which run thus in the Review Ver. 3. Knowing this first that there shall come in the last days scoffers walking after their own lusts 4. And saying where is the promise of his coming for since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were from the beginning of the Creation 5. For this they are willingly ignorant of that by the Word of GOD the heavens were of old and the earth consisting of water and by water 6. Whereby the World that then was being overflowed with water perished 7. But the heavens and the earth that are now by the same word are kept in store reserved unto fire against the day of Judgment and perdition of ungodly men 10. The day of the LORD will come as a thief in the night in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise and the elements shall melt with fervent heat the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt up 13. Nevertheless we according to his promise look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness But that such a triplicity of heavens and earth as the Review contends for is signifi'd or set out by S. Peter's words is very unlikely and the following Exceptions lie against it First those words are so opposite to the first state of the heavens and earth that they cannot admit of it unless one passage in them be false which is this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Review renders consisting of water and by water This must be appli'd both to the Heavens and to the Earth as being spoken of both And if it be to be understood not of the Posture of them according to our Translation but as the Review interprets it it must be void of truth For first apply it to the heavens and they must consist by water as well as of water that is by the help of water tanquam per causam sustmentem as by a sustaining cause says the Review p. 20. But how did water sustain the first heavens or Neptune in that State perform the task of Atlas Secondly apply it to the earth and that must consist of water as well as by water But how did the first Earth in order consist of water more than the second Instead of that this second Earth is of a far more watry constitution than the first half the surface of the present Globe being nothing but Sea And if it be urged that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of water relates to the Heavens and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by water relates to the Earth the very form of the words will not allow it For as the H. GHOST has set them both the Expressions relate as much to the Heavens as they do to the Earth and as much to the Earth as they do to the Heavens and to both alike And the Review gives us leave to refer both to both because it will make no great difference in its interpretation p. 21. Secondly S. Peter's words are so opposite to the second state of the Heavens and Earth that they cannot admit of it unless one Passage in them be inverted For the SPIRIT says that the world that then was being overflowed with water perished And so plainly makes the watry inundation the cause of the Worlds destruction But grant there were Heavens and Earth of a second Order according to the Review and the Earth's Destruction or Dissolution must be the cause of that inundation And is it likely that St. Peter would so teach Philosophy that it should not be understood without transposing the terms in which it is delivered or drawing them to a kind of contrary sense Who can believe that he allowed this second state of heavens and earth much less asserted it in disputing with Philosophers when if he did so in his expression as properly and most naturally taken he mistook the Cause for the Effect and made the Earth to perish by its being drowned when indeed it was drowned by its perishing or being dissolved Thirdly the Apostle's words are so opposite to the Third state of Heavens and Earth that they cannot admit of it unless one Passage in them be contradicted For this Third state which is the same with the new Heavens and new Earth is by the Review post-pon'd to the Conflagration For it tells us that the Earth by that fire being reduc'd to a second Chaos from that as from the first arises a new Creation or new Heavens and a new Earth p. 6. And therefore the Theorist's asserting that these shall rise before the day of Judgment must needs be plain Contradiction to what the Apostle lays down in the 7th verse For there he says that the Heavens and the Earth that are now are kept in store reserved unto fire against the day of Iudgment and perdition of ungodly men And when he has said that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the present Heavens and the Earth shall be kept and reserved till the day of Iudgment the Doctrine of New Heavens and a new Earth to be introduc'd before then must be downright Contradiction to this And truly the same it must be to affirm that these New Heavens and Earth shall be consequent to the general Conflagration Nor is there any way to avoid these barefac'd Contradictions unless in complaisance to this pretty Hypothesis there must be two Conflagrations and two Days of Judgment and two ends of the World which is one of each sort more than GOD has revealed By S. Peter's New heavens therefore and his new Earth we are to understand a new and excellent state of things upon which the blessed Saints are all to enter at the consummation of this present World And as to what the Review says p. 10. they must be material and natural in the same sense and signification with the former Heavens and Earth this does not appear from the Apostle's words The other sense now mention'd may rather be inferred from them considering the way or usage of the holy Writers For with them it is common in passing from one thing to another to carry a word or Notion used just before along with them farther or to rise from a Literal to an Allegorical or Anagogical meaning Such Transitions as these to confine our Observation to one sacred Author occur very frequently in the Gospel of S. John Thus in the 4th Chapter our SAVIOUR discoursing with the Samaritan Woman about drawing water out of a Deep Well carries on the matter to Water that he could give To such Water as he that drinketh of it shall never thirst but it shall be in him a VVell springing up into everlasting life But tho the Well and the Water first mention'd were Material it does not follow from thence that the latter were the same or that they could be such So Chap. 6. from speaking of Loaves and of eating bread he raises his Discourse to that meat which endureth unto everlasting life But yet it is never the more
Material food because the first spoken of was of that nature And in the same Chapter the Jews telling of Manna or bread from Heaven which their Fathers eat JESVS said unto them I am the bread of life he that cometh unto me shall never hunger But this does not make our SAVIOUR real Manna nor was it possible he should be Material bread Yea being but in the Jewish Temple he took occasion from thence to call his body by that name Chap. 2. Destroy this Temple and I will build it again in three days But was his sacred Body ever the more a stony building And when this was the way of our Great REDEEMER what wonder that his chief Apostle should imitate him And that speaking of the old Heavens and Earth kept in store and reserved unto fire should in raising his Discourse to a future spiritual blessed state speak of it in the terms and under the notions of new Heavens and a new Earth But fourthly that the Apostles words should point at a triform state of Heavens and Earth is very improbable from that change which he makes in the Terms that he uses For in the 5th verse he uses the words Heavens and Earth and in the 7th verse again Heavens and Earth but in the verse betwixt both he says the World that then was Now if he meant the same thing in all three verses why did he not use the same Words and say the Heavens and the Earth that were then This fairly intimates that he intended not the natural but animate World and principally Mankind whom he called the old World in this Chapter and in the preceding Chapter the world of the ungodly Fifthly that this threefold state of Heavens and Earth should be denoted in these words is not to be thought because they certify us that the World that then was perished Now could that be true of the natural World Yet it must be true of some World because GOD says it and therefore it must relate to a World which could and did actually perish which must be the Animal World Indeed by this Perishing the Review understands a change only in the constitution and form of the Heavens and Earth But is or can that be a perishing Suppose ones temper or constitution be changed from Phlegmatic to Choleric is the man therefore perished Or suppose the Shell of an Egg should crack and sink inward a little is the Egg therefore perished No more could the Material Heavens and Earth perish by a meer change of their Constitution and form And had but such a change as that befallen them the Apostle would certainly have express'd it accordingly and not have said the World that then was perished But since he has thus express'd it the animate World must be here understood that so the Word spoken may come up to the thing and express it in a just and true sense But because he says that the Apostle speaks here of the Natural World particularly in the 6th verse and offers Reasons to prove that it perished Review p. 14. We shall lay down the Substance of these Reasons and briefly answer them First the ground these Scoffers went upon was taken from the permanency of the natural World in the same state from the beginning And therefore if the Apostle would take away their Argument he must show that the natural World hath been changed or hath perished Answ And does he not show them a sufficient change in nature at the Deluge when as he minds them the Earth stood so deep and the Heavens so high in Water that thereby the animate world perished Only this change was a change in the condition not of the Constitution of the natural World Secondly these Scoffers could not be ignorant that there was a Deluge which destroyed Mankind and therefore it was the Constitution of those old Heavens and Earth and the change and destruction of them at the Deluge that they were ignorant of Answ If they were not ignorant of the destructive Deluge they might have forgotten it See Disc p. 137. and therefore the Apostle minds them of it Or else they were ignorant or forgetful of the divine Cause of the Flood Ib. p. 134 c which he therefore expressly tells them was the Word of GOD. But as to the pretended change or destruction of the Heavens and Earth I doubt not but S. Peter was as ignorant of them as any of the Persons he reprehends Thirdly the Apostle's design is to prove the Conflagration which will be a destruction of the natural World and therefore he must use an Argument taken from a precedent destruction of that World Answ The Design of the Apostle is not to oppose reason to reason strictly in a just parity of Instances but fairly to infer one judicial and calamitous Providence or Dispensation from another And GOD having drowned the old Heavens in some measure as well as the Earth by the word of his power bringing in the flood upon the ungodly he would from hence convince them that by the same word the present Heavens and Earth are reserved unto fire which shall then be the instrument of perdition to the impious and the whole living World as water was before And so from one general destruction past he strenuously argues the certain futurity of another to come Fourthly unless we understand here the natural World we make the Apostle both redundant in his Discourse and also very obscure in an easy Argument Answ His Discourse for this will not be redundant but very close to his purpose For that is not only to mind these Scoffers that men and other Animals were destroyed in a Deluge caused by GOD's Power but to represent the greatness of that Deluge which swell'd so mightily upon the Earth that in some measure it invaded the Heavens And therefore to what he said of the flood 's destroying Mankind in the foregoing Chapter v. 5th he adding here a description of the vastness of that Flood in the drowned posture which the Heavens and Earth then stood in what he says is far from being superfluous or redundant Nor is his Argument thus made obscure On the contrary rather it receives light from hence For he here bringing in the Heavens and Earth into his account of the Deluge does thereby make the Greatness of it he was representing the more conspicuous Fifthly the opposition carries it upon the Natural World Answ The Heavens and Earth that were of old and the Heavens and Earth that are now we grant are opposed But then 't is as to their Fate not in their Natures And tho the Heavens and Earth that are now shall perish more throughly than they did of old Fire being more consuming than Water yet then for a time they perished too That is in S. Austin's sense with whose Authority the Review makes so loud a noise to little purpose For so far as I can find neither he nor any of the Fathers who affirm
was so open that Moses and the Israelites marched through it How does the Answerer take off this Objection Why because the Excepter had said that as in a Bag Psal 33.7 Should be rendred as on an heap and proved it by Authorities he gives him leave to render this place so as on an heap For says he it was done by a miracle But if when by miracle the waters in an open Sea stood on an heap they were said to be in a Bag then this shows more plainly still that that Expression He gathereth the waters of ahe Sea as in a bagg can be no manner of proof that they were ever inclos'd within the Vault of the Earth And at last indeed he in effect confesses that he mis-interpreted the Psalmist's words For he declares now that that other place Psal 33.7 Answ p. 21. speaks of the ordinary posture and constitution of the Waters which is not on an heap but in a level or spherical convexity with the rest of the Earth And thus he catches himself in a trap For if the Text speaks of the Ordinary posture of the waters lying in a Level with the rest of the earth Eng. Theor. p. 86. why did he wrest and misapply it by making it speak of an Extraordinary posture of them an invention of his own whereby they lay within the Vault of the Earth But the Excepter must not escape here neither Answ p. 21. For he complains of him for an unfair citation of a Paragraph of the Theory which he applies peculiarly to this Text of Psal 33.7 whereas it belongs to all the Texts alledg'd out of the Psalms and is a modest reflection upon the explication of them Now if the Paragraph belonging to all those Texts did agree properly with none and with one less than with the rest surely the Excepter might without unfairness cite and apply it to that one without meddling with the rest And so the Complaint is frivolous Tho how modest the Reflection he speaks of was he may consider when it backs such an explication of Scripture as would make Moses and the Hebrews pass thorow a Sea See Disc p. 140. which at the time of their passing was inclos'd within the Vault of the Earth He proceeds next to Job 26.7 He stretcheth out the North over the empty place and hangeth the Earth upon nothing But how can this most aptly agree to the structure of the Theory's first Earth when as the Excepter noted the Theory it self testifies concerning Ib. p. 142. it that it rise upon the face of the Chaos And could not have been formed unless by a Concretion upon the face of the Waters And that it had the mass of the waters as a basis or foundation to rest upon And so was no more stretcht out upon emptiness and hang'd upon nothing than an Arch when built upon its Center And but just before the Theory contended from Psal 24.2 that it was founded upon the Seas and establisht upon the Floods What says the Answerer to this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Not one Syllable We must take it to be answered by the last Expedient The next place is Job 38.4 5 6. Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the Earth Who hath laid the Measures thereof Who hath stretched the line upon it Who laid the corner-stone thereof Where Measures and Line said the Excepter imply only that the Earth was made of a fitting Accuracy And he affirmed that this Earth of ours may be compared with and be thought to outgo the imaginary first Earth of the Theorist's inventing in Two things Comeliness and Vsefulness But because under the first Head of Comeliness the Excepter makes Hills and Mountains to be a piece of the Earth's Beauty P. 22. the Answerer seems much offended with him Not at all considering that at the same time he allows them to be Irregularities Dis p. 144. and 146. and Rudenesses and void of Exactness and Order and calls them the most horrid visible pieces of Nature and hideously amazing c. Only they conduce to the natural Pulchritude of the Earth because it consists in Asymetries and a Wild Variety Yet in respect of these the Earth is more comely than if it were one vast plain or lay every where in a smooth and regular sphaerical Convexity Ib. p. 147. Nor considering neither that the inspired Psalmist as the Excepter noted did devoutly celebrate the Wisdom of GOD exhibited in making the Mountains and high Hills which if they had been nothing but monstrous Scarrs or deformities in the Earthly Body or the Rubbish or Ruines of a decayed Building he would scarce have done so solemnly But as to making the Theorist admire the Beauty of Mountains it was never in the Excepter's thoughts Answ p. 22. Disc p. 146. Tho he takes notice that he was mightily pleased and raised by the sight and contemplation of them But between the Beauty of an Object and the Pleasure of seeing and contemplating it there is great Difference And to turn the Answerers Complement upon himself he that hath not sense and judgment enough to see the difference Answ p. 22. it would be very tedious to beat it into him by multitude of words The Vsefulness of the Earth in its present Form and State beyond that of the Theory the Excepter noted in Three Particulars First in that it had Seas for Traffick and Navigation Secondly in that it had Mountains for Bounding Nations for Dividing Kingdoms for Deriving Rivers for Yielding Minerals c. Thirdly in that it had Rains and seasonable Showres And that Rains and Showres were proper Rules whereby to measure the Vsefulness of the Earth and to show that it excells that of the Theory is manifest from GOD's making use of the same in a Case not unlike said the Excepter Disc p. 148. For GOD comparing Egypt and Palestine prefers the latter before the former because in Egypt the Seed sown was water'd with the foot as a Garden of Herbs but Palestine was a Land of hills and valleys and drank water of the Rain of heaven Deut. 11.10 11. Here the Answerer at lasts chops in and tells the Excepter how unluckily it falls out for him p. 23. that a Country that had no Rain should be compared in Scripture or join'd in privilege with Paradise it self and the Garden of GOD. For so is this very Egypt Gen. 13.10 tho it had no Rain but was water'd by Rivers And Lot lifted up his eyes and beheld the plain of Jordan that it was well watered every where before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrha even as the Garden of the LORD like the Land of Egypt Therefore says he the greatest commendation of a Land for pleasure and fertility according to Scripture is its being well watered with Rivers But that 's more than the cited Scripture speaks and more than it means as will appear if we consider the Occasion
