven not because they uphold heaven as the Poets write of Atlas but because they are high in the aire which is called heaven caput inter nubila coxdunt 5. The onely true pillar by which both heaven and earth is sustained is the power of God which power cannot be shaken in it selfe but in its effects 6. Which way soever you take the pillars of heaven they are moveable but now it will not follow that the pillars of earth are moveable also though the pillars of the Tabernacle were moveable the pillars of the Temple were not so Such as the earth is such be its pillars its selfe is immoveable and so are its pillars except when that great Sampson shakes them being grieved for the many wrongs that hee suffers by our sins then hills rocks houses and cities tumble down and multitudes are buried before they be dead If then we should prove the immobility of the earth from the stability of its pillars wee should have reason for it but to inferre that the heavens were immoveable because they have pillars were ridiculous We read say you of ends sides and corners of the earth and yet these will not prove it to be of a long or square forme Answ. Yes it will for the Scripture doth not describe the earth to us as a smooth and uniforme globe but as a great body consisting of divers unequall parts as hills and vallies and as a body broken by the irruption of many seas as
the Mediterran c. Consisting also of lakes and rivers not to speake of Isles and Isthmus hath not then the earth in this respect many ends corners and sides If you did saile along the coasts of the earth you should finde it so 2. The earth of it selfe is not round for without the water it doth not make a globe 3. Though it were perfectly round yet it must have its longitude and latitude 4. By the earth the Scripture oftentimes meanes the land of Judea with the neighbouring countreys as his dominion shall be from the river to the ends of the earth which words were spoken of Solomon literally All the ends of the earth have seene the salvation of God which was not seen by the Americans in Davids dayes So all the world was taxed under Augustus that is the Roman world 5. Whatsoever is finite hath bounds and ends but such is the earth ergo it hath ends Therefore as the Scripture by the ends sides and corners of the earth doth shew that it is not round so doth it also by the stable foundations thereof shew that it doth not move Isaiah speaketh of the planting of the heavens which you say May as well prove them to be immoveable as that which followes in that Verse concerning the foundation of the earth Answ. I perceive your case is desperate for like a man that is sinking in the water you catch hold of every thing that is next you though it be weeds and such as cannot help you For 1. by heavens here may be meant the Church which is that Vine that God hath planted with his owne right hand 2. Though this word heaven were taken in its proper signification yet the planting of heaven is a metaphor out of which you can conclude nothing but must spoile your Syllogisme with quatuor termini 3. Nothing is properly planted but what hath motion in it as trees hearbs and such like vegetables This word then may intimate that there is motion in the heavens as the word foundation sheweth that there is no motion in the earth for it is very improper and dangerous for a foundation to move When the Scripture saith The earth is established by this word you answer is means onely the keeping of it up in the aire without falling to any other place Answ. If the earth be established onely so that it may not fall or be removed to any other place what singular thing hath the earth that is not in other bodies for so are the heavens established and every starre that they shall not be removed out of that place or station which is appointed for them so is the sea confined within its bounds which it cannot passe But there is something else in the earth whereby it differs from other bodies and wherein Gods power is the more admired to wit That it is so established that it cannot be removed Nay more then so it cannot be stirred or wagged at all Thus as Gods glory is admired in the perpetuall motion of other bodies so is it in the perpetuall immobilitie of this 2. The earth you say is kept up from falling I pray you whither would the earth fall being in its owne place and sowest of all the Elements if it fall any where it must fall upward and that is as proper a phrase as if I should tell you the heaven must mount downeward therefore Mute hauc de poctore euram never feare the falling of the earth The Gentiles were afraid that the heavens might fall being held up by the shoulders of Hercules therefore Artemon it seemes was afraid of this who never durst venture abroad but under a brasen target carried over his head And one Phaenaces in Plutarch was sore afraid that the moon would fall downe and therefore pitied the Ethiopians and others that were under the moone but if he had knowne what you know That there is a world in the moone his feare had been just It may be the great shower of stones that fell heretofore in agro Piceno were the stones of some buildings that had fallen downe in the moone We need not feare the falling of our earth which God hath so established that it cannot be moved You see no reason but that we may prove the naturall motion of the earth from that place in Iob Who moveth or shaketh the earth out of her place that is to say We may prove a naturall motion out of a violent or one contrary out of another we may prove the fire to be cold because it is hot or that the earth may move naturally becanse it moves violently The motion that Iob speakes of is an earth-quake extraordinary which is a violent and temporary motion and of some part only and a concussion rather then a motion the motion that you would inferre from thence is a naturall perpetuall totall regular and a circular motion Will you inferre that because the mill-wheele is turned about violently that therefore the whole mill is turned about naturally I have seen a Church-tower shake when the bells have been rung but if I should inferre that the whole Church therefore may move circularly I should feare Nè manus auriculas imitetur mobilis albas lest I should be thought a creature of Arcadia And I hope you are not so simple as to thinke that God did ever shake the whole earth out of its place or if he had that therefore it may move naturally and circularly CHAP. VI. 1. The earth is in the middle and center of the world and why 2. Hell is in the center or middle of the earth 3. The earth lowest and basest how 4. Every thing is made questionable by some 5. Aristotle defended 6. The earth is in the center because in the midst of the equinoctiall Horizon c. 7. The imagination must be conformable to the things not these to it the vanity of imagining circles 8. Astronomers reproved and their vanity shewed chiefly about the bignesse of the stars 9. The earth is the least circle therefore the center how understood HEre you will not upon any tearmes admit that the earth is the center of the Vniverse because our arguments you say are insufficient Answ. Our arguments may be insufficient to you who hath an overweening conceit of your selfe and a prejudiciall opinion of other men But our arguments have been hitherto accounted sufficient by moderate wise and learned men but to your sublimated understanding they give no satisfaction there are some men that are never content and nothing to them is sufficient no not Gods owne word but what though our arguments were insufficient will you therefore reject them You may by this meanes reject all humane learning for it hath not that sufficiency which perhaps you require We know here but in part the sufficiency of knowledge is reserved for a better life Si quid tamen aptius exit But if you have more sufficient arguments for your opinion impart them to
us and we will imbrace them if you have not his utere mecum content your selfe with these till you know better But you promise that you will cleerly manifest the insufficiency of our arguments in this Chapter Let us see if you will be as good as your word which we have not yet found in you only large promises without performance Larga quidena semper Drance tibi copia fandi 1. We say that the earth is the center not the sun because the earth is lowermost and under the sunne To this you answer That since the sun is so remote from the center of our earth it may be properly affirmed that we are under it though that be in the center of the world Answ. That the sunne cannot be the center of the world and that the earth must needs be the center we have proved against Lansbergius for neither could there be Eclipses of the Moone nor could we discerne the medietie of heaven nor of the Zodiac if the earth were not the center And whereas the center is the middle of the globe equally distant from all the parts of the circumference the wise God placed the earth in the midst of this great systeme of the world not onely for mans sake who being the Lord of this universe and the most honourable of all the creatures deserved to have the most honourable place which is the middle but chiefly that man with all other animall and vegetable creatures might by an equall distance from all parts of heaven have an equall comfort and influence For imagine there were two earths this which is in the center and another out of the center the influence and powers of heaven must needs more equally concurre and be united in this then in that and if the place be it which conserves the creatures what place more fit for conservation then that which is in the midst of the world Having an equall relation to all parts of heaven and all the powers of the universe uniting themselves together in the earth as in a small epitome Therefore nature which is the hand-maid and imitatour of God layes up the seed in the middle of the fruits as being not onely the safest part but also because in the middle as in the center all the powers of the plant meet together in the forming of the seed wherein it doth perpetuate it self How unconvenient and unhealthy were mans habitation if it were neerer the heaven then it is for the aire would be too pure and unproportionable to our grosse bodies for they that travell overhigh hils find their bodies much distempered Acosta witnesseth that they who travel over the high hils of Peru fall into vomiting become desperately sick and many lose their lives by reason of the subtilty purenes of the air But your words would be a little corrected For since the sun you say is so remote from the center of the earth we are under it Indeed we are under it in that it is above us but not for that it is remote from us or from the earth Under and above are relative tearms so are neerenes remotenes 2. You slight the constant and perpetuall doctrine of the Church from the beginning concerning the site of hell which is in the center or bowels of the earth and you call it an uncertainty but so you may call any doctrine in Scripture for where will you have hell to be but either in heaven or in the earth These are the two integrall parts of this universe in heaven I hope you will not place it except you will have it to be in the moone But if there be any hell there it is for the wicked of that world as for the wicked of this world they are not said to ascend to hell in the moone but to descend to hell in the earth as Core and his fellowes Therefore it is called a lake burning with fire and brimstone Abyssus a deepe gulfe Gehenna the valley of Hinnon By Tertullian Thesaurus subterraneus ignis arcant The treasure of hid fire under ground The Apostle speakes of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of those that bow to Christ under the earth Horrende voragines fearfull gulfes they are saith Lactantius And that which you call uncertainty is called certa fides a sure faith an undeniable truth by Prudentius Certa fides rabidos sub terra nocte caminos c. And as this hath been the constant opinion of the Church as may be seen both in the Greeke and Latine Fathers so hath it been beleeved by the Gentiles as I could instance out of Greeke and Latine Poets of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tartarus Phlegerbon Cocytus Styx Acheron which they shew to be in the center or bowels of the earth therefore I hope you are none of those that Iuvenal speaks of who would not beleeve there was any hell under ground Esse aliquos manes subterranea regna c. Nec pueri credunt For whosoever denied hell to be below denied that there was any such place at all as Pythagoras Epicurus Lucretius Tully Seneca Lucian Pliny and some others to whom I may adde the Gnostickes who held there was no other hell but this world whom Irenaeus resutes 2. As hell must needs be in the earth below so must heaven the place of the blessed be above all these visible heavens which is called The third heaven and the heaven of heavens Therefore it is no uncertainty as you say that it is concentricall to the stars for if it be not tell us where you will have it in the moone or in the Elysian fields or in Mahomets paradise I wish you would thinke the dictates of Gods word to be more certaine then your groundlesse phansies and that the Scripture is a more stable foundation to build upon then the Moone 3. It is not an uncertainty that places must be as farre distant in scituation as in use Therefore Abraham saith That there 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great gulfe or gap between Lazarus and Dives So David distinguished between the height of heaven and the deepe of hell so doth Amos and Esay and it 's fitting that heaven and hell the saints and the wicked the joyes of the one and torments of the other be as remote as may be which the Poet knew Tartarus ipse Bis patet in praeceps tantum tenditque sub umbras Quantus ad aethereum coeli suspectus Olympum 3. These things also you will have to be uncertaine 1. That bodies must be as farre distant in place as in nobility 2. That the earth is of a baser matter than other Planets 3. That the center is the worst place Answ. These are not uncertainties to men that have sense and reason for sense tells us that the grosser simple bodies are the lower place have they in this Universe the heaven being a quintessence and of the purest matter is uppermost next is