one founded but it was a real Power actually conferred upon and exercis'd in his own Person and with him by his Children jointly and after him by them successively And truly when in the Grant of this power over the Fish the Advantage lay so much on Adam's side more than on his Offspring's it being made to him in his Person and also in his Innocence it may seem somewhat strange that he who shared most in the conveyance of the Priviledge should in the Judgment of a wise Civilian have nothing to do with the Possesion of it Especially when this Grant was made by the GOD of faithfulness and truth with Whom as there is no shadow of Change so there can be no semblance of Fraud Yet had the Case here been as the Theory makes it there must have been wrong on GOD's part as well as fallacy and his creatures he must have injured by imposing upon them which who can think As if that righteous Being whose Nature is the Rule of eternal Justice could violate that Law which Himself had made And when he had commanded not to steal could rob poor men of that common Right which his own free Goodness and his own kind Promise settled on them Not to be too toedious Either Adam had actual Dominion over the Fish or he had not If he had not why did GOD say to him Have Dominion over the Fish of the Sea If he had why does the Answerer so mince it as if he intended to make away with it Again Either Adam had as much Power over the Fish of the Sea as he had over the Fowls of the Air and the Living things upon the Earth or he had not If he had as much we have what we contend for If he had not the Answerer must show that the Divine Grant now recited vesting Adam with Dominion over the Creatures did confer more Power in the latter part of it than it did in the first But that he cannot do and therefore his Cause is lost For if Adam had as much power over the Fish as he had over the Fowls and over other Animals there must be an open Sea at first And if there was an open Sea there was Mountains too And if there was Mountains there was Clouds also And if there was Clouds there was Winds and Rains and Hails and Snows and Thunders c. And then where 's the Theorists Primitive Earth and his Paradisiacal World before the Flood In the Fourth Chapter of his Answer he reflected upon the Excepter for Dabbling in Philosophy And now I think he has dabbled in it fairly himself even till he has drowned his hopeful Hypothesis in an inclos'd Abyss And as for Extraordinary Providence it affords no help in this Case However it be made too much a Pack-horse to carry the Theory through several Difficulties which otherwise must have been impassable yet here it fails and is able to yield no manner of assistance For he who can imagine that Adam upon the Earth could have Dominion over the Fish in this inclosed Sea by Extraordinary Providence must be guilty of most amazing and unmerciful Extravagance Yet by another Expedient he may find relief When to leave things out he prints his Theory next he may leave this inclos'd Abyss out of that Edition And tho he can worse spare it yet whether he has not as much reason to leave it out as he had to leave any thing out which he did leave out Disc p. 226. let any unbias'd Person judge That there was Open Seas before the Flood we argu'd Secondly from the Waters under the Firmament Gen. 1.7 For had there been none but River-waters in the first World the Earth might have been said to be under the Firmament more properly than the Waters And the Firmament which in the 6th verse is said to be in the midst of the Waters and to divide the Waters from the Waters Ibid. might better have been said to be in the midst betwixt the Earth and the Waters and to divide the Waters from that For as for the River-waters they would have been too inconsiderable to have had the Partition made by the Firmament praedicated of them in exclusion of the Earth or in preference to it Well allow this says the Answerer Answ p. 52. that a Firmament was made to divide the Waters from the Waters Tell us then what that Firmament was For it is said there that GOD set the Sun Moon and Stars in the Firmament We own it is said so and that GOD did do so But if he cannot tell what this Firmament was a few words will inform him It is plain that Moses in his Cosmopaeia makes mention of Two Firmaments and we have told him of them once already Disc p. 22◠One we may call the Aeral the other the Aethereal Firmament The First is the Interaqueous Firmament as lying between Waters for it is bounded by the Waters here below and by those supernal Fountains of Water the Clouds above Gen. 1.8.20 And yet it is properly called Heaven as being not only limited to but also consisting of the Lowest or Subnubilar Heaven The Second is the Firmament of Lights Because in it the Moon and all the Planets the Sun and all the fixt Stars are placed And a most stately and glorious Expanse it is as being of immense and indefinite Amplitude or Extent Here the Excepter encountred that New Notion of the Firmament See Disc p. 226 227 228. which the Theorist vouchsaft to recommend to the World where he makes it expressly to be the Orb of his exterior habitable Earth But what was said against it he answered the best way viz. by declaring that the Things cited and opposed Answ p. 52. are not in the Second Edition of the Theory Ausim enim dicere quantum rerum natura innotescit adhuc Firmamentum Mosaicum prout vulgo intelligitur esse prorsus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Theor. Edit 1. p. 254. But the best on 't is when he had been so brisk as to give us all a Magisterial Reprimand by telling us plainly that Moses's Firmament as commonly understood is an Vnphilosophic thing on the other-side he was so bashful that he would not stand by his own opinion tho more Philosophic as he thought But having conceived it and brought it forth he very fairly gives it the slip and leaves the infant Notion defenceless as it is to shift for it self Concerning what we said in vindication of the Clouds from that contempt which the Thorist threw upon them Answ p. 53. he thus pronounceth With submission to better Judgments I take it to be a Country-Sermon about the usefulness of Rain But I do assure him tho that 's no strange nor new thing with him he is very much mistaken Yet if he will needs have it be a Sermon with submission to better Judgments I take it to be a Funeral-Sermon for one of his Notions
two Cubits of Quails could cover this Camp then fifteen Cubits of Water might cover these Mountains And as for the Tops of the Mountains they are no where said to be covered any more than the top of the Camp was But he says the Tops of the Mountains were discover'd Answ p. 70. when the Waters began to decrease Gen. 8.5 Is not that a plain demonstration that they were cover'd before and cover'd with those Waters To this Objection also an answer was given by the Excepter Disc Ch. 16. §. 5. However to make it more full we are content to recite part of what was formerly said and to add somewhat new as occasion requires We say therefore that the tops of the Mountains being discovered upon the decrease of the Waters is no demonstration that they were covered with them for they might be discovered by their Emergency out of darkness Upon that Answer he brings this Quaery Answ p. 73. Where finds he this Account 't is neither in the Text nor in Reason It was fairly gathered out of both as plainly appears in our Discourse The holy Text we went upon was Gen. 8. ult Where day being settled upon the recovering World the very settling of it then implies that in time of the Flood the Earth was strangely benighted And for a Reason was suggested the Exclusion of Frost Which had not the Air been very thick thick enough to hide the Tops of the Mountains from the Eyes of men would have seiz'd the Waters with exceeding vehemence and have thereby hindred the so speedy drying of the Earth But he goes on in his way of objecting If it was always so dark and the Tops of the Mountains and Rocks naked and prominent every where Ib. how could the Ark avoid them in that darkness And could it by an ordinary Providence have avoided them in the Light For tho the H. GHOST in that Description which he was pleas'd to give of the Ark descends even to Particulars and that to the very Door and the Window of it yet He hints not the least concerning a Rudder belonging to it And being destitute of that there could be nothing whereby to turn or govern it but at all times it must be left to drive right on whatever Dangers tho great and visible might come in its way Or say it had an Helm yet what Pilot without inspiration could have steer'd its Course safely in those perilous new-made Seas upon Earth Where as Rocks and Banks and Flats and Sands were thick set and innumerable so there was not so much as one Buoy or Sea-mark which by showing any of them might help to shun them And as these dangers according to the Common Hypothesis would have been equal when first this Vessel was set afloat so according to the Theory they would have been much greater He continues to object Ib. I see no reason to imagine that there would be darkness after the forty days rain For he the Excepter says the Atmosphaere was never so exhausted of Vapours and never so thin as when the waters were newly come down Tho the Atmosphaere was never so exhausted of Vapours and never so thin as at that time in the vast Body or general Comprehension of it upwards yet here below the Air might still be foggy and thick So we are often invelop'd with caliginous Mists in this lower Region next the Earth when let them but disperse and wear off and the heaven above is most serene and in the Skie there 's nothing but glorious day He objects still Ib. p. 74. It was in the Tenth month that they the Mountains begun to be seen when the Waters were decreas'd 't was therefore the Waters not the gross Air that hindred the sight of them before For if according to the method of the Excepter the Deluge begun to decrease after the first forty days rain by the Sun 's resolving waters into Vapours and Exhalations this in proportion must lessen the waters of the Deluge But we do not read in Moses of any abatement in the Deluge till the end of one hundred and fifty days Gen. 8.3 which is four Months after this term Nor do we imagine that there was any considerable abatement of the Waters till that time For after the Flood was come to its height it was necessary it should stand there a good while the better to effect that fatal destruction of the Animal World for which it was sent Yet during the time that the Flood was thus Stationary we suppose that GOD did work no Miracle for we read of none to weaken Nature in its force and put by its proper Operations And so the Sun which had then a more than ordinary power upon the outragious and prevailing Waters as shining on them through a thinner Medium than ever yet he did could not but turn them a great pace into Misty Vapours and Exhalations And these ascending swiftly and copiously to replenish the Atmosphaere so lately emptied by excessive Resolution might render the Mountains as Mists always do quite invisible at a little Distance Yet this work being done only by Nature's hand or to use the Answerer's elegant style by the Sun 's setting his Engines awork tho it was carried on for several Months the diminution of the Waters I say might be inconsiderable So inconsiderable as not to be worth the Spirits notice And withal so ineffectual that if some better course had not been taken the Waters would have remain'd a very long time upon the drowned Earth beyond the hundred and fifty days mention'd without any considerable degree of abatement For if in the hundred and ten days succeeding those in which the rains fell the Waters went up in misty Vapours towards restoring the Atmosphaere to its lost Consistency in such a quantity as to sink the Flood suppose but one or two Cubits tho this reeking evaporation might so darken the Air as to hide the Mountains yet how little would such a diminution of the Deluge be taken notice of by Heaven or how little would it contribute to drying of the Earth And therefore to speed the work which by the strength of Nature went on but slowly GOD made use of a certain Wind Gen. 8.1 as an extraordinary Instrument And by this added at length to the Attractive influence of the Sun the Waters asswaged so very fast that as the SPIRIT notes on the first day of the Tenth Month the Tops of the Mountains were seen Gen. 8.5 And whereas the sacred Story makes the appearance of these Mountain-tops to follow the decrease of the Deluge-waters nothing could be done more properly according to the tenour of this new Hypothesis For in case the Waters had not been decreased and so decreased as to have refill'd the Atmosphaere with Vapours and so decreased as to have dampt the attractive power of the sun and so decreased as to be drawn so low and grown so gross and foul and heavy as to
resist the attenuating force of the Wind aforesaid these tops of the Mountains could not have shown themselves as yet For had not the Waters been thus decreased they would still have gone away into Vapours and Exhalations at such a rate as that the air by them would have been so bemisted and the Mountains by that would have been so obscured that the tops of them could not have been so soon discovered And why the tops of them were discerned before their lower and their larger parts Disc p. 342. an account has been already given Answ p. 74. Lastly as to this matter he objects That the whole notion of spending the waters of the Deluge by Evaporation hath no foundation in Scripture or Reason But in short it is founded upon both 1st Upon Reason For how reasonable is it that Waters should be turned into Vapours it being a thing most natural And how reasonable that they should be so turned at an extraordinary rate where the Sun had an extraordinary power and when to the force of the Sun was join'd the assistance of a mighty Wind 2ly Upon Scripture For their Returning off the Earth continually Gen. 8.3 might be but their returning into that Principle out of which they were made namely into Vapours See Disc p. 340 341. And that Expression the Waters were going and decreasing Gen. 8.5 may be understood of their going away quite by a wasting or diminishing of them And the learned Schindler makes the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in that very place to signify this very thing And so the Notion was not only founded upon Scripture and Reason but moreover upon good Authority And whereas the Answerer would have the first of these two cited Texts to denote the local motion of the Waters or their returning to the place from whence they came Answ p. 76. this they did do when they were resolved into Vapours and were retracted into the Atmosphaere whence they descended Tho such a Return they could not be so fully capable of according to the Theory's Hypothesis the inclos'd Abyss being fill'd up in a great measure by the fallen Earth And whereas he says farther that then the Dove 's returning Ib. p. 77. was her returning into her principles that is into an Egg It is said expressly of the Dove that she returned unto him Noah into the Ark Gen. 8.9 and neither her's nor the Raven's return into Eggs could have been agreeable to Nature or Reason or have been of any manner of use Tho as nothing was more rational and nothing more natural so nothing could possibly be more useful than the Evaporation of the Waters both to the Earth and Atmosphaere at once For by their thus returning or going away into Vapours the one was dried by their reascending the other And so whereas he demands concerning the Evaporation of the Waters where does he find this notion in Scripture Answ p. 74. I might better put the like question to him where does he in Scripture find the vital Assertions of his Theory Which yet for the relation it has to Scripture he calls Theoria sacra the holy Theory tho in sundry things it be inconsistent with Scripture and opposite to it I must take my leave of this point with remarking an Vntruth which he lays upon the Excepter Another Untruth Answ p. 73◠li. 24◠It is this He gives him the Sun a miraculous power to draw up waters But where does he ascribe such a power to him The Answerer must show it or else incur the Censure of a false Accuser Indeed that the Sun has power to exhale Water now by agitating its Particles and so dilating and putting them into a flying motion is not to be doubted Nor is it to be question'd but this his power of Exhalation was most operative just after the full Rise of the Deluge For then the Atmosphaere having newly suffered a thorow Solution of its Continuity and the stock of its Vapours being greatly exhausted and the whole Earth except the higher parts of the Mountains being covered with the Flood his Beams having now a freer Passage through a finer Air could not but shoot down much more forcibly upon the diffused Water and agitating it more vehemently make Vapours to rise at a far greater Rate than they us'd to do And these Vapours being once raised by the action of the Sun would immediately take wing and fly into the empty Atmosphaere above there being such room and reception for them And as fast as some gave way others following while the void Atmosphaere suckt them up as it were and helpt them to ascend by its readiness to receive them an excessive plenty of misty Vapours must needs go up in continued streams from the steaming surface of the rarefying Water Thus I confess the Sun had power to draw up Water and power to attract it very copiously at the time we speak of till confused Nature came to be resettled in its first Order Yea so plentifully did he draw up Water in that juncture and such a mistiness thereby did he cause in the Air as he never did do before nor never in likelihood shall do again because there never was nor will be the like reasons for it But that the Excepter gave him miraculous power to do it is incumbent upon the Answerer who was pleas'd to say it to make it out A miraculous Wind indeed the Excepter owned Dsc p. 341. sent on purpose to hasten the work of drying up the Water Hic ventus non tam naturali quam divina visiccavit aquas a Lapide in loc Gen. 8.1 which in course of Nature could never have been done in so short a time if it could have been done at all but as for a miraculous influence of the Sun as it would have been needless in conjunction with such a Wind so he knows of none nor did he ever think of any But besides all this at length he would find out an Insufficiency in the new Hypothesis as if the measure of its Waters could not reach to the Execution which was necessary to be done upon the Animal World For whereas an Vniversal Destruction was made by the Flood Answ p. 71. I would gladly know says he how this could be in a fifteen-Cubit Deluge For Birds would naturally fly to the tops of Trees And Beasts would retire by degrees to Mountains Men also could not fail to retire into Mountains Or the upper stories of their houses might be sufficient to save them Or an house seated upon an Eminency or a Castle upon a Rock would always be a safe retreat from this diminutive Deluge Ib. 72. And those that were upon the Sea in Ships would never come in danger This is the substance of the Answerers Objections where he reflects upon the incompetency of the new Hypothesis in regard of the Quantity or height of those Waters of which it supposes the flood to be
misinterpreted and mis-apply'd The first is this In case this Triple state or successive Order of Heavens and Earth be rightly grounded upon the aforesaid Apostles words then those three most eminent Evangelical Writers must implicitly contradict the Doctrine of Moses And so either what he or what they have delivered in some points must be false and all of them being inspir'd from above the H. GHOST must contradict Himself By Moses's Doctrine 't is very plain that the first Earth had an open Sea For GOD he says gave man Dominion over the Fish of the Sea and his Dominion over the Fish appears to be as full and withal as soon conferr'd upon him as that he had over the Beasts or Fowls And therefore if these Apostles warrant this threefold State of Heavens and Earth in the first of which there could be no open Sea their Doctrine must necessarily clash with Moses's and implicitly contradict it So again by Moses's Doctrine 't is undeniably plain that there was Brass and Iron in the Praediluvian Earth For as he teaches Tubal-Cain was an Instructer of every Artificer in those Metals And therefore if these three famous Apostles maintain this triple State of Heavens and Earth they must implicitly interfere with Moses again because the first of these states could not possibly produce either of those Metals both which according to Moses were extant in it The second Exception is this In case such a Triple state as this be truly founded upon the Writings of these three famous men then as all of them must contradict Moses implicitly so one of them must contradict himself expresly I mean S. John For speaking of the state of the new Heavens and Earth he says there was no more Sea Apoc. 21.1 Yet describing the final Judgment which is to be at the end of the same state he says the Sea gave up the dead which were in it Apoc. 20.13 And so in short there is no more probability that there should be such a tripple state as the Theory has invented built upon these Foundations of the Apostles laying than there is possibility that inspired Writers should contradict themselves or one another And therefore if what our Author says be true that the principal parts of this Theory are such things as are recorded in Scripture and so must be taken for granted in one sense or other Review p. 1 yet it is so far evident that he has not hit upon the Right sense of them as it is evident the sense that he puts upon them is not consonant to Scripture And that is so evident that in his interpreting Scriptures and applying several of them to his notions Review p. 8. he seems to have verifi'd his own words where he says 't is a kind of fatality upon us to be deceived Ib. p. 11. Yea even to be deceiv'd in the passages of those principal Apostles of which he thus pronounces These three places I alledge as comprehending and confirming the Theory in its full extent And that he speeds no better in dealing with Prophane Writers about this Matter than he did in tampering with Divine ones one Instance will evince which we meet with in his Review p. 20. where to show the true importance of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and how ill it is rendred in the English standing out of the water 2 S. Pet. 3.5 he says that he that should translate Plato 's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the World stands out of fire would be thought no Graecian And adds that Thales's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cicero renders ex aqua constare omnia But this we except against as nothing to the purpose For the Authors named by their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meant that the World was made out of a thing as out of its principle But did the Theorist's first Heavens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in that sense was water the Principle out of which they were made So far from that that they were compleatly made and the Earth too without any water in their Composition Yea the Sun was fain to dart his fiery Beams through the Earth to rarify the water in the Abyss below and from thence to fetch it up by exhalation before so much as Vapour could spread through those Heavens So that they were no more made out of water than the Air is made out of Clouds because they fly in it or than a County is made out of a River because it runs through it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Plato's or in Thales's sense has nothing to do here For besides that in the primitive Heavens there was no formal or specific Water save only about the Poles of the Earth where it fell but only Vapour even that Vapour was but passant through those Heavens no Ingredient of them no Principle of their Being or Part of their Essence But this was that which the Philosopher meant by his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Orator confirms it by his reddition of the Words We cannot conclude without making this plain but true Observation That the Theory of the Earth is a very vain and false Hypothesis The Vanity of it is notorious For notwithstanding that it pretends to be chiefly Philosophical yet all its Primary Phaenomenaes that we have considered and which make up the biggest and most Philosophical part of it are fain to call in the help of Miracle to support them Review p. 2. The first is the Original of the Earth from a Chaos But that the Formation of this Earth might in due time be effected it is supposed to be done by the hand of Extraordinary or miraculous Providence The second is the state of Paradise and the Antediluvian World And here Miracle must come in again for that World could never have been peopled had not Angels carry'd Mankind over the Torrid Zone The Third is the Vniversal Deluge But without Miracle no Rains could have been before the fountains of the great Deep were broken up nor could the falling Ark have been preserved after it Nor is the Falseness of the Hypothesis inferiour to its Vanity For there is never a one of the Phaenomenaes aforesaid but includes too manifest Contradiction in it to the sacred Oracles or else to it self First the Formation of the Earth out of the Theory's Chaos contradicts Scripture For that tells us the Earth was made the Third day but the Theory says it was increased daily And if to take off this Contradiction to Scripture it be alledged that the Answerer allows it might be made in six minutes this throws the Contradiction upon the Theory For how could the Earth be made in six minutes that was daily increased Secondly the Paradisiacal state and the Antediluvian World Contradict Scripture For the one gives Paradise a Situation Contrary to what Moses assigns it and the other against his most plain Assertions excludes both Metals and an open Sea with Adam's Dominion over its Fish Thirdly the Vniversal Deluge contradicts Scripture For according to the Theorist See Disc c. 8. §. 5. Answ p. 31. Reply p. 67. there were fourscore days Rain towards making the Flood but the H. GHOST mentions and allows but forty This is no more than a Recapitulation or short Rehearsal of some former Remarks Yet they fully exhibit the nature of the Theory And when its Primary and Essential Phaenomenaes are such what must its Secondarys and Collaterals be If the Constituent and substantial parts of an Hypothesis be so very faulty impossible it is that the Coincidents or Appendants of it should be justifiable Yet thus our Author vouches this Hypothesis in his Review p. 12. It is not only more agreeable to Reason and Philosophy than any other yet propos'd to the World but it is also more agreeable to Scripture Having found out words in Scripture that is somewhat like to his own he runs directly away with them and right or wrong applys them to his purpose Just as some persons who listning unto Bells think that they ring what runs in their minds so if Scripture phrases do but chime as it were or sound to his sense our Author concludes that they favour his Notions tho all be but Phantsy But let him make good that fair Character and I am ready to retract what I have said against him and to turn my Exceptions into applause In the mean time I have pursued the Theory as far as I need For as for going through the two last Books which he says will not be unacceptable to the Theorist Answ p. 66. I deem it wholly superfluous Where the Foundations of an house are taken away the Superstructures can never stand The upper Stories must needs follow the fate of the lower ones and both will certainly fall together 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 FINIS ERRATA PAg. 14. l. 24. after Shores a full stop l. 25. after if r. it p. 19. l. 11. r. aereal p. 22. in marg leg Luna p 32. l. 6. blot out in p. 58. l. 14. blot out only p. 65 l. 35. after Expedient r. and. p. 72. l. 11. r. incrusted l. 16. r. account p. 87. l. 26. blot out English p 112. l. 31. r. off p. 119. l. 18. r. aereal p. 134. in marg leg delentur p. 151 l. ult r. his own p. 195. l. 28. r. Tehom p. 196. l. 24. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 205. l. 6. after head a full stop Books lately Printed and are to be Sold by J. Southby at the Harrow in Cornhill 1691. TWO Treatises The First concerning Reproaching and Censure The Second an Answer to Mr. Serjeants Sure-footing To which are annexed Three Sermons Preached upon several Occasions and very useful for these Times By William Falkner D. D. in 4to A Letter to Father Petre concerning his Part in the Late Kings Government Wherein all his Actions are Justified and wherein also the Forgery of a Prince of Wales is freely Confessed and Justified in 4to The Benefit of Early Piety Recommended to all Young Persons and particularly to those of the City of London in Twelves A short View of the Duty of Receiving the Sacrament Fit to be Read in the Time of Preparation With Additions of several Prayers necessary to be used before and after Communion in 24. FINIS
shall be Judge Why one that the Answerer fairly appeals to and one it seems of the Excepter's own chusing namely Scripture I and let the same Judge says the Excepter decide the whole Controversie betwixt us And what says this Judge to the case before him Let all Philosophers who please to be of the Jury mind his sentence and also the Appellant's Argument from it The Moon was made the fourth day and the Earth was formed the third So says the Judge and very truly Therefore unless the fourth day was before the third the Moon could not hinder the Formation of the Earth So concludes the Appellant and very falsely in the case depending For the Earth formed the third day was Moses's Earth which the Excepter contends for and could not possibly think that the Moon should hinder the Formation of that But the Earth he disputes against is the Theorist's which could not be form'd the third day For according to him it was not only to grow out of a Chaos by the rising of Oyl out of an Abyss and the falling of Particles out of the Air but moreover was to be increast daily And therefore had the Moon been made the fifth or sixth day or after it might have been made time enough to hinder the Formation of this Earth But however he intimates here that his Earth was form'd the third day And that 's mighty well for now it 's to be hop'd that Moses and he will agree better Here 's one step towards an accommodation But then the mischief on 't is 't is a step backwards on our Author's part and I 'm afraid will do him but little Service For while he thus endeavours to shun Charybdis he falls unluckily into Scylla is reduc'd to such an exigence that let him choose which way he pleases of these two he is sure to go in contradiction to himself Another Contradiction For if he says his Earth was form'd the Third day according to Scripture he then contradicts himself in his Theory which teaches it was daily increased And if he says it was daily increased according to his Theory then he contradicts himself in his appeal to Scripture which as he now owns tells us it was formed the third day Ib. lin 21. And should it be alledged to evade this that here are two distinct Hypotheses that is to say of Ordinary and Extraordinary Providence whereon these two different Formations of the Earth are respectively founded this would be but the same thing over again As evidently showing that in his way of shifting he has set up two Hypotheses plainly contradictory to one another Even as contradictory as affirming a thing made in one day and affirming it made in many days are contradictory affirmations The Excepter had suggested Disc p. 74 75 76. that the Moon being present and causing Tides and Fluctuations in the waters of the Chaos that would have hindred the Formation of the Earth upon them This says the Answerer Answ p. 6. we have no reason to believe according to the Experiences we have now For Tides hinder not the Formation of Ice in cold Regions upon the Surface of the Sea therefore why should they have hindred the Formation of the Earth upon the surface of the Chaos Some Seas indeed do freeze in some measure but then their waters are pretty still And so the most that can be inferred from thence is but this that if the waters of the Chaos were any where so quiet some Earth might there have been formed upon them Tho this Inference withal is far short of being an evidence of the thing inasmuch as there is more reason for Ice to be formed upon the Sea than there was for Earth to be formed upon the Chaos For our Seas have Shoars where Ice does usually begin its Formation spreading wider or farther by a continued or progressive Concretion Which may be one chief reason why our Creeks or Harbours are oft frozen up when Seas that feed or flow into them are not even because they are bounded with no far distant Banks where Ice can more easily grow from the Sides till it meets in the Middle But the waters of the Chaos had no Shoars Ice also is lighter than water and so swims upon it and therefore if fit chances to be broken in its first Formation and while it is thin it may unite and grow together again by a new congelement But earth is heavier than water and apt to sink and therefore if broken when spread upon it in a thin Covering it immediatly dives and goes down to the bottom And upon this account the same degrees of Fluctuation that permit Ice to gather upon Seas would have prevented an Earth's being formed upon the Chaos But we must go on The Theorist thought that the presence of the Moon was less needful in the first World Eng. Theor. p. 241. And one reason he gave for it was this because there were no long Winter nights To which the Excepter opposed Disc p. 79. that as there were no long Winter nights so there were no short Summer ones neither So that set but the one against the other and the presence of the Moon may seem to have been as needful then in regard of the length of nights as it is now But this in the Answerer's opinion tho witty does not reach the point And pray p. 6. why why because a great Inconvenience attends long nights when they fall upon the hours of travel or the hours of work and business But then at the same time that business and journeys are hindred in some places by long Nights in other places they are helped forward as much by short ones And therefore set but the business and travellings of the Inhabitants of some parts of the Earth against the like Concerns of the Inhabitants of other parts of it and the Excepter's Observation will reach the point And truly where can the presence of a Moon be more needful than in that World where half the time was still to be Night and 12 of every 24 hours was continually dark all over it at once that is all over its habitable Regions For then the Earth standing in a Right Position to the Sun and having none of its motion of Inclination as Astronomy calls it and the Sun always rising and setting in the Aequinoctial and so in the same points of the Heavens without any Latitude as the days would constantly be twelve hours in length so the nights by this means must be as long but the Crepusculum or Twilight in the praediluvian World would be very short and so its Inhabitants immers'd in the deeper darkness and consequently could very ill spare the Moon In the next place the Answerer notes that Oily Particles in the Chaos pag. 7. were excepted against as Precarious And he endeavours to take off the Exception by giving Reasons for their being Original and Primaeval Ib. The first he
makes that evaporate together with it self be apt in some measure to twine and wind themselves Especially at that time when they both upon the Secretion of the Chaos met and encountred one another in single naked Particles before ever they were once united in Bodies or at all incorporated in their respective Masses And altho by reason of their mutual Lubricity the Watry Particles could not long keep fast the Oily ones about which they cling'd with tortuous flexures yet they might considerably check and protract their separation and ascent it requiring some time for the Oily Particles to extricate themselves and get loose from those little watry Wreaths wherewith they were involv'd and hampered Eng. Theor. p. 55 56 57. Thirdly the liquid Mass of the Chaos being a Collection of all Liquors that belong to the Earth every one of these would at first be foul and muddy and their respective Impurities must be discharged Particularly the Water being a vast Body would have sent down its grosser parts in great abundance of Sedimental Stuff Now this Plenty of Sediment was thrown off by the Water either before or after the Oily Matter was risen or in the very Rising of it Not after it was risen for this Sediment being more earthy and so more heavy than the Oil it must be allowed to separate as soon as that or rather somewhat before it And yet if it were discharged and sank before the Oily matter was risen or when it was rising how could it chuse but sweep away that and carry it down together with it self to the Bottom of the Abyss Or say these Dreggs should have been too weak or too light to have overpowred the Oil alone and to have sunk it with its self yet it would certainly have arrested its motion upwards By which means the Terrestrial Particles above taking the advantage thus given would have come poudring down a main fastest at first and also the heaviest of them into the bare Waters and so joining their inconceivable Luggage to the sedimental Clog already hang'd upon the Oily Matter would have quite over-set it and weighed it down to the Interior Earth And this piece of work will appear the more fecible and easy to be done if we consider that it might be half or better than half effected before For all the Bodies or Elements of the Chaos being of an Original or Primaeval Nature and not one compounded or made out of another we must suppose that before the very first resolution of it they did coexist in the Chaos in their several Principles or Particles tho they were not locally severed and made into distinct and specifick Masses till its Separation So that at the same time that there were Earthy Particles there were Oily ones too disperst throughout thē whole Capacity of the Chaos And consequently when the grosser earthy Particles gathered towards the Center of the Chaos They salling through the whole Mass even through every little point or line of it from its Superficies downward where these Oily Particles were diffused and lay in their way they must needs catch hold of the greatest part of them the rather for their being of a viscuous quality and bear them down with themselves Especially they descending in so vast a Quantity as to be able to constitute a central Earth Lastly in case the Terrestrial Principle of the Chaos would not thus have hindred the Oily Principle from doing its part towards the Formation of the Theory's Earth yet then the Liquid Part of the Chaos would have hindred the Terrestrial one in the same Work For how is it possible that an Ocean of Water and Oil should strain through the whole Circumference of the Chaos settling down towards the middle of it and leave earthy Particles behind floating in the Air and that in measures sufficient upon their Descent to compose so immense an Earth as ours Let the Air be filled never so full of dust yet a thin Mist presently lays it all And such a prodigious Sea of Water falling through the entire space of the Chaos could not miss of the like effect upon the Earthy Particles then in the Air especially that Water containing so much Oil in it For by the Virtue of its Unctiousness in conjunction with its Gravity it would have cleansed the Air of Earthy Particles tho very throughly incorporate with it as Izing-glass clarifies faeculent Liquors by carrying their Dregs to the bottoms of their Vessels And therefore whereas it is alledged in the pretended Answer that through degrees of Littleness and Lightness in the Earthy Particles many of them might float in the Air a good while Eng. Theor. p. 59. we may rather think there would have been very few of them if any at all left there And then where would have been matter for the first Earth suppos'd to be form'd upon the Surface of the Abyss So we pass to the Third Precariousness Which is concerning the Quantity and Proportion of these Particles P. 8. says the Answerer And from this Charge he seeks to free himself by demanding to this purpose Ib. In what Theory or Hypothesis are Liquors Gag'd and just Measures and Proportions of each accounted for But then it may be demanded again what Theory or Hypothesis has so much need of just Measures and Proportions of these as his and consequently so much reason to account for them Ib. Then he enquires particularly has the great Philosopher meaning D. Cartes in his Hypothesis of 3 Elements Or in his several Regions of the Vnform'd Earth defin'd the Quantity and Dimensions of each Or in the Mineral Particles and Juices does he determine the Quantity of them Nor is there the like reason why he should For that great Philosophers Hypothesis and this little ones are not of the like Nature they stand not upon the like Foundations D. Cartes publickly owns his Hypothesis to be a meer Hypothesis indeed And tho for the better * Quinimo etiam ad res naturales melius explicandas earum Causas altius hic repetam quam ipsas unquam extitisse existimem Non enim dubium est quin Mundas ab initio fuerit creatus cum omni sua perfectione ita ut in eo Sol Terra Lana Stellae extiterint Prin. Par. 3. Sect. 45. explaining of effects in Nature he searcht deeper for their Causes than they ever lay yet he declares that he did not doubt but the World was at first created with all its Perfection so that in it there was a Sun and Earth and Moon and Stars And therefore here was no need of having his 3 Elements apportion'd in their Quantity or accurately adjusted to one another because by his own Confession there was no World to be form'd out of them Eng. Theor p. 85. But is it thus with the Hypothesis of the Theory No no that 's a Reality as its Author tells us And it must needs be so according