the fire then the aire then the water and lowest of all the earth as being the grossest and reason tells us that God is the God of order and what a disordered world should we have if grosse and heavy bodies were uppermost the light and purest bodies beneath We see in our owne bodies that the grosser the spirits are the lower they are the animall having their residence in the head the vitall in the heart the naturall in the liver 2. Nor is it uncertaine that the earth is of a baser matter then the Planets the obscurity and dulnesse of the one the beauty light and swiftnesse of the other doe shew what oddes there is in the matter How are all Divines deceived who put men in minde of the base materialls of their body and teach that God made men of the basest element to humble him Animalium superbissimi origo vilissima and I thinke you are Planet-struck or have a planeticall head who thinke the earth to be a Planet 3. That the center is the worst place is not held by us for though we say the earth to be the ignoblest and basest element in respect of its matter and therefore the lowest yet as it is the center and habitation of the noblest creature it is placed in the middle as being the noblest place 4. Our second argument is grounded you say upon two foolish foundations 1. That the whole frame of nature moves round excepting onely the earth 2. That the whole earth is heavy and more unfit for motion then the Planets These you reject because they are you say the thing in question Answ. You are doubtlesse that third Cato that fell from heaven or octavus Sapientum Our foundations of the earths stability and gravity are foolishnesse with you so was the Gospell foolishnesse to the Gentiles but you doe well to observe Solomons rule Answer not a foole according to his folly which is the reason that you answer not at all to these foolish foundations of ours but onely with this they are the thing in question But if you question the stability and gravity of the earth is not your question as foolish as our foundation but seeing you may question every thing every thing may be a foolish answer or position to you And what doe you thinke of the Scripture when it saith The earth standeth fast and the stars move doth the Scripture in this speake foolishly Surely we are content to preferre the foolishnesse of Scripture to the wisdome of your scribling because such conceited wisdome is but foolishnesse with God What foundation either in Divinity or Philosophy what Article of the Creed hath not been questioned shall they be counted foolish foundations or unfit to discusse controversies because they have been questioned by pernicious Heretickes If you were as wise a man as you pretend your selfe to be you should have with solid arguments refelled our foundations which are so fully demonstrated by so many Philosophers and then you should have shot your fooles bolt The truth of these foundations I have shewed already to which you answer nothing therefore here I will not actum agere 5. Our third Argument is That our earth must be in the center because it is in the lowest place or middest of the world this Aristotle proves by the descending of all heavy to the center and the ascending of light bodies from it But you reject Aristotle as being a master of Syllogismes and being deceived whilst be supposeth that which he pretends to prove But indeed you are much deceived your selfe whilst you reject this master of Syllogismes who doth not suppose what he pretends to prove but substantially proves what you thinke hee supposeth Hee saith the earth is the center and thus syllogistically out of him it is proved To what place heavy bodies descend that place is the center But to the earth heavy bodies descend ergo the earth is the center You see now that this master of Syllogismes doth not suppose that which he brings unto the conclusion but proves the earth to be the center by a medium which you cannot answer so that being put to your shifts you know not how to elude the force of this and other arguments but by falling to your art of multiplying centers and circumferences which is not difficult to you that can multiply worlds And because cause you cannot be so impudent as to deny the ascending of light bodies you say That they ascend to some circumference which we cannot reasonably affirme to be concentricall with that of the world But I would know of you how you can reasonably affirme that circle to be eccentricall which we sensibly perceive to be concentricall to the world If neither you nor we can perceive that circumference to which light bodies ascend eccentricall to the world what reason have you to affirme it or how doe you prove what you affirme May you not as well tell us that there are more suns then this one which we see For you will say that we cannot reasonably affirme there is but one sun But you say We cannot prove the descent of heavy bodies to the center nor the ascent of light bodies to the circumference of the world because all our experience in this kind extends but to things that are on earth or in the aire above it I pray you good Sir how farre doth your experience reach beyond ours that you should deny this our assertion Have you beene in the moone and observed that which we cannot finde here below We see quantum acie possunt oculi servare as farre as our eyes will give us leave to wit light bodies mounting from the center towards the circumference doe you see otherwise I know you doe not and cannot though you had as many eyes as Argus therefore keep your wilde opinions to your selfe for so long as you can neither by sense nor reason perswade us your bare word will be too weake an argument to worke upon our beliefe You conclude That it were a senslesse thing from our experience of so little a part to pronounce any thing infallibly concerning the scituation of the whole I grant our experience to be little but yours is lesse or none at all a little is better then none and we may more boldly inferre that there is but one center and one circumference because all light things ascend to one circumference and all heavy things descend to one center then you can inferre two centers and two circumferences whereas you never knew any light thing ascend or heavy thing descend to any other circumference and center then to these which we maintaine are not you therefore much more senslesse then we for we follow the direction both of our sense and reason so doe not you 6. Our Astonomicall reasons you refell as wisely as you have done the rest for you grant us That the earth is in the midst of the equinoctiall horizon and other circles but you
deny that from hence can be concluded that it is in the center of the world It seemes then that the equinoctiall c. are not concentricall to the world and that the earth may be in the midst of the horizon and equator though never so much distant from the center and what is this but to make another world consisting of another heaven and earth For if this earth be under any other equinoctiall besides that of the primum mobile or any other horizon it cannot have the heaven equally on all sides of it and so cannot be in the lowest place which is the center though it be the heaviest body and so against its nature must be higher then that body which is in the center This is to take away that order which God hath placed in the creatures to multiply worlds and to bring in a strange confusion And what a wise reason doe you give us why the earth would remaine in the midst of these circles that is the equinoctiall c. though distant from the center because it is the eye that imagins them to be described about it So then the earth doth not goe out of the midst of these circles because the eye imagines them c. You have a strange fascinating eye that can keepe the earth within its circles if you should winke or if you lose your eyes with your great patron ` Democritus would not the earth give you the slip and fall out of your circles into the center of the world Besides I had thought that the action of the eye had been to see not to imagine As you have made a confused Chaos in the great world so you doe in the little world too confounding the inward and outward senses the sight and the imagination I thinke you were begot of Chaos and caligo Againe what a reaching eye have you that can describe circles about the earth If you had spoken of an artificiall Globe you had said something but if your eye were as big as that of Polyphemus Argolici clypei aut Phoebaeae lampadis instar yet you could not describe with your eye a circle about the earth your imagination may describe it but not your eye your imagination cannot be the cause why the earth remaines within its circles your imagination must be conformable to the reality of things and not they to your imagination for though you imagine that there is a world in the moone that the earth moves c. yet there is no such thing because the earth is in the center wee imagine it to be so and beleeve it also but our imagination or beliefe do not make it to be so therefore our collection is not weak when we inferre that the earth is in the center because it is in the midst of these circles which are concentricall to the world or because the parts and degrees of the earth doe answer in proportion to the parts and degrees of heaven which they could not well doe if the earth were eccentricall 7. Now I thinke you go about to conjure us with your figures circles and characters and to hem us in with a circle made by your pen as Popilius the Roman Legate did inclose King Antiochius within a circle made with his rod you remove the earth from one center to another with more facility then Archimedes could have done with his engine you transferre the starres from one circle to another at your pleasure you can doe I thinke as she in the Poet Sistere aquam fluviis vertere sidera ritro and all this stirre is to informe us that though the earth be never so farre distant from the center of the world yet the parts and degrees of your imaginary spheare about it will be alwayes proportionable to the parts and degrees of the earth And what of all this You may imagine what spheares you will and in your imagination place the earth as you will yet the earth standeth fast for ever in this great fabricke of the world as the center though in your head it move to and fro You may place the earth upon the top of the primum mobile and imagine a spheare about it with proportionable degrees and parts to those of the earth wee may retort these words upon the sunne your center that though it be never so farre distant from the center of the world yet the parts of an imaginary spheare about it will be proportionable to the parts of the sun but though in your imaginary circle there be a proportion of parts and degrees to the earth removed from the center I would know if the earth therefore is removed from the center Or if you should remove the earth ten or twenty degrees neerer the pole Articke or to the Zenith of the Meridian from the center is there or can there be any proportion between the two hemispheares Will not the one be so much the lesse by how much the other is inlarged Or can the true spheare of heaven be divided equally into twelve parts or signes so that sixe be alwayes above the earth and sixe below Or can the stars in both hemispheares appeare of the same bignesse Doubtlesse though you make a proportion in your imaginary spheare to your imaginary earth in your imaginary center yet there can be no proportion between the reall spheare of heaven and the reall earth which is the reall center of the world if it should be removed from its place where it is your imaginations then are but the images phansies and toyes of your head without ground or solidity therefore they are neither so strong nor we so weake as that they should make any impression upon our beliefe as the mothers imagination doth upon the tender Embryo in her wombe When you are pressed with the manifest absurdities and inconveniences which arise from removing of the earth from the center of the universe you have no other way to escape but like a hedgehog to shrinke back into your imaginary globe or circle for you grant that the earth must needs be placed both in the axis and aequator but that must be in the center of the spheare which you imagine about it and not in the midst of this universe But why must the earth be removed from being the center of the universe which by sense reason daily experience and continuall observation of Astronomers is knowne to be the center Why I say must it be removed from its owne reall circle to your imaginary circle What inconvenience will follow in the world if it remaine the center of the universe Or wherein shall the world be bettered if it be removed to your supposed circle Nay what absurdities will not follow upon this removall which you will never be able to avoid for all your starting hole for whereas you say That though the earth were as far distant from the center as we conceive the sunne to be yet it may be still scituated in the very concourse of
the axis and aequator Truly though we should conceive it to be so farre distant yet it would not be still in the concourse of these two lines for if either the sunne or the earth were there still there would be a perpetuall equinox through the world neither would there ever be any increase or decrease of dayes and nights Now you present unto us a Scenography or plat-forme of your imaginarie world in which like another Joshua you make the sunne to stand still so that here is a perpetuall solstice if that American who would not acknowledge the sunne for a god because it never rested had seen your sun or had known of him what you know he would have recanted his opinion What fooles were the Poets to bestow so rich a chariot and foure prancing horses on the sunne who could make no use of them they should have bestowed this gift upon the earth for she it is that undertakes all the toile and rejoyceth as a Gyant to run her course Ovid's second booke of Metamorphosis must be mended and Phaeton must preferre his petition to the Earth his mother and not to the Sun his father except perhaps in those dayes the Sun did travell about the Earth but now being wearie to go about so often and to take such paines for her thanklesse inhabitants hath given over this toile and hath left the earth to shift for her selfe and children The reason why you present this figure to us is to let us see That though the sunne be in the center and the earth in the suns orbe yet that there can be no Eclipse but when the sunne and moone are diametrically opposite But here your opinion is diametrically opposite to the truth for the line from the center to the circumference is but a semidiameter and indeed the sunne is distant from the moone in your figure nothing neere a semidiameter and yet your moone is eclipsed But what a mishapen world have you made us in which you have placed the sunne lowermost and the earth above the sunne and hath made such a vast circuit for the earth and such a little circle for the moone You told us afore that the earth drawes about the moon but in your figure it cannot be so for you have made the earth to compasse the sunne round but the moone to fetch a compasse of her owne aside off from the sunne so that whereas you have placed the earth in Aries she is between the sunne and the moone but when she comes about to Libra the opposite signe then the sunne will be between the moon and her This is indeed a strange world and doubtlesse none of Gods making I wish I were out of it for I am wearie and sorrie to spend time in refuting of such toyes You doe well to confesse the uncertainty of finding out the exact distance of the firmament which is but conjecturall according to mens fancies and so indeed are the motions and magnitudes and number and order of the spheares and starres about which Astronomers have so many digladiations and oppositions which were tedious but to name From their conjectures and uncertainties have proceeded such a number of conjuring words as Trepidations Retrogradations Excentricities concentricities Epicyles Accessions Recessions and I cannot tell what so that as Cato said of Sooth-sayers I may say of Astronomers It is a wonder that they do not laugh at one another The best of them all are but Cu va in terris animae coelestium inanes They gaze and stare on the stars and dispute and assever with great boldnesse that each star is of such and such a bignesse and altitude and that they move thus and thus and that there be so many of each magnitude and so expert they are and quick-sighted in these things that are so remote and yet cannot perceive the things that be hard at hand therefore Anaximines gazing on the stars fell in the ditch and was checked by his maid for his curiosity in things beyond his reach and neglecting that which most concerned him Saint Ambrose complained of the Astronomers of his time that they were busie in measuring of the heaven in numbering of the stars but carelesse of their salvation that was indeed Relinquers causans salutis error is quaerere Even like the Pharisees whom Christ reproves That they could discerne the face of the skie and of the earth but could not discerne the time Saint Austin preferres that man who is conscious of his owne infirmities to him that is curious in the speculation and serutiny of the stars Laudabilior est animus cui nota est infirmitas sua c. Even in the opinion of Socrates it 's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be mad to inquire curiously into these celestiall things which are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not to be found outby us Furiosi dementesque sunt judicandi they are furious and mad men c. saith Lactantius I will not condemne the good uses that may be made of Astronomy in calculation of times observation of seasons prediction of eclipses and such things as have their immediate dependence from the opposition and conjunction of starres and the uses that may be made of it in physicke and in the campe but that which I reprove is the vaine curiosity of men who cannot be content to know with sobriety things revealed must needs with Phaeton and Icarns meddle with these heavenly bodies in vaine and curious speculations the knowledge whereof in this life is denyed us as being a part of Adams punishment for his affected knowledge and being a meanes for us to have recourse to Christ in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdome and knowledge Therefore for their needlesse paines and presumptuous curiosity God doth punish them with multitudes of contradictory opinions Who can sufficiently laugh to heare their jars and dissentions saith Theodoret for their difference is not about the measuring of an acre of ground but of the whole world Now saith the same Father who can measure the whole earth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God himselfe asketh Iob Who is it that hath laid the measures of the earth and who hath stretched the line upon it and he asketh him whether he hath perceived the breadth of the earth Ver. 18. intimating hereby the impossibility thereof and shewing what difference there is between Gods knowledge and mans saith Saint Chrysostome on that place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For God saith the same Father will let Iob see how much man is inferiour to him in that not onely hee cannot doe the workes that God hath done but also that he hath not the knowledge of them As it was Gods proper worke to make the earth so it is proper to him alone to know the measure of it if then we know not the earths measure which is but a point in comparison of heaven what madnesse is it to measure the heavens or to define the motions scituations
thinke you of a Hedge hog when he wraps himselfe up in his prickles as round as a bowle is the best part then more in the middle of his body then it was before Or hath the earth which is of a round forme better things in the center then in the superficies What difference is there betweene the middle and out-side of a round stone Againe you say the center is not the worst place although Aristotle proves it from the dignity of the thing containing over that which is contained and your reason is That though the center be contained yet it is one of the termini or limits of a round body as well as the circumference but I reply that though it be one of the limits yet it is contained and therefore more ignoble then that which containeth it so you have but offered to answer this argument and indeed you know not how to answer it 6. If we suppose the sunne to be in the center say you we may conceive an excellent harmony both in the number and distance of the Planets For my part I give you leave to conceive what you will so that you doe not obtrude your conceits on us as oracles but will keep them to your selfe if you continue to divulge them we will conceit that your conceits are but idle phansies if you cannot set them forth with better proofes then as yet you have done We are confident the earth is in the center and doe conceive that there is an excellent harmony in the Planets though the sunne be not in the center and therefore to say that the harmony would be disturbed if the sunne were amongst the planets you wrong both Pythagoras your master whose conceit of the musicall harmony in heaven was grounded on the motion of the Planets and injurious to Apollo himselfe the author of musicall harmony and the continuall companion of the Muses without whom there can be no consort CHAP. VIII 1. How the eye is deceived and how not and that if the earth moved we should see it 2. Motion and rest how the objects of the eye and of the common sense 3. If the earth moved the clouds would but sceme to move as well as the sunne 4. How the eye can be deceived in the motion of a lucid body 5. The naturall motion of the foundation cannot keep buildings from falling 6. The heavens sitter for motion then the earth 7. Rugged bodies not fittest for motion 8. The sight hindred by the motion of the subject medium and object 9. One simple body hath but one naturall motion proved 10. Essentiall properties more chiefly in the whole then in the parts the earth is heavy in its owne place how bignesse how a hinderance to motion of the earths ineptitude to a swist motion 11. The magneticall qualities of the earth a fiction 12. Similitudes no prooses the seas ebbing and flowing what 13. The whole earth moveth not because the parts move not round 14. Absurd phrases and the spots about the sunne censured 15. That the earth turnes about the moone is ridiculous 16. Some observations to prove that the earth turnes about the clouds refused 17. Of a mixed motion of the place medium and space 18. Of the motion of comets 19. My nine arguments desended 1. That the earths motion would make it hot 2. The aire purer 3. A sound 4. Heaven hath all things sit for motion 5. Of similar parts and the whole 6. The sunne is the heart of the world 7. It workes by motion 8. The earth is the firme foundation 9. The authority of Divines the heaven called AEther the earth hath not two distinct motions THe chiefe businesse of this Chapter you say is to desend the earths diurnall motion Indeed you are too busie Non amo nimium diligentes neither is this businesse of yours anything else then idlenesse otiosi negotium And because you cannot answer our objections you are as busie here as you can be to illude them and to delude the world with your great brags Rhodomontado's but let us see with what dexterity you dissipate the strength of our arguments you doe as Cacus did to Hercules Cacus being too weake to resist that invincible champion laboured to escape his hands by darkning the cave and Hercules his eyes with smoake and ashes which hee belched out against him the like stratagem you use with intricate words and smoakie phrases to darken the understanding of the Reader 1. We objected that if the earth did move we should perceive it you answer but in many intricate and ambiguous tearms which were tedious to relate That the sight judges of motion deceitfully your reason is because motion is not the proper object of the sight nor belonging to any other peculiar sense and that the common sense apprehends the eye it selfe to rest immoveable as when a man is carried in a ship Ans The sight is oftentimes deceived either in respect of the distance of the object so the stars appeare lesse then they are or in respect of the agitation of the object so a square thing seemes round being swiftly turned about 2. In respect of the indisposition of the medium and so the Planets rising and falling seeme biggest the aire being thickned 3. In respect of the organ when the eye optick nerves or visive spirits are disturbed vitiated indisposed or agitated and so things that rest seeme to move because the eye moveth for that apparent motion is not the object of the eye as a true motion is but as it were the effect of the eye moved So then tell us the cause why we cannot perceive the earth move seeing it moves with such a stupendious swiftnesse You cannot say that the distance of it nor the indisposition of the medium are the causes the eye then must be the cause But are all mens eyes from the creation till now so disturbed or agitate with an insensible motion that they cannot perceive the earth nor any part of it to move and yet doe perceive the sunne to move What will you make God so defective in his work of mans body as to give him such eyes which shal continually delude him neither shall they ever apprehend their object though never so neere or the medium though never so well disposed Or will you make him so envious as to give us such eyes by which we should receive the knowledge of visible objects and yet cannot see them when they are so neere us This is the curse of the Sodomites who could not see Lot's dore though they were close by it Your simile of the ship will not hold for though it be true that the shore apparently moves when the ship removes yet we see and feele the true motion of the ship as well as we see or rather seeme to see the apparent motion of the shore When I have beene in a ship I have observed by looking on the mast how swiftly it is moved from the shore but being on