to his following Expressions To speak the truth P. 149. this Theory is something more than a bare Hypothesis P. 150. The Theory riseth above the Character of a bare Hypothesis Ib. We must in equity give more than a moral certitude to this Theory P. 274. The Theory carries its own light and proof with it And most fit it is therefore that this Theory being brought to the Test should approve it self far beyond others And an Earth being formed out of a strange Chaos the Creature of this Theory and according to the Laws of its Hypothesis as fit it is that the Ingredients of this Chaos should upon enquiry be found well proportion'd to one another beyond the Elements of D. Cartes's Hypothesis which arrogates no such certainty to it self but openly renounces it Yet if we compare D. Cartes's Hypothesis in the principal Instance here alledged with that of the Theorist we shall find it will acquit it self much better than his For suppose the World had been really to have been form'd out of the Cartesian Elements Yet upon examination it will appear that they were less liable to just Exceptions upon account of their possible Disproportionateness than the Chaos of the Theory upon the same account in regard of its Ingredients For of these 3 Elements the entire Vniverse was to be composed So that if they had all of them been more or less in quantity the Universe would only have had the larger or straiter Bounds And if any of them singly had been excessive or defective nothing worse would have followed upon this but that the several Bodies made out of them respectively must then have been proportion'd accordingly Thus if there had been more or less of the 1st Element there must have been more or greater or fewer or lesser Suns If there had been more or less of the 2d Element there must have been bigger or lesser Vortices If more or less of the 3d Element there must have been more or less of Terrestrial Matter in being So that the worst result from an excessive quantity of any one of the three Elements aforesaid would have been but an alteration in the Great World or at most but an inconvenience here and there in some parts of it no way detrimental or pernicious to the whole But as to this Earth of ours the case would have been quite otherwise For had not the Materials of that been duly proportion'd but one left to exceed and predominate over the other this redundance or inequality in measure would have been of very fatal Consequence That is it would have caused a miscarriage in the production of the Earth and have ruin'd the whole work which Nature was about And therefore in making the Chaos into an Earth there was absolute necessity as of Regularity of Process in its Formation so of due proportion in the Ingredients of its Constitution otherwise it could never have been brought to Perfection From D. Cartes the Answerer turns to the Excepter and thinks to choak him with an example of his own Does the Animadverter in his new Hypothesis concerning the Deluge P. 9. give us the just Proportions of his Rock-water and the just Proportions of his Rain-water that concurred to make the Deluge And does the Answerer think that the like accurate Proportion of things is needful to destroy a World that is necessary to form or rear one Yet here a World was to be destroyed only to be destroyed by being drowned Now supposing the destructive Flood was to rise out of Rock-water and Rain-water it mattered not as to the Destruction they were to bring on if both were of equal Quantity or which and how much one exceeded the other so they were together sufficient for the Work But what says the Answerer farther I find no Calculations there that is in the Animadverter's Hypothesis but general Expressions that one sort of Water was far greater than the other and that may be easily presumed concerning the Oily Substance and the Watry in the Chaos Here he must be minded of one of these two things that is to say either of Shuffling or of Mistaking First of Shuffling For he instanceth only in the Oily Substance and the Watry in the Chaos which he thought might shift pretty well together tho the one in Quantity exceeded the other But he knows there was a Terrestrial Substance too and what would have become of his Paradisiacal Earth which was to rise out of that if the Oil had not been fitly proportion'd to it If it had not been just enough that is to mix with the Earthy Particles and to make them into a good Soil For if it had been more than was sufficient to that purpose Disc p. 80. it would have overflowed them and rendred the Earth useless as a Greazy Clod. If less it would not have imbib'd them but they must have lain loose above in a fine and dry powder that would have made the Earth barren as an Heap of Dust And this in these very words the Excepter told the Theorist before Yet here we see the Earthy Substance is taken no notice of but rather slily shuffled out of the way Unless he intended that what he said of the Oily and Watry Substances in the Chaos should be meant of the Earthy one too And then Secondly he must be put in mind of a gross Mistake For tho in our Waters that Drowned the Earth one sort may easily be allowed to be greater than the other yet the same thing cannot be easily presumed concerning his Materials supposed to form it For Rock-water and Rain water were both alike for Drowning and so equally fitted to serve that End whereunto they were appointed and the Excess of one above the other could be no hindrance of the Effect they were design'd to produce Yea without such an Excess the Effect intended could never have been wrought according to our Hypothesis of the Flood But Oily Liquor and Earthy Particles are very different things out of a well proportion'd mixture of which the Earth it self was to be made And therefore to presume the * The Oil that is far greater than the Earthy substance or that unduly proportion'd to the Oil. one was far greater than the other is to presume they were not duly proportion'd or mixt together and consequently that the Earth could not be raised out of them But we must not forget the Close of this Paragraph which runs in these Words What Scruples therefore he raises in reference to the Chaos Answ p. 9. against the Theorist for not having demonstrated the proportions of the Liquors of the Abyss fall upon his own Hypothesis for the same or greater reasons And you know what the old verse says Turpe est Doctori cùm culpa redarguit ipsum Here he goes on in his shuffling or mistaking Way still For he speaks of Scruples raised in reference to the chaos only whereas this refers as well to
the Formation of the Earth Disc p. 80. And he proceeds upon the Proportions of the liquors of the Abyss only whereas our Scruples referred as well to the Earthy Matter Let that be included therefore as it ought and then what he says will in plain terms amount to thus much That tho the Rain-water were far greater than the Rock-water yet there would have been greater reason why the Earth should not have been drowned than there would have been why the Earth should not have been formed tho the Oily substance had been far greater than the Earthy For the Scruples against the Theorist's Formation of the Earth can never for greater reason fall upon the Animadverter's Hypothesis concerning the Flood unless there be greater reason why vastly disproportionate Quantities of Oily and Earthy Substance should make an Earth than there is why the like disproportion'd Quantities of Rock-water and rain-Rain-water should make a Flood Now have we greater reason to think that a little Terrestial Matter mixt with a vast deal of Oily matter should compose the first Earth than we have to think that a little Rock-water mixt with a vast deal of rain-Rain-water should drown it There is great reason why one Tun of Rock-water mingled with an hundred thousand Tuns of Rain-water should drown a good Garden But is there greater reason why one Tun of Earthy matter mingled with an hundred thousand Tuns of Oily matter should make a good Garden Soil I hope tho our Answerer be too great a Favourer of many Absurdities he will not be forward to assert this Rock-water and Rain-water were similar Causes and could not but with equal readiness of natural Disposition conspire to the effect of Drowning And tho the one in measure was much inferior to the other yet if both of them in conjunction were but sufficient for the Inundation that was enough for the Deluge depended chiefly upon the quantity of Water in general and not upon the Proportion of this or that kind of it in Particular But Oily matter and Earthy matter are Heterogeneal Substances and therefore could not so readily and immediately conspire to the Earth's Formation Some other Helps conducive thereunto were to come betwixt them and that and Concretion for one But then Concretion depending upon the due proportion of Ingredients Due Proportions of Oily and Earthy matter must be more needful in forming the Earth and so ought to be better demonstrated than the Proportions of Rock and rain-Rain-waters in raising the Flood And thus it is manifest that the Scruples raised against the Theorist by the Animadverter fall not upon his own Hypothesis for the same or greater reasons He might well therefore have spared his old verse which as appli'd here was as insignificant as an old Almanack But since in Civility to the Excepter he would needs send him it he cannot but in kindness give him a piece of it back again Letting him know that to reason or answer at such a rate as this Turpe est Doctori To make an end of this point of Precariousness The Excepter alledged Disc p. 81. That all these things that is to say The Ingredients of the Chaos and the Proportions of those Ingredients and the right timing of their Separations should have been more fully explained and clearly made out for a Personal reason which the Theorist made peculiar to himself Namely because he declared it to be his Judgment that things of moment of which nature was the Formation of his Earth are to be founded in aliquâ clarâ invictâ evidentiâ Lat. Theor. p. ◠on some clear and invincible evidence And what says he to this To it he gives a double Answer Answ p. 9. First that he set that sentence of which these words are part in opposition to such incertain Arguments as are taken from the interpretation of Fables and Symbols or from Etymologies and Grammatical Criticisms But is there nothing then of a middle nature betwixt Incertainties and invincible evidence No 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Probable or Credible things to come between them that he must needs over-strain himself by taking such a Leap not over but into a Ditch For thus he plunges into this deep absurdity of tying himself up to such an evidence as he is not able to produce But therefore he gives in a Second Answer more to the purpose That this Sentence because it might be taken in too great an extent Ib. is left out in the Second Edition of the Theory It seems then it was not taken in a worse sence than it might be taken Having done with the Precariousness he comes next to the Vnphilosophicalness wherewith the Theory was charged Answ p. 9. The instance is the Descent of the Terrestrial Particles from the whole capacity of those vast spaces betwixt the Moon and us And how could this Phaenomenon fall in with a smooth Philosophie Explication said the Excepter For either the bounds of the Chaos Disc p. 82. and the Sphaere of its Gravity reached as high as the Moon or they did not If they did not how could these Particles ever come there at all or come down from thence If they did extend so high then as the Excepter quaeried at first so he does still why did not the Moon come down with those Particles It is answered by another Question Answ p. 10. why does not the Moon come down now the same reason which keeps her up now kept her up then But this Answer is no Answer for that which kept the Moon up then would have kept up these Particles too And so either there must have been no Earth composed or else the Moon as an overplus must have dropt into its composition I think I have read of a Bullet shot up so high that it never came down upon the Earth more And then how could those terrestrial Particles descend that were disperst in all that vast space contain'd between the heighth of the Bullets ascent and the orb of the Moon The Last Charge upon the Theory in this part was its being Anti-scriptural That is in making the Chaos Dark whereas the Scripture says there was light the first day He answers to this sence P. 10. That the Scripture does not say the Chaos was throughly illuminated the first Day That the light then was faint and feeble and yet might be sufficient to make some distinction of day and night in the Skies A fair Concession and enough to end this part of our Controversy Only we must observe that the Theorist in this matter has changed his Mind and now plainly retracts his former Doctrine For how could he think there was any light in the Skies the first Day when he taught that the Matter whereof the whole Earth was to be made was diffused in Particles through the Air See Discourse Chap. 3. Parag. last Vid. Lat. Theor. Edit 2. p. 229. and that after the grossest
the Creation is to be limited to the Formation of our lower World and those parts of Nature which could be made out of the Earthly Chaos And that when he speaks of the Coelestial parts of the Universe the Luminaries Ib. cap. 7. p. 232. Edit 1. he meant no more than that they were then made Conspicuous and this if need be he declares he could demonstrate But the Objections made against these Confident Notions of his are answered only by being in part left out of the second Edition of the Latin Theory A farther Evidence that what he wrote was true and remarkable Natural History And also plain Demonstration in the case too But then 't is of the weakness to speak freely not of the truth or validity of his Assertions And withal here 's some proof that notwithstanding the great impertinence of this Chapter it reached the Theory in some things which ought to be taken notice of and spoken against for they were so very culpable it seems that they deserv'd to be cashier'd or left out CHAP. V. HEre the Answerer observes the Form of the Earth to be Excepted against upon the account that it would have wanted Waters or Rivers to Water it in that there would either be no Rivers at all or none at least in due time But before he opposes these Reasons he gives a short account of the state of the Waters in his primeval Earth and then declares p. 13. This I believe is an Idea more easily conceiv'd than any we could form concerning the Waters and Rivers of this present Earth if we had not experience of them On the other side I believe the contrary so easie to be conceived that I shall not spend time in making it out I only say thus much In case his Idea were most easie to be conceived yet what is most fair and easie in the Idea or speculation of a thing is not always most true but may be most false in Nature Look to the constitution or posture of the Heavens There the Aequator and Ecliptick intersect each other in an angle of twenty three Degrees and better But the Philosophers Idea represents a Parallelism in the axes of these two Circles and a Coincidence in their Plains most easie and natural Yet this angular intersection holds tho it is thought some Mechanic or Physical Causes would bring them nearer to the site we speak of And this very position tho it seems to be forc'd and violent and that as well to the Course of Nature as the Philosophers Conception or Idea is yet the most convenient that possibly can be for the Earths Inhabitants and by its lasting continuance becomes a choice argument to confute the Atheist and evince a Providence The Reason why there would be no Rivers at all Answ p. 14. he notes was because the Regions towards the Poles where the Rains are supposed to fall and the Rivers to rise would have been all frozen and congeal'd And he goes on Why we should think those Regions would be frozen and the Rains that fell in them he the Excepter gives two reasons the Distance and the Obliquity of the Sun As also the Experience we have now of the Coldness and Frozenness of those parts of the Earth And what says he to these our Reasons As to the Distance of the Sun he would make the Excepter answer that Himself bringing him in thus He confesses Ib. That is not the thing that does only or chiefly make a climate cold Ay and that Confession he keeps to still supposing the Suns Distance be Perpendicular which was the Distance he spake of Disc p. 118. But if the Sun moved always in the Aequinoctial his Distance from the Circumpolar or Raining Regions must be an Oblique Distance And if that Distance were but as great betwixt the Sun and the imaginary Raining Regions as it is betwixt the Sun and us in the Depth of Winter it may from hence be concluded that the Cold in those Regions must be as great as in Winter time it is in ours by reason of his distance As to the Obliquity of the Sun the Answerer says it was neither so great nor so considerable in the first Earth as in the Present Answ p. 14. But tho the Obliquity of the Sun be greater now because the body of this Earth lies in an oblique Position to him yet his Distance from us in Winter is far less now in this present Earth than his Distance from the Raining Regions was in the primitive Earth Because that being an oval or Oblong Earth its circumpolar Regions must be far more remote from the Equator See Discourse c. 5. § 4. than if it had been Round or Globular And so the Raining Regions then must be much colder than our Climate is now in the dead of Winter For as it is not the Distance of the Sun alone that makes a Climate vehemently cold so it is not his Obliquity alone that does it neither but a great oblique Distance And so great and considerable must the Sun's Distance of this Nature be from the Raining Regions in the Primitive Earth as to leave them in a very freezing Condition Especially if the Experiences alledged by the Excepter be well considered Ibid. to which there is nothing distinctly answered Instead of applying himself to take off them the Answerer is pleas'd to tell us thus Answ p. 14. That if the Excepter had well consider'd the differences betwixt the present and the primitive Earth as to Obliquity of Position and that which follows from it length of nights he would have found no reason to have charg'd that Earth with nipping and freezing Cold where there was not I believe one morsel of Ice from one Pole to another As to his belief who can regard it It comprehends such things as no Christian Philosopher ever yet did nor ever can or will put into his Creed And as for the Fxcepter he has well consider'd the things he speaks of and still finds he has sufficient reason to charge the primitive Earth in its Rainy Regions with Nipping and freezing Cold even with a Cold more nipping and freezing than is felt in our Climate in the Winter Season Indeed he instances in one thing in this present Earth which he thinks should cast the Advantage for Coldness on our Climate's side that is the Length of Nights Ibid But consider all Circumstances aright and the real Advantage as to Cold will appear to be with the First Earth it s Rainy Regions must be colder than ours For in that Earth the Nights were continually twelve hours in length and in our Climate if we take one with another throughout the Winter Months we shall find that our Nights do not much exceed those in Length For tho in December they be above four hours longer than they yet in February they are never longer by two hours and an half and in the end of that Month