the shore and looking upon trees I see no other motion in them then what is caused by the winde When I am in a ship I perceive the motion of the other ship that saileth by me though the motion of both be equall and uniforme but when I am in an Island I can neither perceive the motion of it nor the motion of the other Island that is by it And although the motion of the eye makes a thing seeme to move which doth not move yet it doth not make the thing seeme to move which doth really move if it be within distance for being in a ship I have discerned the running of horses and carts upon the shore really though the shore it selfe moved apparently therefore though I should yeeld that the earth did move yet that motion could not make me thinke that the sun did not move really no more then the motion of the ship can hinder me from discerning the true motion of a horse or wheele on the shore and albeit motion be not the proper object of the eye yet it is an object neither is the eye more deceived in apprehending or receiving the species of motion then it is in receiving the species of colours caeteris paribus the action of the eye or passion which you will being no other towards the motion of a coloured object then towards the colour of a moving object Againe it would be considered whether the naturall motion of the earth as you call it and the violent motion of a ship produce the same effect in our eye as because the moving of a ship makes the shore seeme to move therefore the moving of the earth makes the sunne seeme to move 2. Your words seeme to be contradictory when you say That motion is not the proper object of the sight nor belonging to any other peculiar sense We say that colours are the proper object of the sight because they belong not to any other peculiar sense and that motion is not the proper object of the eye because it doth belong to other peculiar senses but your other words are false when you say That the common sense apprehends the eye it selfe to rest immoveable For when the eye is moved the common sense apprehends it to be moved and so when it rests the common sense apprehends it to rest otherwise it and the imagination should be still deceived But when you say That the eye is an ill judge of naturall secrets you should have said That it is no judge of naturall secrets for the visible workes of nature are no secrets natures secrets are invisible and therefore are judged by reason not by sense Now though this be a good consequence the earth doth not move because it doth not appeare so to us yet this consequence will not hold the earth doth move because it appeares to move for an object that is immoveable may seeme to move because the eye is moved but when we see a great body neere us to stand still wee justly inferre that it moveth not because we see it not For the apparent motion of the shore there is a manifest cause but for the apparent rest of the earth there can be no cause for if it did move it would not seem to rest being there is no cause not so much as imaginable of this supposed rest but rather the contrary for if it did move it and all things else would seeme to move as for the apparent bignesse of the sunne and moone I have already told you a reason but you have not nor can you tell mee a reason for the apparent rest of the earth 2. I objected That if the motions of the heavens be onely apparent that then the motion of the clouds would be so too your answer is That I might as well inferre that the sense is mistaken in every thing because it is so in one thing Answ. You should have rather inferred that as the sense is mistaken in one thing so it might be in any other thing but I will stand to your illation the sense is mistaken sometimes in every thing when it is mistaken in one thing of the same kinde the eye is mistaken in the bignesse of one star and so it is in the bignesse of every star because the reason or cause of the mistake is alike in all to wit the distance The eye is mistaken in the motion of one tree or house upon the shore and so it is in all the trees and houses it seeth on the shore for the reason of this mistake is alike in all to wit the agitation of the eye even so if the heavens move apparently the clouds also move apparently Nam in horum motu potest decipi visus non minus quam in motu coelorum these are my words which you cunningly left out The eye is deceivable in the one as well as in the other therefore my eye being alike disposed in respect of its agitation by the supposed motion of the earth to the heavens and to the clouds it will follow that as it is mistaken in the one so it is in the other and consequently wee must no more trust our eyes in the motion of the clouds then in the motion of the heavens if the earth did move Therefore what you speake of Anaxagoras his opinion concerning the blacknesse of the snow is fit for your selfe for to hold the snow to be blacke and the earth to move are both alike absurd and ridiculous but this opinion is more dangerous then that As for your conceit of the common sense conceiving the eye to be immoveable I have said already that it is false and indeed the opinion of one that seems to want common sense and as boldly without proofe doe you affirme that the clouds though they seeme not to move are carried about with our earth by a swift revolution for so you make the inferiour bodies against that order that God hath placed in the world to move the superiour as if you should say The foot originally moves the head and not the head the foot But this is no hinderance you say why we may not judge aright of the other particular motions It is true I judge aright of the particular motions of the clouds when I see them carried to and fro by the winde and so I judge aright of the motion of the sunne but when I see the sun and a cloud moving from East to West and you should tell me that the sunne doth not move though the cloud doth move I would know the reason why my eye should be more deluded in the one then in the other seeing the motion of the earth and so of my eye is alike disposed to both It is as much as if you would tel me when I see a horse and a man run both on the shore that the man runs but not the horse whereas my eye is alike disposed to both As for your similies of a man walking in the
etheriall aire But first tell us if Iupiter and the rest are separated from the whole if they be what is it that moves them with contrarie motions If they be not then your simile hath never a foot Againe doth this follow Iupiter Saturne c. have such and such motions therefore bullets and parts of the earth being separated observe the motion of the whole You had been better to have brought your simile from the sea which is neerer to the earth in place and nature then the heavens are thus The sea ebbs and flowes therefore parts of the earth being separated may observe the motion of the whole Doth not this hang well together like a rope of sand If you had told us that parts of the sea being separated observe the motion of the whole in ebbing and flowing therefore parts of the earth separated observe also the motion of the whole you had said something but you know the contrary of the Antecedent to be true for you tell us that a bucket of sea water doth not ebbe and flow though this motion be as you said naturall to the sea But here you are deceived for if this motion were a naturall property flowing from the essence of the sea the whole sea and every part of it should ebbe and flow but it is not so for the Adriatick sea hath this motion the Tyrrhene Baltick and some other seas have it not so some parts of the sea ebbe and flow more and longer then others but essentiall properties are not capable of more and lesse some thinke that this is no pure motion but an alteration rather in the sea but be it what it will be it proceedeth not from the nature of the sea but from externall causes partly from the force and motion of the stars chiefly of the moon and partly from vapours and exhalations in the sea 12. You say The whole earth may moveround though the severall parts thereof have no such revolution particular of their stone for there be many things agreeing to the whole frame which are not discernable in the divers parts of it which you instance in the sea water and in the bloud and humours of our body which ascend in the body but descend being separated from it Answ. There is nothing proper and essentiall to the whole but is also proper and essentiall to the parts separated or not separated thus if circular motions were naturall to the whole earth as you say the parts of it would retaine their nature still though separated therefore every part of the earth descends because the whole doth but no part thereof moves circularly because the whole doth not As for the parts of the sea water in a bucket there is not ebbing and flowing as in the whole because that motion is not naturall to it nor doth it proceed from the active forme but from its passive whereby it is apt to receive such a motion from externall agents that motion which is essentiall and naturall to it is not lost in the parts being separated for every bucket yea every drop of sea water descends because that motion is naturall therefore not separable As for the bloud and humours in our body which you say ascend naturally to the head I say they ascend not naturally for naturally they descend because heavy but they are carried upward by the spirits in them and drawne up by the attractive faculty for each part drawes its aliment now this bloud and humours being separated from the body lose their heate and spirits and so descend Your instances then will not evert our maxime to wit that if the whole earth move circularly the separated parts would retaine the same motion but you say that this motion is not discernable in the parts I grant it neither is it discernable in the whole and seeing it is neither discernable by the sense nor demonstrable by reason how come you to know it if you can perceive in the swift violent course of a bullet the magneticall revolution of the whole earth you are more quick-sighted then Lynx You have certaine phrases like riddles which stand in need of some Oedipus to explaine them 1. You call the earth a great magnet What 's that A great load-stone If there be great store of iron in your moone world this great magnet in time may draw down the moone upon us 2. You say That parts of the earth may according to their matter be severed from the whole perhaps you meane they may be severed in respect of place not of matter for if they have not the same matter with the whole they cannot be parts nor can they be the subject of these common magneticall qualities you speak of 3. You say That Iupiter and Saturn hang in the etheriall aire you love to confound what our wise fore-fathers have distinguished because you have an etheriall earth in the moon you would fain have an etheriall aire to God hath separated the heaven or etheriall region from this aereall so must we I have read once of aura aetherea in Virgil but there the Poet divinely meanes our breath which wee have originally from heaven I know no other etheriall aire but this 4. You say That the flesh bones c. tend downeward as being of a condensate matter but gravity is the proper cause of descent and not density for the fire and aire may be condensate and yet tend upward 5. You say That Saturne Iupiter and the Sunne are magneticall bodies If you meane that these stars have the essentiall properties of the magnes to draw iron then you wil make the earth and Planets to be of the same kind and species if Mahomeis iron chest were hanged between the sun and the earth it 's a question whether it should be drawne more forcibly upward or downeward 6. You aske a reason Why the earth should not move about its center as the Planets doe I may rather aske you why it should seeing it was made for rest and they for motion neither is there any thing wherein they agree but that they are corporeall substances in all things else they differ why then should wee inferre the earths motion from their motion 7. You that prove nothing but boldly sayes any thing as if men were bound to receive your dictates though never so unreasonable and ridiculous as if they were oracles you I say tell us Of spots about the sun thought to be clouds or evaporations from his body If your eagle eyes can see spots about the sun then the heavens are not pure in your sight but who hath spotted them which God hath made cleare and pure without spot or wrinkle are not the spots in your glasse or in your eye rather I have heard of one who with his spectacles reading in a booke beat the booke three or foure times thinking he had seen a flye on the paper when it was a spot in his glasse If you had read the absurd opinion of the Manichees who
held with as great confidence as you doe your conceits That the sunne was a great ship sailing about the world perhaps you would have told us that these spots are great whales playing about the sides of the ship and we should as soone beleeve you in this as in the other but now you cannot certainly tell us Whether these spots may not be clouds or evaporations from the body of the sunne But I would know what use is there for clouds there except it be to shadow now and then and to refresh with raine your world in the moon and if there be any such watry meteors about the sun they must needs be extracted out of the sea lakes and rivers that are in your upper world And seeing these vapours cannot be condensate into clouds without cold it confirmes my opinion that the sun is not hot formally and that the heaven was nick-named when it was called aether ab ardore but I much muse what these evaporations should be from the body of the sun What doth the sun pant and sweat with his daily labour Evaporations are hot and moist exhalations is there any moisture in the sunne Doe not these clouds and evaporations proceed rather from his horses nostrils But the prince of Poets tels us that they blow light out of their nostrils Lucem que elatis naribus efflaus thus you afford us matter of sport But you goe on in your absurdities for having once plunged your selfe in this mire the more you strive and struggle to get out the faster you sticke and the deeper you sinke in You tell us That the moone is turned about by our earth why doe you not tell us also that the sunne is turned about by the moone and the firmament by the sunne and the primum mobile by the firmament and the first mover by the primum mobile and so the world shall be turned topsie turvie For is not any of these turnings as probable as the moon to be turned about by the earth perswade me this and then you shall easily assure me that the cart drawes the horse the crab courses the hare and the ship turns about the wind You would make the common-wealth of heaven like many disordered common-wealths here on earth where the inferiour and meaner sort of people will take upon them to rule and guide their superiors Princes and Magistrates and then all comes to confusion the horses run away with the coach and coach-man Frustra retinacula tendens Fortur equis auriga neque audit currus habenas Is it not reasonable that the inferiour bodies should receive their motion from the superiour as they have from them their beauty perfection and conservation But you give the moone many turners The earth by her magneticall motion Iupiter who turnes the foure lesser Planets by his body the Sun by his revolution So here be three severall wayes of turning motion body and revolution but is not revolution motion And when Iupiter turnes by his body is there no revolution Or when the Sunne turnes by his revolution doth he not turne by his body It seemes that he that turneth by his body toucheth and so Iupiter toucheth the lesser Planets He touched indeed Venus in the Poet when he kissed her Oscula libavit natae But how he toucheth and turneth these Planets by his body you doe not instruct us but your drift in all this is to shew that if the Sunne carry about his spots or clouds the earth carry about the Moone c. much more may the earth carrie about an arrow or bullet as if you would say If the water carrie about the mill-wheel and the wheele carrie about the mill-stones much more may the mill carrie about the miller and his horse Concerning other mens observations of the flame of a candle carried equally in a ship of an equall force casting an heavy body but at an equall distance with against the motion of the ship of a heavy body in a ship falling down in a straight line of a man leaping up in a ship and abiding in the aire one second scruple of an houre and yet the ship not withdraw it selfe fifteene foot Of these I will say but little because I have already said something of them elsewhere yet I must tell you that though the smoake and flame of a candle within the ship are carried with the ship it will not follow that the clouds which are without the earth are turned about by the earth If you could thrust the clouds within the bowels of the earth they should be carried about with the earth if it did move but take the same candle which you talke and place it in a calme night on the top of the mast when the ship is carried with the tyde then you shall see that though the candle is carried along with the ship yet the smoake being separated from the candle doth not follow the ship but remaines mounting upward in the aire If the ship then carrie not along with it the smoak of the candle which is in it how shall we thinke that the earth can carrie about the clouds which are so farre above it Now to salve this you tell us That the aire is as well limited in bounds as that which is included in a roome But then I answer that it is one thing to be included and another thing to be limited every thing that is included in a roome is limited but not every thing limited is included what is included must needs partake of the motion of that which includes it the aire within the ship is moved by and with the ship because it is included but the aire without the ship though it be limited yet moves not by or with the ship because it is not included You ask where the bounds of the air are terminated and you answer your selfe by the spheare of vaporous aire or which is all one by the orbe of magneticall vigour so you distinguish between the aire and vaporous aire but you tell us not how farre this spheare of vaporous aire or this orbe of magneticall vigour reacheth so that wee are not satisfied with your answer except you meane that it reacheth to the moon for you told us before that the moon is turned about by the earth but then you contradict your selfe for you say here that these bounds are not terminated by the concavity of the moone's orbe so where to finde you and the bounds of your spheare of vaporous aire I cannot tell neither doe I understand how vaporous aire being a substance can be all one with magneticall vigour which is an accident and how this accident can have its orbe this is a new piece of Philosophie which would be illustrated and so doe the words following That all earthly bodies are contained within these limits as things are in a close roome and as parts in that whole to which they belong Though a heavy by equall force be cast at an equall
witnesse If we should have occasion to saile to New England wee should be there quickly but no hopes ever to returne thence how should we be able to walke or sit on horsebacke travelling against the motion of the aire if it did move with that violence you speak of much lesse could birds in their flight resist such a force not the great bird Ruck that I may fit you with a bird somewhat proportionable to your conceits whose wings are twelve paces long and snatches up elephants as if they were but mice in his talons a great way in the aire sometimes you play the Painter as in your circles and other figures and sometimes the Poet as here Admiranda sanis sed non credenda As for your distinction of the motion of heavie and light bodies to wit That they being considered according to the space wherein they move their motions are not simple but mixed of a direct and circular but according to the medium wherein they move they have properly right motions This I say is such a riddle that Oedipus could scarce have solved it for why should not the motion be mixed as well in the medium as in the space Is the aire or medium a hinderance to circular motions so that these bodies can onely move there in a straight line if so you contradict your selfe for you tell us still that bodies are moved round by the aire and this by the earth And how shall we understand that a stone falling downeward hath a mixed motion of a direct and circular according to the space wherein it moves but a simple straight motion according to the aire wherein it moves What mean you by this word space you cannot meane the ubi of these bodies moving for that is their rest in the place to which they move ultima perfectio corpor is mobilis You doe not understand I thinke the intervall of the ancients which Aristotle hath refuted as being neither a substance nor an accident not a substance because there would be penetration not an accident for so an accident should be better then the substance for Locus est prior nobilior locato And if by space you understand the aire then how will your distinction stand the aire or medium and the space being all one the place it cannot signifie for the stone descendeth not in its place but to it therefore what your space is and how distinguished from the medium I thinke you doe not know If wee should aske you with what motion Christs body ascended into heaven you will answer that according to the space wherein it moved it ascended by a mixed motion of a direct and circular but according to the medium it ascended by a simple straight motion and so wee shall depart from you as wise as we came like those that consulted with Sibylla Inconsultì abâ—unt You say That Aristotle would not deny but that fire may ascend and yet participate of a circular motion so likewise must it be for the descent of any thing Aristotle is beholding to you for if you will beleeve him that heavie bodies must have a double motion because he would not deny but that the fire may have a double motion then if he would not deny but that the heavens may move round and that the earth may stand still you will beleeve him much more I hope you will credit him when by irrefragable reasons hee proves the motion of the one and immobilitie of the other but how ever it is bad reasoning from the possibilitie of one thing to the necessity of another great oddes between may be and must be between fire and earth because Croesus may be poore must therefore Irus be rich Because Aristotle saith the fire may descend must the earth therefore ascend there is no consequence à posse ad esse much lesse à posse ad necesse I will suppose with you That whilst the ship is in her swistest motion a ball of wax being let fall into a vessell full of water may be slow in sinking and that the motion of the ship will not be discernable in it But that the wax should seem to the eye to descend in a straight line I wil not suppose because I have found it otherwise the wax will seeme to have a transverse motion in the water though it descend in a straight line so an oare seemes to be broken in the water which element is not a true medium for the sight now the reason why the motion of the ship in the way is not discernable is because the great disproportion betweene the bignesse of the ship and smallnesse of the wax and because that motion is not the waxes owne but the ships these two reasons concurring make this motion in the wax indiscernable but suppose what you say were true in preternaturall motions it will not therefore follow that is also true in motions naturall If the aire did move round with the earth it is most certaine that the comets would seem alwayes to stand still being carried about by the revolution of this aire but experience sheweth that they rise and set to this you answer That most comets are above the spheare of the aire which is turned round with our earth Answ. You told us before that the earth turneth about the moone therefore it must follow that the comets are above the moone if they be above that aire which is turned about with our earth 2. We have already shewed that the aire sometimes moveth the earth but that the earth moveth the aire is false and preposterous 3. You tell us That those comets which are within the orbe of our aire seeme to stand still you instance that comet mentioned by Josephus which hung over Ierusalem Answ. That was no ordinary comet or the worke of nature but a miracle or worke of supernaturall power as the rest of those prodigies which happened about the same time to wit the sudden light which appeared halfe an houre about the altar the Cow that brought forth a Lambe in the Temple the flying open of the brasen gate of its owne accord the chariots and armed men that were seene in theaire c. Now when you say That this comet being within the orbe of our aire seemed to stand still you are deceived for it was Gods worke that it stood still over that place and it did not seeme but did truly stand still by which it is plaine that the earth moveth not for if it did move then the comets which are neerest to it would move swiftest but the contrary of this is true for the higher the comet is the swister it moveth the lower the slower yea scarce at all because it is the heaven that moveth the comets and not the earth so you falsifie Seneca for he doth not say that these low comets seeme to move but the clean contrary that they are altogether immovable undique immota You say That you might justly passe over my