heavens kindness that have been or can appear are properly to be solved CHAP. VII HEre the Answerer applies himself to vindicate those Texts of Scripture which being alledged in confirmation of the Theory were excepted against The first is that in the Second Epistle of S. Peter C. 3. v. 5. For this they willingly are ignorant of c. But he quarrels with the Excepter for rendring it generally Wilfully ignorant Answ p. 19. Now who can say they were not thus ignorant And is it not most probable that they really were so Or who can clearly discern and justly dinstinguish betwixt Willing and Wilful Ignorance and rightly determine which of the two men are guilty of in all cases It is hard to set an exact boundary between Willing and Wilful Sin so as positively to say where the one ends and the other begins The Difference here is so nice and obscure as not easily to be discovered If we look to the sins of the Tongue they that Ly and Swear Willingly commonly do it Wilfully If we look to the sins of the Hand they that Rob and Kill willingly commonly do it wilfully And so it is commonly as to sins of the mind and particularly as to the sin of Ignorance They that are willingly ignorant are wilfully ignorant For they are usually ignorant because they forbear to consult men or because they neglect to peruse Books or because they refuse to observe or consider or examine things And these Omissions being deliberate chosen and affected must consequently be wilful and make their ignorance of the same stamp Especially if men persist in their ignorance till it becomes high and hainous by being customary and habitual which seems to be the Case of them here reprehended Ib. And whereas the Answerer says that the Excepter lays a great stress upon the word Wilfully That he did not do nor was there any need of it For whether they were willingly or wilfully ignorant it matters not because they could in neither sense be blameably ignorant of such things as the Theorist presumes they were inasmuch as they were in no capacity of acquiring the Knowledge of them supposing they had been Real This the Excepter fairly made out To have proved them culpably ignorant therefore in either of these senses Disc p. 128. 129. c. the Answerer should have taken off what the Excepter objected against the likelihood of their attaining to the knowledge of those Matters and should have shown that the Pseudo-Christians reproved by St. Peter might by the use of such means as they had have come to a competent understanding of those Phaenomenaes which he believes the Apostle chid them for being unacquainted with But the doing of this he either willingly or wilfully omitted it being much easier to run out into an empty debate about a word than as he should have done to pursue the proper and material things He says indeed p. 20. The mutability and changes of the World which these Pseudo-Christians would not allow of was a knowable thing taking all the means which they might and ought to have attended to Great news this that the Changes of the World which they were checked for being ignorant of were knowable by the means which they injoyed Did GOD ever blame ignorance but in such Circumstances But let him prove that the first Constitution of the Heavens and the Earth and the changes and dissolution which happened to them at the Deluge were knowable things to them according to his Notions of them let him prove that they had means to bring them to the knowledge of these as he represents them and then he does something But he must first prove that there ever were such things And because he is for Instances out of Scripture where the Phrase used by S. Peter signifies wilful and obstinate ignorance let him take these that follow Answ p. 19. as proofs of as much The forgiven Servant obstinately refusing to shew mercy to his fellow-servant it is said of him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he would not S. Mat. 18.30 The Inhabitants of Jerusalem obstinately refusing to come under GOD's Protection it is said of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ye would not S. Mat. 23.37 And so again S. Luke 13.34 Now if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with a negative Particle before it signifies a Wilful and obstinate Refusal of a thing then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without a Negative may signify a wilful and obstinate Consent to a thing or Compliance with it And so the Phrase here 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 might signify a wilful and obstinate ignorance And because he is for Proofs out of Greek Authors Ib. one Proof shall be given him out of an Author that he knows understood Greek well enough I mean the very learned and judicious Dr. Hammond Who in his Annotations writes thus upon this Text. The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seems here to be taken in a sense not ordinary in other places for being of opinion or affirming perhaps with this addition of asserting it magisterially without any reason rendred for it but a sic volo c. So I will I command my Will is my reason And according to this excellent Annotator the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports extraordinary Wilfulness here Nor let him think that he gains any thing by noting p. 20. that it was not their ignorance that S. Peter chiefly reproves but their deriding and scoffing at the Doctrine of the coming of our Saviour For if he reproved them as Scoffers yet in the words considered he reproves them chiefly for their Ignorance and in all likelihood for their Wilful Ignorance p. 12◠Next he checks the Excepter for Dispatching Scriptures quickly by the help of a Particle and a Figure But if arguments be so weak that they will fall with a Fillip why should greater force be used to beat them down The fault is in him that should have brought stronger To draw a Rapier to stab a Fly or to charge a Pistol to kill a Spider I think would be preposterous He goes on next to Psal 33.7 He gathereth the waters of the Sea Eng. The. p. 86. as in a Bagg He layeth up the Abysses in Store-houses Which according to the Theory hints that the Sea or Abyss before the Deluge was inclosed within the Vault of the Earth In confutation of this Phantsy So the Vulgate and Septuagint both render it which the Theorist quoted for rendring the forecited place Psal 33.7 as in a bag the Excepter brought in that Passage Psal 78.13 He set the waters as in a Bag. Which proves according to the known Rule of Expounding one Scripture by another that by the waters being as in a bag Psal 33.7 could not be meant their being inclosed within the vault of the Earth Because this Text which says the same thing speaks of an open Sea viz. the Red Sea See Disc p. 139 140. and that when it
plain Contradictions of Moses Yet the Replicant does not say that they were Rude ones Tho whether they are not more Rude and Groundless than the Excepter's Censure of Anaxagoras was let the Ingenuous and Impartial judge And besides in his English Theory p. 288. he puts this amongst the Vital Assertions of it That neither Noah 's flood nor the present Form of the Earth can be explain'd in any other method that is rational nor by any other causes that are intelligible And speaking of the Ancient Earth and Abyss p. 93. he delivers himself thus If they were in no other Form nor other state than what they are under now the expressions of the Sacred Writers concerning them are very strange and inaccountable without any sufficient ground or any just occasion for such uncouth representations Some perhaps may see as much rudeness here as in any thing that the Excepter said of Anaxagoras And should absolute strangers to his Religion read this Author they might possibly be apt to think from many passages in his books that instead of believing these sacred Writers in several Matters he designs to confute them And should they at the same time be strangers to these Writers too they might be apt to think also that they deserve to be confuted or that they were not worth confuting For to say that their representations of things are uncouth and that their Expressions are occasionless and groundless and very strange and inaccountable is the same thing as to say that they writ non-sense These are our Authors words and if we will believe him who must needs know best he finds no reason to alter his Opinion in any one particular And when he can thus express himself of sacred Writers because their Doctrines differ from his Notions is he not like to be thought by some to be as deep in the dirt of rudeness as the Excepter is in the mire for saying what he did of an heathen Author To the Philosophers the Answerer says he might have added the Testimonies of Poets who tell us of a perpetual Spring And particularly he quotes Ovid for it But if his Evidence must be admitted it is but reason that we should have the whole of it And if we take it in its full latitude there is nothing more contrary to the Assertions of the Theory than that For as after that Testimony of his ver erat Aeternum Answ p. 35. c. there was a perpetual Spring he says Flumina jam Lactis jam flumina Nectaris ibant Sometimes Rivers flowed with Milk sometimes with Nectar so before it he speaks many things Metamor l. 1. in initio perfectly destructive to the Doctrine of the Theory For he tells that in the Beginning and even before man was created some Deity or other made Seas such Seas as had Shores and were tossed with Winds and so were open Seas Tum Freta diffudit rapidisque tumescere ventis Jussit ambitae circundare littora terrae Then Seas he made with blustring Storms to swell And Shores to th' Earth inclos'd he gave as well Then he says there were Valleys and Stony Mountains Jussit extendi campos subsidere Valles Fronde tegi sylvas lapidosos surgere montes Next Fields came forth and Valleys sunk below And leavy Trees and stony Hills did grow And tells us farther that at the same time there were two Zones of the five covered with deep Snows And that there were not only Mists but Clouds and dreadful Thunders and cold Winds with Lightnings Nix tegit alta duas Illic nebulas illic consistere nubes Jussit humanas motura tonitrua mentes Et cum fulminibus facientes frigora ventos With pure white Snows Two Zones were covered There Mists did fall and Clouds were gathered And frightful Thunders dwelt that awe mens minds And flashing Lightnings with most nipping Winds So that if he spake one word for the Theory he spake many against it And therefore it had been better that he had said nothing and that the Answerer had wav'd this Testimony of his Answ p. 36. In the next place he brings in the Christian Father's Character of Paradise in proof of his perpetual praediluvian Equinox And this Character he takes from Bellaâ—mine De Grat. prim hom cap. 12. who delivers it in these words Paradisus ita describitur a Sancto Basilio c. Paradise is so describ'd by S. Basil in his Book of Paradise by John Damascen in his second Book of the Faith and the eleventh Chapter By S. Austin in the fourteenth book of the City of GOD and the tenth Chapter by Alchimus Avitus and Claudius Marius Victor and others above cited by Isidore in his fourteenth book of Etymologys and third Chapter and others commonly as if in it there were a perpetual Spring no colds no heats no rains snows hails also no clouds which very thing the Scripture signifies when it says the first of mankind were naked in Paradise We reply First that the Cardinal who here summs up the Evidence of these Witnesses as a Judge did himself pronounce Extravagant things in the Case And therefore no wonder if he picks up and brings in such kind of Testimonies as may be somewhat sutable to his own * He believed that the waters of the Flood came not into Paradise But that Enoch was kept alive there when the Earth was drowned and that he and Elias do dwell together there now and shall continue to do so till such time as they come from thence to oppose Antichrist vid. Cap. 14. De Grat. prim hom De grat prim hom Cap. 12. Answ p. 37. Notions Secondly the Testimonies brought in by his own Pen he blots out again with his own hand For speaking of Bede's opinion that Paradise was a place as high as the Moon which he makes the opinion of Bridefert rather who glossed upon Bede he says that the Author of that opinion was pleased to make use of an Hyperbole that by the heighth of that Paradisi excellentiam demonstraret he might set forth the excellency of Paradise Quemidmodum intelligimus verba Sancti Basilii c. After the same manner that we understand the words of S. Basil of John Damascen of Alchimus Avitus c. And when what they said was Hyperbolical to the Theory's purpose it cannot be material After this he attaques the two Queries made by the Excepter against the praediluvian Equinox The First was this Disc p. 185. Would it in likelihood have continued till the Flood For the water of the Abyss being in process of time exhausted and the exterior Earth hanging hollow over an empty space round it by being pendulous and oblong the waters upon that Earth abounding for some reasons given more at one Pole of it Disc p. 187. than at the other might have sunk or sway'd down that Pole which was overcharged To this the Answerer opposes P. 37. the Waters were not
more rarifi'd towards one Pole than towards another And we never said or thought they were But in his English Theory we read p. 229. that the Current of the waters from the Poles might in some places rest and be stopt and then it would spread it self into Lakes and rise till it grew to such an heighth as to be able by its force or weight to overflow and break loose again before it could pass farther Now in case the Current might thue be stopt and the obstruction be so great as to cause the Waters to swell into Lakes how easily might there be more or greater Lakes near to one of the Poles than the other And so how easily would the overweight of water have sunk the Earth down at the praeponderating Pole tho the Waters were no more rarify'd there than at the other That therefore being wide of the Mark he should have hit he sends another Arrow after it taken out of the Quiver of Philosophy Ib. The empty space betwixt the exterior Region of the Earth and the Abyss below would be fill'd with such gross vapors that it would be little purer than water and would stick to the Earth much closer than its Atmosphaere that is carried about with it But this shaft also tho levell'd more directly at it misses the intended Scope For if those Vapours were but a little purer than water yet look how much they were so and so much the weaker they would be and less able to keep the pendulous Earth in its Aequilibrious or even posture And that grossest Vapours are very much purer or thinner than water is evident from hence that they cannot sustain or buoy up a piece of light Cork whereas upon waters ships of greatest Burthen float and swim And tho the Atmosphaere be carried about with the Earth yet if that were inclosed with an oblong or Oval Orb of Earth this Orb would not sit half so fast and steddy upon that Sphaere of Vapours as it would do upon a Sphaere of Waters the Consistency of Water being many times as thick again as any Mass of Vapours can be in their natural Constitution The Second Query is this Granting there was such an Equinox in the first World Disc p. 187. Would not the natural day towards the latter end of that World have been longer than in the former periods of the same Yet that the days just before the Flood were of no unusual length is evident in the very Story of the Flood the Duration of which we find computed by Months consisting of Thirty days apiece Whereas says the Excepter had Days been grown longer fewer of them would have made a Month. This says the Answerer is a meer Blunder And he proves it thus If thirty days were to go to a Month Answ p. 28. whether the days were longer or shorter there must be thirty of them and the Scripture does not determine the length if the days Tho Scripture does not limit or account for the length of days expresly yet it does it implicitly and withal very plainly and intelligibly For it gives us to understand that days before the flood were of the same length that they are of now by informing us that months and years which were of the same length then that they are of at present were made up of the same numbers of days For how could there be just twelve Months in the Year at the time of the Deluge and thirty days in each of those Months if days then had not consisted as they do now of four and twenty hours a piece And as Providence has so ordered Nature that days which depend upon its Diurnal motion should be measured by Circumgyrations of the Earth So it has order'd likewise that Months which depend upon its Annual Motion should be measured by its progress in the Heavens And as it has so suted these Motions that the Earth while it makes a Month by running from one Sign in the Zodiack to another should turn about thirty times upon its own Axis and thereby make so many Days So it has taken care that each of these Circumrotations should be perform'd in four and twenty hours and consequently that every day should be just so long that thirty of them in way of round reckoning might compleat a Month. But now had the Circumgyrations of the Earth grown more slow towards the Deluge by such causes as the Excepter suggested so that every day had consisted of thirty hours suppose it is manifest that fewer than thirty days they being longer than formerly must have made a Month. Because then before the Earth could have turned round thirty times she would have been translated by her progressive motion from one Celestial Constellation to another and so the Month would have been consummated But to talk as the Answerer does that the Month should be lengthened by the days being so is a fearful Blunder indeed Tho as luck will have it still it falls upon himself For let the days by slackning of the Earth's Diurnal motion have been never so long yet its Annual motion continuing the same the Month must needs have kept its usual Length only fewer days would have made it up the very thing objected The Answerer therefore need not have been so officious as to undertake to teach the Excepter to speak which he was pleased to do in these Words Answ p. 30. I suppose that which he would have said and which he had confusedly in his mind was this That the Month would have been longer at the Flood than it was before The Answerer it seems had such a confused thought in his mind but the Excepter 't is plain was clear from it And truly had he been guilty of it he should have counted it a Meer Blunder For how could the Month be longer for the Earth's Circumgyrations being slower when the Month was measured by such a motion of the Earth as would have continu'd as swift as ever tho its Circumgyrations had been never so slack The Moon never turns circularly upon her own Center to make days and nights and yet she makes regular Months and Years by her Periodical and Synodical Courses And had the Circumgyrations of the Earth been never so swift at the Deluge or had they been never so slow or had they been none at all still the Months would have been the same that they were and neither longer nor shorter Tho then indeed they could not have consisted of so many days and nights following each other in an orderly succession because through want of the Earth's Diurnal motion there would have been no such vicissitude of them And since the Answerer took upon him to tell the Excepter what he had in his mind as he supposed the Replicant in requital of his kindness as well as in imitation of his Patern may suggest to him what he should have had in his thoughts When he said if thirty days were to go to a Month whether