nine arguments which I urged in one Chapter against your opinion but because I proceed say you with such scorne and triumph you will examine my boastings You doe wisely like the Romans who that their Generals might not be puffed up with the glory of their triumphs caused some to walke along by their chariots using upbraiding words the like doe you calling my arguments cavills not worth the naming yet you are pleased to name them to shew doubtlesse their weaknesse and your wit My first cavill as you call it is this If the earth move it will be hotter then the water because motion is the cause of heat but that the earth should be hotter then water is repugnant to that principall in naturall Philosophie which affirmes the earth to be colder besides the water would never freeze if it were moved as swiftly as the earth This argument because you cannot answer you picke as you thinke a contradiction out of it which is this The earth by motion is hotter then the water and yet the water moves along with it which water is made warme also by motion that it is not capable of congelation Answ. Is this a contradiction thinke you the earth is hotter then the water and yet the water is hot too the fire is hotter then the aire and yet the aire is hot too who ever heard that the degrees of comparison make a contradiction I should not contradict my selfe if I should say Keplar was a cold disputant but you are a colder 2. Though I say that the water moveth along with the earth yet the earth may be hotter then the water without any contradiction for of two bodies moving together one may be hotter then the other especially if they be of different natures who knowes not that drie and solid bodies such as the earth is are more capable intensively of heate then thin and moist bodies such as the water is 3. Though the earth water and aire next to it be not severed one from another yet they are made hot by such a violent motion when you runne your cloathes skin flesh bloud c. are not severed one from the other and yet your motion makes them all hot 4. If motion in fluid bodies were the cause of coldnesse as you say some do think then it would follow that the more you move your bloud should be the colder Scaliger shewes that they who water their horses being hot use to stirre the water violently that it may be brought to a warme temper that the horses may drinke without danger 5. I deny that all running waters are the coldest neither are they the colder because they run but because the meet still with fresh aire so shall you in a cold day if you rise to walke be colder for a while then when you sit still not because you walke for that in time will warme you but because you meet with fresh aire vvhich you did not vvhilest you sate neither is there yet so much heat in you as to abate the sense of the cold aire till your motion have caused it 6. I deny that the strongest windes are still the coldest though they blow from the same coast at the same time of the year for I have observed that in one February a gentle easterly vvind hath brought snovv and the next February a strong East vvinde hath brought raine 7. If rest be the cause that in cold vveather vvater doth freeze then all vvaters that rest vvould freeze and no running vvaters vvould freeze but this is false for some vvaters resting doe not freeze and sometimes running vvaters doe freeze vvhen the motion is not so strong as to stirre up the heat therefore it remaines that the heat caused by the motion and not the motion it selfe is the hinderance of the waters freezing 8. If this motion were true that the earth runnes foure miles in a minute the heat of the aire would be more then moderate even in winter you could not indure the heat of it we should need no fire to warme us wood would be cheap enough 2. My second argument was this If the earth did move the aire then the aire which is next to the earth would be purer as being more rarified but the contrary is true for the higher the aire is the purer it is You answer never a word to this argument which shewes you assent Qui tacet consentire videiur 3. My third argument If the earth did move the aire it would cause a sound but this is no more audible then the Pythagoricall harmony of heaven You answer That there is no reason why this motion should cause a sound more then the supposed motion of the heavens But I say there is a great deale of reason for if any solid body be it never so small though an arrow bullet or wand moving the air cause a sound will not the vast body of the earth turning the aire with that violence cause a hideous noise which would make us all deafe now there is no reason why the motion of the heavens should make any sound for neither are they solid bodies themselves nor doe they move or encounter any solid body nor is there any aire in heaven which things are required to make a sound 4. I argued that nature had in vaine endowed the heavens with all conditions requisite for motion if they were not to move for they have a round figure they have neither gravity nor levity they are incorruptible and they have no contrary This you say will prove the earth to move as well as the heavens For that hath a round figure it is not heavy in its proper place and being considered as whole the other two conditions you reject as being untrue and not conducing to motion Answ. Though I should grant you that the earth were round yet it is not so exactly round and smooth as the heaven for it hath many mountaines and vallies and some hills higher some lower is a globe or boule that hath knobs and dents in it so fit for motion as that which is smooth and equally round 2. I have shewed already the folly of that conceit which holdeth the whole earth not to be heavy in it s own place as if the elements must loose their essentiall properties being in their own places whereas it is the place that preserveth the propertiese and essenc of things Have the fire and aire lost their levity because they are in their own places and is it not absurd to say as I have already shewed that there should be weight in a part of any thing and not in the whole as if a piece of an yron bullet were heavie but not the whole bullet you were as good say that totum non est majus suâ parte 3. Whereas you say that the heavens are corruptible you may say also that they are generable and so being subject to generation and corruption they are of the same nature with sublunary bodies and must
have the same matter so that as there is a transmutation of the elements into each other even so the heavens may be changed into the elements and these into them heaven may become earth and earth heaven this is your admirable learning which passeth all understanding 4. Heaven it seemes by you hath a contrary but you tell us not what that is they are not contrary to one another as fire and water nor are they contrary to sublunary things for they cherish and preserve them neither have they the same common matter 5. Any sensible man may easily conceive that contrariety and corruption are hinderances to a perpetuall circular motion and because as is said the heaven is not capable of them but the earth is it will follow that I argued upon good grounds that the heavens onely are endowed with all things requisit for motion and not the earth and therefore God will have nothing idle as hee made nothing in vaine hee hath made the heavens and the three superiour elements to be exercised with motion and the lowest element with generation and corruption but it were strange if the earth should be subject to all three and the heavens to none but should stand still and be perpetually idle this is not sutable to the wisdome of the Maker 5. I reasoned that all similary parts are of the same nature with the whole but each part of the earth doth rest in its place therefore doth the whole also You say this Argument would prove That the sea doth not ebbe and flow because every drop of water hath not this motion or that the whole earth is not sphericall because each part hath not the same forme Answ. I have shewed already that the ebbing and flowing of the sea are not essentiall to the sea for in many places the sea doth not ebbe and flow therefore it is no wonder that parts of the sea being severed from the whole lose that motion seeing many parts being joyned with the whole have it not This motion then is caused by externall agents but those qualities which are essentiall to the whole are not lost in the parts Every drop of water is heavy and moves downward because the whole doth every drop of sea water is salt because the whole is 2. I have said already that the earth is not exactly sphearicall and though it were your conceit is nothing for roundnesse belongs not to the earth quà talis as it is earth sed quà tota as it is whole When a thing ceaseth to be whole it loseth the figure of the whole neither are external figures or outward qualities essential to things but common accidents onely Now the qualitie of resting in the lowest place is essentiall to the whole earth therefore to the parts also 6. I said that the Sun in the world is as the heart in mans body but the motion of the heart ceasing none of the members stirre so neither would there be motion in the world if the Sun stood still This you say is rather an illusturation then a proof I grant it for I used it as an illustration to discover with its light the weaknesse and to dispell the darknesse of your opinion And were it not an absurd thing to think that the arteries move but the heart standeth still So no lesse absurd is it to say that the Earth moveth but the Sunne standeth still 2. Illustrations oftentimes are forcible proofs and used they are both by Divines and Philosophers 7. I said that the Sun and heavens work upon these inferiour bodies by their light and motion You say That the Sun and Planets working upon the earth by their owne reall daily motion is the thing in question therefore must not be taken for a common ground Answ. If nothing shall be taken for a common ground which is or hath been in question then there are no common grounds in Divinity and Philosophy for I know no fundamentall doctrine in the one or principall in the other which hath not been questioned by wanton and unsettled spirits 2. I said that the heavens work by motion you inferre as if I had said of a reall daily motion I spake neither of daily nor annuall motion if hee doth not work by his daily doth hee work by his annuall revolution 3. Tell mee if you can from whence proceed the many motions and mutations that are in sublunary things from themselves they cannot from a superior cause then they must and what is that but the heavens and what other media or meanes are in heaven by which they work but light and motion If you can tell us any other besides these wee will be beholding to you 8. I proved that the earth must be firme and stable because it is the foundation of buildings You say That it is firme from all jogging and uncertaine motions Answ. This is a jogging conceit of yours and an uncertain answer as I have shewed already for motion as it is motion is an enemy to buildings be it never so uniforme and a moving foundation can be no settled foundation If a foundation be stable how can it move if it move how can it be stable 9. My ninth Argument was taken from the authority of Divines grounded on Scripture Thy Sun shall no more goe downe c. In the Revelations the Angel sweares there shall be no more time therefore the heavens must rest whose motion is the measurer of time so S. Paul saith The creature is subject to vanity this is the vanity of motion of which Solomon speaks The Sun riseth and the Sun goeth downe c. This you say is but a weake Argument for it is granted that this opinion is a Paradoxe Answ. As it deviates from the opinion of other men it is a Paradoxe but as it is repugnant to Scripture it is a Cacodoxe 2. When you say that Isaiah speaketh of that light which shall be in stead of the Sun and Moon doe you answer any thing at all to his testimony Thy Sun shall no more goe downe c. for hee distinguisheth between that light which God shall give to his Saints and the light of the Sun which shall no more goe downe so that hee doth not confound these two lights which are in God and in the Sun as you would have it A part of the Churches happinesse shall be that shee shall both enjoy the light of the Sun without intermission and also that new inaccessible light of divine vision If then the Sun shall goe downe no more it argues that the Sun useth to goe downe Now if you will have these words understood mystically yet the thing to which they doe allude must be understood properly to wit the going down of the Sun 3. You will have time to be measured by the motion of the earth not of the heaven and this you prove out of Pererius who saith That time depends upon the motion and succession of any duration But