the days were longer or shorter there must be thirty of them he should have considered that these thirty days were to be of such a length just as that that Number of them might make a Solar Month. For supposing them either longer or shorter than so they could not be such days as the Scripture speaks of because thirty of them still made such a Month. Whereas if they had been shorter as there must have been more so if they had been Longer fewer would have done it And thus the Answerer's design of throwing a Blunder upon the Excepter is quite defeated and while he made an awkward Blow at him he only struck and wounded himself Yet the Dust he here raises can neither hide the Objection which the Excepter made nor yet so blind the Reader 's eyes as that he should not see it remains unanswered For after all if the Contiguity of the Sphaere of the Exterior Earth with the Abyss ceased by reason the Waters of the Abyss were exhaled that Sphaere of the Earth must be carried about with less Celerity than before it was Especially if the Moon came late into the Earth's Neighbourhood which being an heavy Luggage in the outward part of the Earth's Vortex like a Clog hang'd upon the Rim of a Wheel would make it turn more slowly as the Excepter objected But because we have hinted that Scripture gives us to understand that there were twelve Months in the Antediluvian year and thirty days in each of those Months it will not be amiss to conclude this Chapter with showing how Scripture makes the things out In the eighth of Genesis then and the fifth verse it informs us that the waters decreased until the tenth Month. And after this that at the end of forty days Noah opened the window of the ark v. 6th And that he stayed yet other seven days and sent forth the Dove v. 10th And that he stayed yet other seven days and sent forth the Dove again v. 12th Which fifty four days following the first day of the tenth Month on which the tops of the Mountains were seen v. 5th show that there must be twelve months in the year and indeed they make them up so many bating five days which we must suppose were still to run out before the first Month of the next year came in v. 13th And then it shows that there were thirty days in each Month. For first we find twenty seven days in one Month in this Chapter v. 14th And as we read in the Seventh Chapter the Waters prevailed upon the Earth one hundred and fifty days v. 24th Yet they began to come in the seventeenth day of the second month v. 11th and they began to decrease by the seventeenth day of the seventh month Chap. 8th v. 3d. Whence it is plain that the hundred and fifty days made just five months during which the Waters prevailed and so every month must consist of thirty days CHAP. IX IN the beginning of this Chapter relating to the Oval Figure of the first Earth he goes about to rectify a Principle of the Excepter's Answ p. 38. That terrestrial Bodies have a nitency inwards or downwards towards their Central point But let this be understood of Self-centred and Quiescent Earthly Bodies and the Assertion will need no Rectification And so the Excepter really meant it should be understood For he was not yet come to Consider the Mass upon which the Primitive Earth was founded as turning upon its own Center See Disc p. 190. but was going on towards the Consideration The Waters of that Mass Globular at first rising up above the Aequator by its gyration upon its own Axis became oval and so made the Earth of that Figure defluendo ad latera Disc p. 193 194. Answ p. 39. by flowing down at the sides of the Globe So the Theorist said at first To this word the Excepter spake so home that the Answerer we see was almost angry by the Reflections he makes We will therefore touch that tender place no more for fear of giving farther Provocation And we the rather forbear to press upon it because the Answerer we find is sensible it is sore by the Plaister he is fain to apply to it For now he has explain'd that word by another as he tells us namely Detrusione Ib. Let us therefore to the Thing Only in our passage to it it will not be amiss to observe his humour When he was fain to flinch and forc'd thus to shift from one word to another he falls upon the Excepter with a causeless censure of Pedantry and little triumphs He resolves that is to shoot Powder where he wants Bullets and at the same time that he gives Ground he will be as fierce as if he gain'd it Very pleasant to see to that he who blamed strong Passions as producing weak Arguments should thus by his Anger show his Impotence But we are to consider the Thing And here the Answerer interrogates Ib. May not waters ascend by force and detrusion when it is the easiest way they can take to free themselves from that force and persevere in their motion Without all Question they may provided that force and detrusion be of power sufficient to compel them to ascend against the Principle of their natural Gravity and such extrinsic accidental Obstacles as may chance to lye in their way and hinder them But what then He goes on Ib. This is the case we are speaking to They were impell'd to ascend or recede from the Center and it was easier for them to ascend laterally than to ascend directly upon an inclin'd Plain than upon a perpendicular one This assertion wants a great deal of Proof For that the Waters of the Chaos should through the Circumgyration of it rise or ascend any way is very improbable as being bound down by the circumambient Air which is carried about therewith Fill a sphaerical Glass with water and then turn it swiftly upon its own Center However the water in this Glass may have a strong and constant Conatus during that its Motion towards rising up yet certain it is the Glass that contains it would keep it from swelling out beyond those Bounds to which it self confines it In like manner the Body of the Air in which at that time was the whole matter of the Exterior Earth diffused surrounding the entire Element of the Water would have kept that from actual receding from the Center tho it were impregnated with a conatus that way 'T is confess'd if we take a Globe and turn it round swiftly Water or Sand if we lay either upon it will fly off it violently And one reason is because the ambient Air does not turn with this Globe but gliding close upon its wheeling Surface by a renitency against it sweeps off whatever lies loose upon it But were the Air about it carried round with it the lightest things that lye loosest on its Superficies would rest
there unmoved supposing it the proper Center of their Gravity And for the same reason finest Dust lies undisturb'd even upon the tops of highest Mountains tho they whisk about with such celerity as no humane Art and strength can imitate And if the Earth's Rotation as rapid as it is cannot cause small Dust to rise from Hills in way of recession from the Center much less could it produce that great effect upon the Mass of Water which as it was a vast and ponderous Body so it couched the closer to the Earth under it And the truth is as to a competent or sufficient Cause of the Wate 's supposed Rise or Ascent we are yet at a loss For the Cause assigned is Detrusion Detrusion made by the superambient Air. Answ p. 39. Methinks the Observator might have conceiv'd this Detrusion of waters towards the Poles by the resistance of the superambient Air. But now if this Cause fail'd and was not able to detrude the Waters at the Equinoctial where they were to be thrust down Or which is worse if it be sound a more effectual Cause to detrude them at the Poles where they were to rise up what then becomes of this Assertion we ore upon or of that Essential of the Theory it relates to the Oval form of the Primitive Earth Yet in Reality thus it was The Air that should have depress'd or thrust down the Waters at the Aequator of the liquid Globe was more dispos'd to do it at its Polar parts For the Sun moving always in the Equinoctial of that Globe the Air thereabouts must needs be very hot and so very thin and so very yielding and so less able to resist and detrude the Waters And on the contrary the Sun being always very distant from the Poles the Air in those parts must needs be more cold and so more thick and so more stiff and heavy and so more fit to make Resistance and Detrusion there than any where else Yet see the unluckiness of this contrivance the Waters were to rise higher there much higher at the Poles where the Air would most resist them and to be thrust down lowest at the Aequator by the Air where it could least depress them And if by the Air 's Resistance be meant any thing else but a meer Detrusion arising from its natural weight which as is said had most force to keep the Waters down where it was most needful they should have risen up such a Resistance cannot be conceived considering that the whole Mass of the Air was carried about in Circumgyration with the Globe of Water The Deserts of Biledulgerid Lybia c. lie betwixt the Aequator and our Northern Tropic and so within the compass of that Latitude where the Waters of the liquid Globe should have felt a Resistance of the Air. But what reason have we to believe they did so when the light or running Sands there are no more ruffled or in the least stirred by such Resistance than if they were a crust of Flint or Adamant and the like may by said of Mare del Zur It lies under the Line and so in the Equinoctial part of this Terraqueous Globe Which being there of the biggest Circumference it must turn thereabouts most swiftly and so cause the greater resistance of the Air were there any such thing and that would produce as great a disturbance in the Water But on the contrary so quiet and still and smooth and even is this vast Ocean that it is called the Pacific Sea And if these spatious Waters so exactly fitted for this Resistance both by their situation and immensely wide and far extended Surface feel nothing of it now why should or how could the waters of the Abyss do it at first No the Air resisted and detruded then but as it does now That is so far as its own Gravity caused a Compression Which as it was gentle so it was general comparing the entire Globe at once with a soft constringency Only there was reason as we have shewed why this compression should be lightest at the Equinoctial and why it should be heaviest at the Poles of the Globe and why it could not make such Resistance or Detrusion as is imputed to the Air. In short If it did make Resistance either it was gentle and would only have rimpled the Surface of the turning Waters as the Subsolanus does which blows constantly about the Equator and so would not have been of force sufficient to depress them into an oval Figure or else it was violent and so would have discompos'd the Abyss so much that the Earth could never have been founded upon it And truly what less than such a violence as would so have discompos'd it could alter the Figure of it But yet that there neither was nor could be such a violent resistance made by the Air as to detrude the Waters of the Chaotic Mass may I think be demonstrated from the Motion of the Moon Her Distance from hence in her Perigee or nearest approach to us is about 51 Semidiameters of the Earth in her Apogee or farthest remove from us about 65. To take a moderate or middling Distance therefore betwixt both let us suppose her always 56 of those Semidiameters off us And then let us suppose again that she performs her Periodical Circuit in 28 Days tho she does it in less Now she absolving her Circuit at 56 Semidiameters distance from the Earth in 28 Days in case She were but 28 Semidiameters distant which is but half the Space she must do it in 14 Days which is but half the time And so were she distant but 14 Semidiameters she must do it consequently in 7 Days According to which proportion the Air towards the Earth at the heighth of one Semidiameter above it must wheel about as fast as the Earth it self does to the space of half a Day Now every Semidiameter of the Earth containing says Mr. Rohault Tract Phys par 2. cap. 12. near 1431 Leagues or 4293 English Miles hence it will follow that the Air at the heighth of 2146 Miles turns about as fast as the Earth bating but 6 Hours And at the heighth of 1073 Miles as fast as that bating 3 Hours And so at the heighth of 357 Miles to avoid fractions to one Hour Which divide into 60 parts because in an Hour there are 60 Minutes and the Air at the heighth of 6 Miles must turn as fast as the Earth in round reckoning to the space of one Minute And if we drive down the Account so low at 3 quarters of a Miles heighth it must turn as fast to the eighth part of a Minute And so just on its Surface even with it And when the Air encompassing the Earth does thus conspire and circulate with it in its Gyration how could it possibly resist the Waters of the turning Abyss so as to change their figure from Sphaerical to Oval Nor will the Answerer's Simile help here unless it be
to aggravate the thing against himself He thinks this Detrusion of the Waters may be conceived Answ p. 39. as well as their flowing towards and upon the Shores by the pressure of the Air under the Moon And so indeed it may by those that can conceive the Air alone to be as heavy in it self as that and the Moon are both together But who in reason can conceive this And to say it was easier for waters to ascend laterally than directly to ascend upon an inclin'd Plain than a perpendicular one is vain in this case For what real Inclination could there be on a Globe towards the Poles more than at the Equator every point of whose Superficies is Equidistant from the Center And how could the Ascent of Waters at the Poles of a Globe be other than Direct and perpendicular when its Polar parts are always as much a Plain as its Aequinoctial ones can possibly be So that to suppose waters could ascend more easily at the Poles than at the Aequator of the Chaotic Abyss is in effect to suppose that they could ascend perpendicularly more easily than they could ascend perpendicularly For at the Poles they were to ascend as directly as at the Aequinoctial the waters being exactly globular at first till by this supposed ascent they grew oval Only there they must have met with these two Disadvantages which at the Equinoctial they were free from First as we have hinted already a more cold and thick and stark Air. Which we may be sure would crowd them down at the Poles because an Air more warm and fine and soft and open is presum'd to do it at the Aequator Secondly a weaker Spring or power to impel them For in the Middle of the turning Globe there was a Conatus or tendency of the Waters towards receding from the Center but at the Sides of it none at all So that at the sides they were to rise by that Conatus or Nitency in the Middle And if a thin and open Air could prevail against that force in its direct and primary efforts at the Aequinoctial how much more would a thicker closer Air have overpowred it where it could be exerted but obliquely remotely and as it were at second hand at the Poles of the Abyss From what has been said it will follow that without a better Defence of this Vital Assertion of the Theory its whole Hypothesis will fall to the Ground for want of an Oval Earth to support it And whereas the Answerer in the Close of his 14th Chapter makes this Reflection Some men they say though of no great valour yet will fight excellently well behind a Wall So the Excepter behind a Text of Scripture is very fierce and rugged He may please to take notice that tho it be much better fighting behind the Wall of a Text than against it the Excepter is here behind no such Wall but ingages him in the open field of Reason and Philosophy and doubts not but to keep his Post That is if he does not run to his First Expedient as his wont is and turn the great Artillery of Extraordinary Providence upon him before which there is no standing For that mows down the best Arguments and makes a Lane through them as Chain-shot does through a Company of the bravest Souldiers tho they fight never so well and have all imaginable Right on their side But then he must desert his Hypothesis again as he has often done and the World knows what he is that runs from his Colours One they say of no great Valour But truly if it be matter of reproach to a man to fight behind a Text of Scripture the Excepter desires that it may always stick close to him To adhere to the divine and holy Word and to oppose error by revealed truth he thinks is far enough from Cowardise Blessed be GOD that we have such a wall as His Scripture is behind which to fight against Truth 's Enemies Yet in this very Instance of forming an Oval Earth he flies to the help of Extraordinary Providence and thereby turns this necessary and indispensable Notion of the Air 's resistance or detrusion quite out of doors I mean by a certain Dilemma of his own brought in in the second Page of his Answer I apply it to him in his own words Either you take the Hypothesis of an ordinary Providence or of an extraordinary as to the time allowed for the Formation of the Earth If you proceed according to an ordinary Providence the formation of the Earth would require much more time than six days And so you must not take that Hypothesis because as you your self own in the fifth page of your Answer Scripture tell us that the Earth was form'd the third day But if according to an extraordinary you may suppose it made in six minutes But then the Resistance or Detrusion of the Air could not make the Waters oval that the Earth might be so For that being an ordinary natural Cause supposing it could be a cause would have required much more time than six days for the production of such an Effect And consequently this Resistance or Detrusion is made vain here and utterly useless by your self But if against the Answerer's concession of an extraordinary or miraculous efficiency here we should suppose an oval Earth to be made in a natural way and that in order thereunto a globular Abyss were to be form'd into an oval figure yet how could this be done according to the rule or method of the Theory For if the Waters of the Chaos by receding from the Center did rise up at the Equinoctial part of it and above fall off towards the Poles then underneath there must be a draught of Waters back again from the Poles toward the Equinoctial which continuing to rise there might push or drive on the stream towards the Poles that otherwise would not hold on its motion forasmuch as it flowed on a true Globe the surface of which is equivalent to a Plain where Waters never flow but by force or impulse And yet if such counter-motions as these be allowed to those Waters they might thus flow and reflow for ever without producing the design'd effect For the draught of Waters below towards the Equinoctial would draw in the liquid Mass at the Poles and so hinder its growing into an oblong or oval figure as much as the Drift of them above towards the Poles could swell them out there and so help towards the same The first Argument against the Oval Figure of the Earth was its inconvenient Position which would have followed thereupon For then it must have lain cross the vehicular Stream by which it was carried round the Sun and have been directed not unlike to Ships sailing side-ways and so it could not have kept that Position long but must have chang'd its Site in compliance with the duct or tendency of that Current wherein it swam In answer to this it is