how 9. Of Intelligences how and why they move the heavens 10. Magneticke vertue an idle conceit IN this Chapter ampullas loqueris sesquipedalia verba you talk not like a man of this world but like one who hath dwelt long in the Moone or as if you were Iupiters secretary with Minos and had the honour with AEolus Epulis accumbere divûm You dispute of the magnitudes and distances of the orbs and of the swiftnesse of their motion with that exactnesse as if you had measured them with a line but I wonder how you could stand steady to take their measure seeing the foundation on which you stand whirles you about foure miles every minute of an houre I should thinke that your head was giddy when you wrote this and that indeed you can no more dispute of these things then a blinde man can doe of colours neither can we give you any credit untill first you goe thither and bring us a certificate signed with the hands of these Angels which turne about the orbes otherwise you will but loose your labour Nec quidquam tibi prodest Aereas tentasse domos anintóque rotundum Percurrisse polum 1. You will have us suppose that the earth is the cause of this motion but this wee may not suppose for if there be any motion in the earth the earth is the subject of that motion but not the cause for nothing can move it selfe movens mobile are distinct things but what if we should suppose what you desire what will be gained thereby to wit this That the heavens shall be freed from their inconceivable swiftnesse and is not this a goodly reason We cannot conceive how the heavens move so swiftly as they say ergo we must suppose the earth to move Shall we suppose the fire to be cold because we cannot tell how the sunne is hot If one cannot tell how the eye seeth will you bid him suppose that the foot seeth This is homines ex stultis insanos facere let the swiftnesse of heaven be never so great we cannot suppose the earth to move For that they may be swifter then our thoughts is not impossible if either we look on Gods power or on the aptitude in these bodies for such a motion But you will not have us flye to Gods power what he can doe I pray you then whither shall we flie If we goe up into heaven he is there if we goe downe to hell he is there also c. Whatsoever is done in heaven and in the earth c. he doth it himselfe saith David Hee sustaineth all things by the word of his power In him we live move and have our being therefore the Philosophers said well that he was the first mover and that the outmost heaven was the first moveable But if you will have us looke unto the usuall way of providence what is most likely to be done then we say that it is most likely that the heavens move and the earth stands still as is already proved 2. You say the heavens being vast materiall condensate substances are not capable of such a motion I heare words but to no purpose for you should tell us whether the matter of heaven and the condensation thereof be like this of the earth and whether the mover be so weake as that he cannot turne about that vast body I had told you heretofore that bodies move swifter or slower not because they are greater or lesser but because they are heavier or lighter Motion which you call a Geometricall thing but you are in this decived depends not from quantitie lesser bodies move oftentimes flower then the greater a snaile then an elephant a pebble stone then a great cloud it is not then beyond the phansie of a Poet or mad-man as you madly speake for the heaven to move very swiftly but if any man will take upon him to tell exactly how swiftly the heaven moveth or that the earth moveth at all I must needs tell him that he needs hellebor 3. When we say that the heavens are bodies without gravitie you answer us with your recocted coleworts or idle evasion of yours so often repeated That the whole earth in its owne place is not heavy which shift we have divers times already refuted but when you say That the heavens being of a materiall substance it 's impossible but that there should be in them some ineptitude to motion you speake like one who is a stranger to Philosophie for if it were not for the matter there would be no motion in the world As the forme moveth so it is by reason of the matter that all things are moved so that where there is matter there can be no ineptitude to motion in respect of the matter But it is a rugged conceit in you when you say That it 's not conceiveable how the upper spheare should move the lower unlesse their superficies were full of rugged parts or else they must leane one upon the other Answ. What rugged parts are there in the superficies of winds and clouds when the windes move the clouds or what ruggednesse is there in smooth waters when in rivers the formost waters are moved forward by the hindermost Or in the smoake when it carrieth upward a piece of paper But when you say That the farther any spheare is distant from the primum mobile the lesse it is hindered by it in its proper course It is true and yet not repugnant to Ptolomies opinion who saith That in heaven there is no reluctancie for his meaning is that there is no inferiour spheare that hindereth the swiftnesse of the primum mobile and that is the reason why it is so swift because it hath no resistance either from the forme or from the matters or thicknesse of the medium Novv In nova fert animus you vvould faine play the Poet and build castles in the aire but indeed you have already played the Poet too much for your vvhole booke is nothing else but a heap of fictions your vvorld in the Moone your moving earth your standing heavens your figures and characters what are they else but pleasant dreames and idle phansies fit enough to be inserted into Ovids Metamorphosis if you could digest them into good verses And you doe not onely play the Poet but the Painter also in your figures for a fictitious Picture is a visible Poem and a Poem is an audible Picture Painters and Poets have authority you knovv But you wonder much why Poets have not feigned a castle to be made of the same materials with the solid orbes Answ. I thinke the reason is because they did not knovv that there vvere people in the Moone if they had knovvn this doubtlesse they vvould have fitted them vvith inchanted castles and other buildings novv vvhat they have omitted doe you that posterity vvhen you are dead may say Nunc non cinis ille Poetae Faelix now levior cippus nunc imprimit ossa But I vvill
this you have not as yet proved neither will you be ever able to prove The earth indeed is a mother but as senslesse and stupid as Niobe who would suffer her children to starve with cold if that heavenly fire did not move about her As for your instance of a Watch-maker I will use it in your owne words but to our purpose If a wise Watch-maker will not put any superfluous motion in his instrument shall we not thinke that nature is as provident as any ordinary mechanicke Therefore doubtlesse it had been superfluous for the earth to move And whereas you say That the motion of the starres is full of confusion and uncertainties That is true in respect of your ignorance there is an heavenly order and harmony amongst them the confusion is in your head and the uncertainty in your knowledge 7. You say That motion is most agreeable to that which in kinde and properties is neerest to the bodies that are moved But this I say is false for an immoveable body is not made capable of motion because it is neere in some properties to the body that is moved A rocke and a mill-stone which perhaps was taken out of the same rocke agree in kinde and properties will it therefore follow that because the mill-stone moves round the rocke also moves round The sea-water and well-water agree in kinde and properties doth the well-water therefore ebbe and flow But your drift is to shew That the earth moveth with the six Planets because both Earth and Planets have a borrowed light whereas the Sunne and fixed Stars have it of their own Answ. A goodly reason the earth must move as well as the sixe Planets because it hath a borrowed light as well as they as if you would say Saturne and the Moone have a borrowed light therefore they have the same motion and bignesse or thus the Planets have a borrowed light as well as the earth therefore they rest or be as heavie as the earth but what if I should say the Planets have some light of their owne as may be seen by the Moone which the earth hath not and therefore they agree not in this property of light and consequently the earth moveth not as they doe But when you say the fixed stars have light of their owne you speake at randome for you can shew no reason of this conceit why the fixed starres should have light of their owne and not the Planets or why the Planets borrow light and not the fixed stars Againe you thinke That the Sunne and Stars should rest because they are of a more excellent nature As if motion did belong to the ignoblest creatures we know the contrary Man is a more noble creature then a rocke yet man moveth and the rocke is immoveable The heart in our bodies is more noble then the guts yet that moveth they move not Is the body of man lesse excellent when it is moved by the soule then when it is at rest putrifying in the grave When water rests from its motion it loseth its excellencie and stinketh therefore motion in many things is more noble then rest as for the rest which you say is ascribed to God that is not to our purpose for it is transcendent and hyperphysicall and as God is said to rest so he is said to move therefore called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But why you should thinke the fixed Starres of a more excellent nature then the Planets I know not neither can you give any reason for it 8. Aristotle you say tels us that the time of the revolution of each orbe should be proportionable to its bignesse which can only be you thinke By making the earth a Planet I answer that of two evills the lesse is to be chosen and better it is that there should be some disproportion between the bignesse of the orbes and the time of their motion then that the earth should move 2. You cannot exactly tell what disproportion there is in their motions till first you finde out the true knowledge of their magnitudes That the Comets which move in the aire are not moved by the heavens but by the earth you prove Because the concave superficies of the Moone is thought to be smooth so that the meere touch of it cannot turne about the fire with a motion not naturall to it nor can the subtle fire move the thicker aire nor this the waters Answ. How the upper spheares move the lower is neither knowne to you nor me but by conjectures 2. I have already shewed that one smooth body by its touch may move another as the winde moves the clouds so in the Northerne seas one mountaine of ice which is smooth moves the other forward 3. The subtiltie and puritie of the fire is no hinderance to its moving of the thicker aire for doe not our animall spirits which are pure and subtle and yet materiall move our grosse bodies Doth not the winde move grosse substances 4. That the aire doth not move the water is repugnant to experience for within the Tropickes the sea is continually moved from East to West by the aire and this by the heaven as I have shewed elsewhere 5. That the circular motion of the fire is not naturall is false for though this motion proceed not from an inward principle as the straight motion doth yet it is naturall because the nature of the fire is preserved by it for the fire never gives off moving upward till it begin to move circularly and then is it in its chiefe perfection when it hath attained this motion Lansbergius you say concludes that the earth is easily moveable from the words of Archimedes who said that he could move the earth if he knew where to stand and fasten his instrument it is a foolish conclusion for so he might as well conclude that armed men may arise out of the ground because Pompey said that if he did but stampe with his foot the ground would yeeld him armed men So because Medaea said Ego inter auras aliti curru vebar That shee would flie in the aire in a chariot drawne by dragons that therefore shee could doe as shee said this is to play the Poet. 9. The opinion of Intelligences by which the heavens are moved you say hath its originall from Aristotle's mistake who held the heavens to be eternall I answer that Aristotle was mistaken in holding the heavens to be eternall à priori but I deny that there is any errour in holding them to be eternall à posteriori in respect of their substance 2. Aristotle might have held the opinion of Intelligences without holding the heavens to be eternall for the eternity of the mover doth not necessarily inferre the eternity of the thing moved God is eternall so is not the world our soules are eternall so are not our bodies 3. You prove That Intelligences are superfluous because a naturall power intrinsecall to these bodies will serve the turne as well So you might
by sense or reason demonstrations are of things true and reall not of dreames and imaginations therefore neither your pictures nor bare words shall perswade us that dayes moneths yeares houres weekes c. are or can be caused by the earths motion till first you have proved that the earth moveth you that cannot abide Eccentrickes and Epicycles in the heavens are forced now to make use of them both for the motion of the Moone and of the earth too so that you have not mended but marred the matter rejecting Ptolomy because of Eccentrickes and Epicycles aud yet you admit Copernicus with his new devised Moone Eccentricks and Earth Eccentrickes so that you thinke by these fictions to solve the divers illuminations bignesse eclipses c. of the Moone A phantasticall Astronomer might devise other wayes besides these of Ptolomy and Copernicus to shew the different appearances of the Planets for of things that are uncertaine and beyond our reach divers men will have divers conceits and conjectures many have held and doe at this day yet maintaine that the stars have soules and are living creatures and why may not this be as true as your opinion that there is a world of living creatures in the Moone What if I should hold that the eight spheare is a solid substance therefore called firmamentum full of holes some great and some small so that these lights which wee call starres are but beames of that bright and cleare heaven above called Empyreum shining through these holes Or if I should say that every starre had its Angel moving it about the earth as wee use in darke nights to carry lanternes divers Nations of Asia Africke and America have divers opinions of the starres and few or none true all which do argue our ignorance and foolishnesse we are but Curvae in terris animae coelestium inanes But any of these conjectures mentioned is as probable as yours of the earths motion therefore I was not without sense and reason when I concluded my Booke with this Argument That if the Sunne stood still there could be no variation of the shadow in the Sunne Diall you will say that may be altered by the earths motion but I say to you as I said to Mr. Carpenter prove that and what I profered to him I also profer to you Phillida solus habeto You will say this may be easily proved if I will admit the earth to move but so you may say that you will easily prove an Asse to flye if I should admit that hee hath wings but I will not admit that upon a false maxime of your devising you shall inferre what you please What if I should admit an absurd conceit of yours that the Earth draweth the Moone about can you prove mee that when the Moone shineth there is any variation of shadowes when both the luminous and opace body are moved with the same motion 2. The difference you say betweene Summer and Winter between the number and length of dayes and of the Sunnes motion from Signe to Signe and all other appearances of the Sunne concerning the annuall motion may be seene by your Figures and easily solved by supposing the earth to move in an Eccentricall orbe about the Sunne Answ. Not the Sunnes appearances but your phantasies are to be seene by your figures the earth doth not move because your figure represents it it is also an easie matter to suppose things that never were nor can be you suppose the earth to move about the Sunne and not the Sunne about the earth you may as well suppose the house to be carried about the candle and not the candle about the house and so all appearances may be solved as well this way as the other for if the house did move about the candle the house shall be seene as well as if the candle did move about the house and why may we not suppose the house to move sometimes neerer to and sometimes farther from the candle the neerer it moveth the more it is illuminate c. But what Cato is so grave as to refraine from laughter at such absurd and foolish suppositions You spend much paper to shew how the Planets will appeare direct stationary retrograde and yet still move regularly about their owne centers This is Magno conatu magnas nugas dicere and who but Iudaeus apella will beleeve that one motion of the earth should cause so many different appearances in the severall Planets howsoever you talke of Ptolomie's Wheele-worke I preferre his Wheele to your Whirlegig It is more easie for many Planets to wheele about then for one rocke or piece of earth to whirle about but you are as exact in placing the Planets as if you had been upon the top of Iacobs ladder You place Mercury next to the Sunne hiding himselfe under his rayes you say well for theeves doe use to hide themselves but for one to hide himselfe in the open light is not usuall darknesse one would thinke were more proper then that But how Mercury hath a more lively vigorous light then any of the other I understand not I should rather thinke that there were a more lively vigorous light in the Sun Moone and Venus And whereas you say that Venus in her conjunction with the Sunne doth not appeare horned is true but if her husband Vulcan had beene as neere the Sunne his hornes doubtlesse had beene seene doe not you know how much ashamed Venus was when the Sunne looked upon her being in bed with Mars Now that the orbe of Mars containeth our earth within it I will not deny but I am sure our earth containeth Mars within it who is oftentimes too exorbitant Toto saevit Mars impius orbe And that the orbe of the Moone comprehends the earth in it because shee is sometimes in opposition to the Sunne is a feeble reason as though the opposition of two round bodies should be the cause why that which is in the midst betwixt them should be within the circumference of either of their circles or orbes Other Planets have their oppositions is therefore the earth within the orbe of either of them Or why is the earth more within the orb of the Moone then of the Sun seeing the Moone is no more in opposition to the Sun then the Sun is to the Moone 3. You conclude your Booke with a large digression upon the commendations of Astronomy which hath for its object the whole world you say And therefore farre exceeds the barren speculation of universale and materia prima Answ. It seemes you have left nothing for the objects of other sciences if Astronomy must ingrosse the whole world for its object 2. Vniversum belike exceeds Vniversale with you and the extent of the one is not so large nor the speculation so fruitfull as of the other but surely your Vniversum or world in the Moone is as barren a notion as that of Vniversale 3. The knowledge of Philosophy and Logicke
planting of the heavens 12. How the earth is established 13. What Job meanes by the earth moved out of its place YOu would faine here overthrow those Scriptures which shew the immobilitie of the earth 1. That place of Ecclesiastes one generation cometh and another passeth but the earth standeth for ever You say That it is not the purpose of this place to deny all kinde of motion to the whole earth but that of generation and corruption But I say that it is neither the purpose of this place to deny the motition of the earth nor to affirme the motion of the sunne for why should he either deny the one or affirme the other which no man doubted of or called in question his drift is to prove the vanity of mankinde from the stability of the earth and motion of the sun windes and waters thus man is inferiour to the earth because the earth is firme stable and immoveable whereas man abideth not in one stay but cometh forth like a flower and is cut downe he flyeth like a shadow and continueth not Or as it is here he cometh and goeth so that coming going are motions to which man is subject and are opposite to the immobilitie of the earth The Antithesis then or opposition here is not between the substance of man and of the earth for man in respect of his substance is permanent as well as the earth if either we consider his soule or his body according to the first matter but the opposition is between the qualities outward estate and life of man and the immobilitie of the earth so that the standing of the earth must be meant either of its permanency or immutabilitie or immobilitie not the first for man as I said is not inferiour to the earth in permancie not the second for the earth is subject as all sublunary things are to mutability and changes therefore the third which is the earths immobility must needs be understood And if Solomon had thought otherwise to wit that the earth moved and the sun stood still he would have said The sunne standeth for ever the earth ariseth and the earth goeth downe c. But for all his knowledge he was ignorant of this quaint piece of Philosophie Againe he proves mans vanity from the motion of the sunne windes and waters though they move and are gone for a while yet they returne againe but man being gone returnes no more so that man hath neither the stability of the earth but passeth away and being past hath not the power to returne againe as the sunne winde and waters doe It is plaine then that the standing of the earth is opposed to its locall motion and to the motion of men coming and going but it were ridiculous as you say to inferre that the earth is immoveable because permanent for the mill and ship may be permanent and yet move this illation is none of ours we say it is immoveable because Solomon here sayes so for he saith it standeth and if standing be motion then the earth moves It is more safe for us to say That the earth is immoveable because Solomon saith it stands then to say it is moveable because the word standing may signifie permanency or abiding As for the motions as you cal them of generation and corruption from which you free the earth they are not indeed motions but mutations Metus est à termino positivo ad terminum poserivum You checke the Jewes for collecting the earths eternity from the word Legnolam albeit I know that this word doth not alway signifie eternity but a long continuance of time yet that the earth is eternall à posteriori I thinke you will not deny except you will tread in some new way of your owne different from that both of ancient and modern Divines who affirme with the Scripture That there shall be a new earth but new in qualities not in substance a change of the figure not of the nature of the forme not of the substance a renovation of that beauty which is lost by man but no creation of a new Essence so that the Jewes might justly inferre from Solomons words that the earth is eternall or stablished for ever You snap at Mr Fuller for urging that these words of Solomon must be all understood literally and not some of them in reference to appearance but without cause for can the same Scripture with one breath blow hot and cold At the same time speake plainly and ambiguously in the same sentence have a double meaning The Scripture which is plaine and simple is farre from double dealing Will any thinke that when Solomon saith There be three moveable bodies the Sun Windes and Rivers that there are indeed but two and that the Sun moves not but in appearance that is moves not at all This is to make the Scripture indeed a nose of wax for what may I not interpret this way Christ fed the people with five barley loaves that is with foure loaves for one was a loafe but in appearance Three Wise-men came from Persia to worship Christ that is two came indeed but the third came onely in appearance You would laugh at me if I should tell you that of any three ships or mills which move really one did move apparently whereas both you I see them move really Now if the Sun doth not move why doth the Scripture say it doth What danger would arise if it spoke plaine in this point You say That the Scripture speaks of some naturall things as they are esteemed by mans false conceipt But this is a false conceit of yours the Scripture doth not cherish or patronise the falshood of our conceits the end of it is to rectifie our erroneous conceits It is true that in high and obscure points of Divinitie the Scripture condescending to our capacity useth the tearms of familiar and earthly things that by them we may by degrees ascend to the love and knowledge of spirituall things for the naturall man understandeth not the things of God but in naturall things which are obvious to our senses we need no such helps If the Sunne stood still it were as easie for us to understand his standing as his moving What you talke of the ends of a staffe and of the ends of the earth is impertinent and frivolous for the Scripture for want of proper words useth metaphoricall and because there is no other word to expresse the remote bounds of the earth then the word End therefore the Scripture useth it But you inferre that because the ends of a staffe and the ends of the earth cannot be taken in the same sense that therefore the motion of the sun and of the winds must be understood in divers senses make an Enthymeme and see the consequence the Scripture saith That a staffe hath ends and that the earth hath ends which cannot be understood properly and in the same sense ergo when the Scripture saith The sunne moveth