suggested that such a posture as lying cross the Stream would be more likely to effect the Earth's turning upon its own axis as it does And the Stream would take more hold of an oblong Body than of a round Answ p. 40. And because it would take more hold of it for that very reason it would the sooner turn it out of its Position For what makes the force of a stream turn a long Body that lies cross it sooner than another as long which already lies length-ways in it but only its taking more hold of it And then as to the Earth's turning upon its own axis it would rather have promoted than prevented the change of its situation considering its wallowings in its Annual Circuit For where a Body has two Motions upon the same Center if one of them chances to be irregular the other commonly disorders it farther rather than helps to correct its Exorbitance Somewhat like a Bowl which being not set out of hand right the oftner it turns round in its progressive motion the farther it runs on in a wrong Course The second Argument against the Oval Figure of the first Earth Disc p. 196. is the Sphaericalness of the present Earth And that the present Earth is Sphaerical is not only the Opinion of Modern but also of Ancient Philosophers said the Excepter and he named some But the Theorist Answ p. 40. says the Answerer alledg'd many more Authorities in favour of the Oval Figure of the Earth For besides Empedocles in particular he affirms that the Philosophy of Orpheus the Phoenician Aegyptian and Persian Philosophers did all compare the Earth to an Egg with respect to its Oval External Form Here we must reply Another untruth 1st That this is another very false Assertion For those Philosophers made the comparison betwixt the World and the Egg not betwixt the Earth and the Egg tho our Author would put that sense upon them Only two of the Authorities cited by him Lat. Theor. Edit 2. p. 267. resemble the Earth to the Yolk of the Egg very unluckily for that we know is of a round Figure 2ly Where the Ancients compare the World to an Egg they do it usually with respect to its Production as well as to its Form A Notion which the Answerer or any Theist would be loth to admit of that Heaven and Earth and all things therein should spring out of a material Egg. A pregnant Instance of this occurs in Athenagoras which upon occasion we noted formerly who tells us that Orpheus the Author we may suppose Legat. pro Christ pa. mihi 72. Disc p. 105. Sympos l. 2. Qu. 3. of the Doctrine of the Mundane Egg for Plutarch calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Orphic Doctrine taught that a vast Egg brought forth by Hercules being broke by him fell into two parts Of the upper part Heaven was made and of the lower the Earth So that Heaven was contained in and sprung out of this Egg as well as the Earth And then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Heaven being mingled with Earth brought forth Men Women and GODS And what is this less tho the Gentil Divinity was tinctur'd with it than a piece of rankest Atheistic Physiology For it makes Mankind and Gods to rise out of meer Matter without allowing such a Principle as Soul or Spirit to any one of them And this Egg out of which Aristophanes will have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In Avib the Race of Gods to be hatched as well as mortal and inanimate Creatures was layed he says by Chaos and Night And so gives us a plain account of the old Atheistic Theology which made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Production of the Gods and the Production of the World the same thing Yet the Theorist was pleased to show Vid. Lat. Theor. li. 2. c. 7. 10. Edit 2. that between this Doctrine and his there is an Harmony or Affinity Which if it will conciliate Reputation to his Hypothesis let it But so far as it agrees with the Aristophanic or Atheistic Cosmogony so far it will be the less reconcilable to the Mosaic Cosmology or inspired Doctrine of the Creation Disc p. 197. The Sphaericalness of this present Earth was argued First from the Conical Figure of its shadow cast upon the Moon Answ p. 41. But that says the Answerer cannot make a Difference sensible to us at this distance whether the Body that cast the shadow was exactly Sphaerical or Oval This is gratis dictum and spoken against a common and approved Argument and so of little weight Secondly It was inferred from the place of the Waters Which are deepest so far as we know near the Poles whereas were the Earth Oval the middle Regions thereof being lowest the Waters would have run thither and settled under the Aequator But this he tells us has been answer'd before The same Cause that drive the Waters thither would have kept them there And that Answer has been reply'd to already and the Replicant has shewed that there was no sufficient Cause to drive the Waters thither and so none to keep them there Thirdly It was urged That if this Earth was Oval Navigation towards the Poles would be extremely difficult if not impossible because of Sailing up an Ascent But says the Answerer If there be a continual draught of Waters from the Aequator towards the Poles this will Ballance the Difficulty But if there be no such draught the difficulty holds and that there is such a Draught remains to be proved That the Figure of this Earth is truly Sphaerical is fairly discovered and determin'd by this Observation That the Gibbosity of the Sea rises as fast behind a Ship Sailing in direct Latitude towards the Poles as behind one whose course lies in direct Longitude towards East or West CHAP. X. THE Excepter proved that Mountains were before the Flood from the words of Moses Psal 90. Read Disc c. 10. § 1. Before the Mountains were brought forth Thou art GOD from everlasting And from Pro. 8.22 25. where we read that the LORD possessed WISDOM before the Mountains were settled And the Answerer grants that the design and intention of the H. GHOST is plain in both these places in the one Answ p. 43◠to set out the Eternity of GOD and in the other of the Logos in particular Now where it was the design and intention of the H. GHOST to set out the Existence of GOD and the Divine Logos which were from everlasting by temporal things would he do it by any but such as were soonest brought into being Or would Moses himself without the H. GHOST have done it by any other things than such Surely it would have been a very faint and improper Illustration of GOD's Eternity unbecoming Moses much more the H. SPIRIT to say that he existed before the World was seventeen hundred years old Yet when
Force and made it rise into many and prodigious inequalities And these things are here mention'd the rather as being a full answer to a Question that is put Namely why we have no Mountains made now Answ p. 48. It might as well have been askt Why does not the Fire make a down-bak'd Loaf swell and huff up because it made it do so when it was Dough But then it was a soft and puffy Mass whereas since it is hardned and the strength of that Leaven which was put into it is wholly spent And such is the changed State of the Earth It is dried and hardned very much over what it was and its Original fermentive flatulent Principle designed to assist in blowing it up is quite exhausted And tho GOD himself did cooperate with the Sun in the production of Mountains yet still this Answer must be fully satisfactory as to the Question propounded For when subject matter grows indispos'd or secondary Causes flagg and fail the first and great Cause most commonly stops and ceases to act GOD ordinarily limits his Almighty Power by the Creatures Capacity And where he is pleas'd to make use of means if those be wanting he does nothing of himself as being destitute of their concomitant Causality And if He did not thus desist from acting He must violate the Laws which he has given to Nature and invert or dissolve that fixt Regularity or methodical Order that His Wisdom has appointed and establisht in the Universe Thus He gives us Fruits but Plants bear them He gives us Plants but Rains nourish them He gives us Rains but Clouds disburse them and those Clouds arise from Vapours and those Vapours are exhal'd from the Earth and that Exhalation is perform'd by the Sun So that take but one Cause out of this whole Series of them and this orderly train of Effects would cease notwithstanding the Power of ALMIGHTY GOD as depending secondarily upon the entireness of this chain of Causes the agency of which must needs be suspended or finally stopt upon the disjunction or interruption of their effective connexion or concatenation Thus also he gives Sight to Animals but it is by their Eyes He gives them hearing but it is by their Ears and if their Organs fail their Senses must do so In like manner he thought sit to give Mountains to the Earth but then it was by imparting such an Habit to it or by conferring such Qualities upon it as might prepare and dispose it towards their Production And those Qualities being perfectly altered and that Habit decayed or destroyed we are not now to expect that more Mountains should be raised And tho we never suppos'd the Sun could make them alone yet we hope it will be granted that GOD and the Sun could easily do it That They could raise the vastest Mountains of all in the Northern parts of the Earth Yea even mighty Taurus it self As in making Rivers the Answer says p. 15. the Waters were accelerated by a divine hand so in raising Mountains the Sun might be assisted by the same But for the Excepter to have supposed that that and other Mountains were drawn up by the sole power of the Sun would have been to run himself under the Dint of his own Invective against abusing Philosophy Disc p. 34. c. by screwing it too high But Secondly as the Answerer mistook greatly concerning the Thing Another Mistake so he mistook as greatly concerning the Time For the Excepter was so far from supposing that the Sun did raise the Mountains on the third day that he supposed them to issue forth into being but as fast as Nature could permit ib. p. 202. Not that they were produced by a far distant succession neither as he says in the same sentence but all together that is in a short space of time as fast as they could well be one after another And however the Earliest that is to say the Maritime Mountains and such as were made with the Hollow of the Sea must rise when that was sunk or depressed yet touching the Inland ones in raising which the Sun was cencern'd he said as plainly as he could speak that in some Countries they were produced earlier and in some later Ib. p. 208. And could he suppose then that the Sun by his heat raised them the third day How strange is it that an Answerer should thus run on in Mistaking That having once got into the way of doing it he should never know when to come out of it again Surely by fair and just dealings with the Excepter he had better consulted his own ease as well as his Credit For by making these false charges upon him he occasion'd himself the trouble of spending most of this long Chapter in confuting nothing by things which he took to be plainly unanswerable Answ p. 4â— For still we stand the ground of our Conjecture and are like to abide unmoved by it Namely that Nature had a considerable stroke in making the Mountains and tho GOD could and t is like did produce them another way yet He might do it partly by the instrumental Efficiency of the Sun raising the Inland ones some earlier and some later but all together as fast as Nature could permit Tho when GOD caused the Sun to raise the Mountains it was as he caused the Earth to bring forth Trees on the third day Gen. 1.12 after the Waters were drained off it that is by a special Blessing and Divine assistance And so he might cause those Trees again to bring forth Fruits and those Fruits to ripen by that time Adam was created that so they might be in a readiness for his nourishment And here it may be remembred that what the Excepter said in this matter as to GOD's producing the Mountains by the instrumentality of the Sun was but to humour Philosophy Disc p. 208. and was meerly conjectural I will venture to guess he might do it thus p. 209. The last argument to prove that there were Mountains in the First World Disc p. 215. was this There were Metals in it which are usually found at the Roots of Mountains Answ p. 49. And here he tells the Excepter that he 's hard put to it to prove that the Theorist hath any where asserted whatsoever he thought that there were no Metals then Yet he did prove it and that so plainly that the Answerer if he considers will be much harder put to it to deny it The proof consists of his own words cited out of the English Theory p. 244. Disc p. 216. As for subterraneous things Metals and Minerals I believe they had none in the first Earth and the happier they no Gold nor Silver nor Courser Metals And then he proceeds to give Reasons why there could be none And does not he that says he believes there were no Metals in the Earth and then gives Reasons why there could be none and declares men were happier
can be expected but Extraordinary providence should be brought in next And so it is with a witness Ib. in these words The Angels whose ministery we own openly upon these grand occasions could as easily have held the Ark afloat in the Air as on the Water But because Angels could do this may we argue from thence with good consequence that they did do it and from their power to act it conclude they effected it Without question they could have kept Judea dry when all the rest of the World was drown'd yet we know this was not done But the Ark however was held afloat in the Air by them For it follows the Ark being an Emblem of the Church GOD certainly did give his Angels charge over it that they should bear it up in their hands that it might not be dash'd against a stone Surely this Hypothesis must needs be very strong and lasting that has so much miracle and ministery of Angels to support it And then what matter for Philosophy tho the Theory is to be chiefly Philosophical Eng. Th. p. 6. when it may stand much better without it But the same pen writes thus in another place Eng. The. p. 98. Noah and his Family were sav'd by water so as the water which destroy'd the rest of the World was an instrument of their Conservation inasmuch as it bore up the Ark and kept it from that impetuous shock which it would have had if it had either stood upon dry land when the Earth fell or if the Earth had been dissolv'd without any water on it or under it Now if Noah and his Family were saved by water if the water which destroy'd the rest of the world was an instrument of their Conservation if it conserv'd them as it bore up the Ark and if it so bore it up as that it kept it from an impetuous shock which otherwise it would have had when the Earth fell how could the Answerer say there was no necessity that the Ark should be afloat before the Earth broke and now make the conservation of Noah and his Ark at the fall of the Earth to be wholly Angelical In short the Theorist affirms that mankind was saved by water that bore up the Ark and kept it from an impetuous shock when the Earth fell it having the Advantage of a River or of a Dock or Cistern wherein to float The Answerer that there was no necessity that the Ark should be afloat before the Earth broke because the Angels could hold it in the Air and they having charge over it did bear it up in their hands The Question therefore might be put which of the two speaks truest But e'en let them agree the difference as they please Another Contradiction and reconcile the plain Contradiction between them But for the Ark's being afloat in a River or Dock or Cistern before the Earth fell he has this pretence Those things were premis'd in the Theory Answ p. 62. only to soften the way to men that are hard of belief in such extraordinary matters Truly these matters are very Extraordinary and the way to believing them had need be well softned But when that is softned if so be men are not softned withal and made extraordinarily soft too they will hardly ever believe them at last And pray what are the Extraordinary matters to the belief of which the Arks being afloat in a River or Dock or Cistern was to soften the way They seem to be the saving of Noah and the saving of his Family and the saving of the Ark when the Earth fell But then in truth these things could not be those matters For we are here told at the same time that there was no necessity of the Arks being afloat in water in order to these things and that Noah and his Family and the Ark were saved by the Ministery of Angels And to the belief of the Angels saving them such a mollification would be vain and needless inasmuch as every one who believes their Existence believes also what the Answerer says of them that they could as easily have held the Ark afloat in the Air as in the Water And so what was premised in the Theory of this softning Nature and what the Excepter is blamed for not noting was of as little use as it is of truth And to shut up this particular by calling in this extraordinary help of the Angels he renders the Rains at the Deluge the principal Cause of it Gen. 7.4 wholly unnecessary For tho at first he would have them to save the Ark by setting it afloat yet now we see there was no necessity of that And then if the Earth fell into the Abyss and by its fall made the waters of it so raging and destructive to all things as he represents them there could be no more need of forty days rain in order to the Flood than of forty Candles to give light to the Sun And so GOD did a great work to no end or purpose Especially this 40 days rain following the Disruption Which happened the very first day that Noah entred the Ark. A Third Reason against the Floods coming in by the Dissolution of the Earth was this The Earth or dry Land of this Terraqueous Globe would in likelihood have been of another Figure than what it now bears Disc p. 289. But instead of answering it Answ p. 63. he speaks against a change in the Poles and Circles of the Earth a needless trouble and occasion'd by his own oversight For had he but lookt into the Errata's he might have seen there that those Parentheses upon which he grounded what he says should have been left out And in case he did peruse the Errata's and observe that these Parentheses were marked for such I may say of him as he said of the Excepter it must be a wilful dissimulation not to take notice of them Ib. p. 62. And if he had taken notice of them as Errata's he need not have troubled himself farther about them And so we pass to The Fourth Reason Had the Earth been dissolved to make the Flood Read Disc p. 290 291 292. its Dissolution would have brought it into lamentable barrenness For the dry and dead Soil would have been turned up by whole Countries at once and where the outward part of the Earth continu'd outward still the top of the Ground would have been rinsed off by the vehement workings and incessant beatings of the Flood upon it And then the furious commotions and aestuations of the Waters washing off an abundance of Earth from the innumerable Fragments which fell into the Abyss and this Earthy stuff being carried into all places and spread thick upon the Ground and mix'd and incorporated with much other Filth it would have hardned upon the going off of the Flood into a Crust or Cap on the surface of the Earth and so have been very destructive to its Fruitfulness It is answered first
I willingly allow Answ p. 64. that some of the interiour and barren parts of the Earth might be turn'd up as we now see in mountainous and wild Countries but this rather confirms the Theory than weakens it He must allow according to the tenour of his Hypothesis not only that some but that many of the interiour barren parts of the Earth were turned up everywhere And then the Waters being so strangely tumultuous and the fluctuations of them so extremely boisterous The Tumult of the Waters and the extremity of the Deluge lasted for some Months Eng. Theor. p. 76. Ib. p. 75. and their mighty rage of so long continuance While they were carried up to a great height in the Air and fell down again with prodigious weight and force they could not but harrass the Ground at such a rate as to wear away the upper part of it and make the top of the Earth as bare and barren as the bottom of a river by their monstrous and unspeakable Surgings Secondly he answers that the filth and soil would have made the Earth more barren p. 64. I cannot allow For good husbandmen overflow their grounds to make their Crops more Rich. And 't is generally supposed that the inundation of the Nile and the mud it leaves behind it makes Egypt more fruitful Besides this part of the objection lies against the common Explication of the Deluge as well as against that which is given by the Theory But when good Husbandmen overflow their grounds to improve their Crops they do it seasonably and they do it moderately and to be sure they do not at the same time turn them up for half a mile or a mile deep And tho several Rivers do inrich grounds by their Inundations by vertue of a great plenty of unctuous mud which they bring upon them that makes the Soil new as it were Nearchus de fluviorum effusione haec affert exempla quod dictum est Hermi Caystri Maeandri Caici campos similes esse propter limum qui e montibus delatus campos â—â—get imo facit Strabo Geogr. li. 15. so Hermus does and also Cayster Menander and Caicus as Strabo informs us from Nearchus yet that mud which the Deluge would have left would have been of a silty and sandy nature and so of a lean and hungry and starven quality as being mostly washt off from the Edges of those pieces into which the dissolved Earth was shattered and consequently would rather have prevented and hindred than helped or promoted the Earth's fruitfulness And therefore the Geographer notes that the mud of the aforesaid Rivers which makes the fields over which they flow is not coarse and dry like that which would have been eaten off of the verges of the terrestrial Fragments but of a softer and fatter sort Deferre autem flumina eum qui mollior sit pinguior ex quo campi fiunt Id. Ib. And then as to the Nile that the Mud it brings down upon the Land of Egypt is light and soft and fat and so fit to impregnate it with a strong Fertility we may properly infer from the sweetness of its Waters For as Diodorus reports they are the sweetest of all that are in the whole Earth Which made that famous General Piscenius Niger who contended with Septimus Severus for the Empire reprimand his Souldiers for hankering after wine and for muttering for the want of it when they might drink their fill of this pleasant Stream Tho it is well known that an ingenious French Writer I mean Duval in his Geogr. Vnivers ascribes both the Muddiness Fruitfulness and Overflow of it to its Nitrous Quality His words are to this purpose It has lately been found out that the Nitre wherewith the Nile abounds so much is the cause of all those wonderful Effects and that being heated by the sun it mingles it self with the water renders it troubled swells it and makes it pass over its Banks But yet concerning this noble River it is as well known that as sometimes it has not increased at all as in the tenth and eleventh year of Cleopatra against the downfal and the death of that Princess and her admired Anthony and as sometimes it is defective in its increase to lamentable failures in the usual Products of that plentiful Country So if at any time it happens to exceed in its increment but two or three Cubits that excess is at once both a clear Prognostic and a certain Cause of a dearth or scarcity in the ensuing year But then that such a Deluge as the Theory supposes it being Universal and of long continuance and made of lean subterraneous water and full of dead and harsh and heavy soil fetcht off from numberless pieces of the broken Earth should occasion barrenness for a considerable time in the post-diluvian World is but reasonable to conclude Nor lastly does this part of the Objection lie against the common Explication of the Deluge with such force as it does against the Theory's Explication of it For tho a General Flood overtopping the Mountains must have left mud and slime and filth behind it yet where the water rise upon an Earth that remained unbroken they could be nothing in quantity to what they must have been where the Earth was dissolv'd and fell all to pieces and where the water boiling up from under these Fragments and then falling down again violently upon them raged amongst them with lasting incessant and unimaginable turbulence As a Fifth Reason against the Earth's being drowned by its being dissolved Disc p. 292 the Excepter added this All the Buildings erected before the Flood would have been shaken down or else overwhelmed Here as to the City Joppa which is the main hinge upon which the Objection turns he Answers it is incertain whether it was built before the Flood â— 64. But besides the authorities of Mela and Solinus cited for it it is generally granted to be so ancient and none that speak of its Antiquity take upon them to deny it Nor will the Fiction concerning Perseus and Andromeda subvert the receiv'd opinion in this matter For as many Fables are made out of true stories so many again are tacked to them â— 64 65. He goes on However suppose the ruines of one Town remain'd after the Flood does this prove that the Earth was not dissolv'd I do not doubt but there were several tracts of the Earth much greater than that Town that were not broken all to pieces by their fall Had that tract whereon Joppa stood continued whole yet falling down so very low a mile at least by the force of its weight it would have suffer'd such a shock as could not but have levell'd its Buildings with the ground Thus very good houses are oftentimes shatter'd down in Earthquakes meerly by the concussion or shaking of the Ground tho it never breaks And truly if only the bare ruines of it had remained which
we do not nor need not grant yet these must have given as fatal a blow to the Theory as the fall of the Earth would have done to this City For their very out-lasting the fury of the Deluge would prove that Joppa consisted not of a Number of Cottages made of branches of trees Answ p. 50. of Osiers and Bull-rushes or of Mud-Walls and Straw Roofs which then must all have been quite washt away but of Edifices made of such Materials as could never be prepared formed and set up without Iron tools And so we come to The Last Reason against the supposed dissolution of the Earth It would have made GOD's Covenant with Noah See Disc p. 296 297 298. a very vain and trifling thing Because then the Earth was not capable of or liable to such another Deluge It is here answered So much is true p. 65. that the Deluge in the course of Nature will not return again in the same way If it returns not in the same way that is in the course of nature it cannot be such another Deluge as Noah's was for that came in by the Course of Nature Read the beginning of the 6th Chapter of this Reply Answ p. 65. He proceeds But unless GOD prevents it it both may and will return in another way That is if the World continues long enough the Mountains will wear and sink and the Waters in proportion rise and overflow the whole Earth How possible soever such a Deluge may be in long process of time yet Christians who believe the Doctrine of the Gospel and that principal Article of it the World's Conflagration can never think that it shall come to pass For if the World in the end were to be overflow'd with Water how could it according to St. Peter be reserved unto fire 2 Pet. 3. ◠And GOD having thus declar'd that he will prevent it His Covenant with Noah could have no relation to such a natural Overflow This piece of answer therefore is so very thin that a weak eye may easily see through it and discern that there is shifting at the bottom of it He adds therefore Answ p. 65. GOD might when He pleased by an extraordinary power and for the sins of men bring another Deluge upon the World And that is the thing which Noah seems to have feared and which GOD by his Covenant secur'd him against Noah's Flood was brought upon the World for the sins of men And if another Flood may be brought in upon that account by GOD's extraordinary power then Noah's Flood might come in by that power too even by its creating waters to make it Which in case it had been but yielded at first it might have sav'd the pains of setting up this Hypothesis And not only so but likewise have superseded the collateral trouble of too weak and ineffectual endeavours to support it And when all is said the sole reason why such another flood as Noah's was shall never come in again is not any change in Nature rendring the thing difficult or impossible but the unchangeable covenant of GOD as appears Isai 54.9 Where GOD to illustrate the stability of his kindness to the Jewish Church and to show that its calamity shall never be reiterated compares it to the sure and perpetual exclusion of the waters of Noah to the return of which his immutable Oath is the eternal bar For this is as the waters of Noah unto me for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the Earth so have I sworn that I would not be wroth with thee nor rebuke thee Thus we have done with the Answer to our Exceptions In which I am not conscious to my self that I have omitted any one thing which deserves notice and a Reply And here I might speak freely of this Answer But because its defects are plain and obvious enough to the intelligent I only say this much That I expected a better from the Author of the Theory or none at all CHAP. XV. HEre the Scaene changes and our Answerer now becomes an Objector and manages this part as he did the other And as an instance of as much he trips in the first step that he makes and stumbles into a Mistake For he affirms Answ p. 66. that the first Proposition laid down for the establishing of our Hypothesis is this That the Flood was but fifteen Cubits high above the ordinary level of the Earth But as any one that pleases may see the Proposition laid down as the foundation of our Hypothesis is verbatim this Disc p. 30◠That the highest parts of the Earth that is of the common surface of it were under Water but fifteen Cubits in depth And between the common surface or ordinary level of the Earth and the highest parts of that surface or level there is great difference For according to the first the Waters were not 30 foot high as he noted Ib. l. 12. but according to the latter they might in most places be thirty forty or fifty Cubits high or higher as we observed Disc p. 300. l. 31. Ib. l. 27. And whereas it is said of the Waters of the Flood that they were but fifteen Cubits high in all above the surface of the Earth it is manifest that the highest parts of its surface were there intended by what follows in explanation of that Clause even to the end of the Paragraph Touching the Proposition he cries out This is an unmerciful Paradox Answ p. 66. But who could have lookt for such an Exclamation from him whose own Paradoxes are so many and unmerciful Here therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His Censure returns double upon himself And while he finds fault with the sliver in my Teeth I may justly give him the Talmudic answer usually directed to the more guilty Reprehender 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 take the Beam out of thine eyes Then he enquires Ib. p. 66 67. under what notion must this Proposition be receiv'd as a Postulatum or as a Conclusion If it be a Postulatum it must be clear from its own light or acknowledg'd by general consent It cannot pretend to be clear from its own light because it is matter of fact which is not known but by Testimony Neither is it generally acknowledg'd for the general opinion is that the Waters covered the tops of the Mountains and were fifteen Cubits higher We might bring this home to the vital Assertions of the Theory but let us try but one of them Namely that the Primitive Earth was without a Sea Under what notion must this Proposition be receiv'd As a Postulatum or as a Conclusion If it be a Postulatum it must be clear from its own light or acknowledg'd by general consent It cannot pretend to be clear from its own light because it is matter of fact which is not known but by testimony Neither is it generally acknowledg'd For the general opinion is
made But how easily are they taken off For the common unmountainous Surface of the Earth See Disc p. 301. being by necessary and providential contrivance made inequal hence it will follow that when the Waters were fifteen Cubits higher than the highest parts of that common Surface which is the Fundamental Assertion of the new Hypothesis they might be forty or fifty or an hundred or two hundred Cubits higher than the general ordinary Plain of the Earth And when fifteen Cubits Water above the highest parts of the Earths common surface would drown the Level of it generally to so prodigious a pitch instead of a diminutive as the Answerer calls it here must be a most dreadful and destructive Deluge both to Mankind and all Living Creatures For put case that the Birds upon the rise of the waters flew unto trees yet where are the trees whose tops are an hundred or two hundred Cubits high Or say the tops of some trees stood out of the Waters as growing upon the highest parts of the Earth's common Surface yet could the poor Fowls be able to roost there during the time of the whole forty days Rain and then on to the end of the Flood And grant that Men and Beasts retired to the Mountains when the Waters began to swell and threaten them Yet then they were great Mountains to which they betook themselves or else they were lesser ones If they were great ones See Disc c. 16. §. 6. they could not run to a more improper Refuge If they were lesser ones how could they possibly subsist there without Shelter or Sustenance till the Deluge was drawn off and the Earth dried up And the like may be said of those in the upper Stories of their houses Admit that the Flood did not reach them yet how could they live there to come down again at last when their Domestick Stores in their Cellars c. were all overflowed and were so to continue for a great while And as for them in Castles and high situate Habitations if any were seated above the Water-mark of the Deluge how could they shift for food and fewel and keep themselves from famishing for a year together For either they were well furnisht with Provisions or they were not If they were not they could not hold out If they were it was because a number was to be maintain'd by them And many will as soon devour much as a few spend a little And where is the Castle that being well stockt with men as well us stor'd with necessaries which commonly go together does not fall into want before a year comes about where there is no kind of Forage or provisionary Recruits And therefore these Castles on Rocks as to the Answerer's purpose are but Castles in the air for being on every side so surrounded with water they who were in them would be starved to death And methinks there is one thing which seems to insinuate that a good part of the Animal World might perhaps come to an end thus By being driven to such streights by the overflowing waters as to be famished or starved to death The thing is this Tho the Instrument of Vengeance upon the wicked World was an Universal Flood and tho the proper way of that Instrument's killing is by drowning yet in all the sacred story of the Deluge it is no where said of men and living creatures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they were drowned but all-a-long 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they died 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and they were destroyed As if the SPIRIT would give us to understand that all the living Creatures which perisht at the Flood were not directly overwhelm'd and absorpt by it but by means of its Waters were forced to die very many of them and were fearfully destroyed some other way even that which we have hinted And then lastly as to Ships I will not deny that there were any before the Flood for all I find Hornius does it positively in his Introduction Noachi aevo nullae adhuc naves in Noah 's Age there were not as yet any ships tho could we allow them at the Deluge to be as good as ours which are the best in the World yet the persons in them at that time must needs be in most imminent Dangers For at first for forty days together they were to sail in darkness And after that for several Months in such foggy Mists as obscured the Tops of the vastest Mountains By the increase of the Waters also the whole World became one boundless Ocean And the Sea by that means having lost its Shores the Mariners skill would be strangely lost or non-plust too For instead of finding the Seas in their usual Figures and Chanels and of making their Ports at the wonted places and Distances wild Waters would lead them into unknown Rodes and trapan them on to land And there being Rocks in great plenty to split them Hills to stave them Banks to strand them Buildings to annoy them Woods and Forrests to hamper and intangle them their dangers being new they could not apprehend them and being so many and various and unexpected how could they avoid them And then we must consider farther yet that Shipping at the Flood was very far short of that strength and perfection which now it has attain'd to The first considerable Vessel that we read of I think was the Argo And indeed some necessary Appendages of a Ship were not found out till about the time that she was equip'd for Colchis For famous Daedalus who invented the Mast and Main-yard and his Son Icarus who invented the Sails lived then Typhis also who invented the Rudder was one of those Heroes which attended Jason when the young Gallants of Thessaly or the flower of its Nobility went along with him in the Argonautick Expedition And yet this Ship as Pliny tells us in the Six and fiftieth Chapter of the Seventh Book of his Natural History was but a Gally And he adds which it will not be wide of our purpose to recite That Troughs or flat Planks were used by King Erythras to cross from one Island to another in the Red Sea That in the British Ocean were made certain Wicker-Boats of twigs covered with Leather and stitcht round about In Nilus Boats of Paper Cane-reed and Rushes That the Erythraeans made the Bireme or Gally with two Banks of Oars Aminacles the Corinthian the first Trireme The Carthaginians the Quadrireme Nesichton the Salaminian the first Quinquereme And so they were raised by Zenagoras of Syracuse by Mnesigeton by Alexander the great by Ptolomy Soter by Demetrius Son of Antigonus by Ptolomy Philadelphus and by Ptolomy Philopater till they came to fifty Banks or Courses of Oars on a side So that here we have an account of Two things not unworthy of our notice The First is the low and mean and rude Beginnings of Shipping In some places it commenc'd in Troughs or Hollowed trees So it did in Egypt Lib. 16.
to his concluding Objection against our Caverns What reason have we to believe that there were such Vessels then Ib. p. 77. more than now To this we have spoken so very fully Disc p. 306 307 308. that nothing more needs here be added in way of reply Who would have thought there had been such fountains in the Rocks of Rephidim and Cadesh if God had not opened them But he draws out the Objection farther thus Answ p. 77. If the opening the Abyss at the Deluge had been the opening of Rocks why did not Moses express it so and tell us that the Rocks were cloven and the waters gushed out and so made the Deluge This would have been as intelligible if it had been true as to tell us that the Tehom Rabbah was broken open But there is not one word of Rocks or the cleaving of Rocks in the History of the Flood To which we reply first Moses does not say that the Tehom Rabbah was broken open but only the fountains of it were broken up And what fountains belonging to the Tehom Rabbah could more properly be so broken up than these Caverns Secondly the Intelligibility of a thing is no reason why it must needs be expressed How many things are passed by with silence in Scripture even where occasion is offered to speak of them which yet are true and had they been expressed might easily have been understood And thirdly the same Objection which he throws at the Excepter rebounds back with violence upon himself If the breaking up of the Abyss at the Deluge had been the Disruption and fall of the Earth into the Abyss which lay under it according to the Vital Assertion of the Theory in that case why did not Moses express it so and tell us that this Disruption and Fall of the Earth into the Abyss which lay under it made the Deluge This would have been as intelligible if it had been true as to tell us that the Fountains of the Jehom Rabbah were broken up But there is not one word of this Fall of the Earth in the History of the Flood Thus have we seen the Assaults that are made upon the new Hypothesis for the Explication of the Deluge But so far are they from overthrowing it that they seem to me not to shake it in the least And I cannot but own that I am never so inclinable to believe it may be true as when I consider how weak the answers are to the reasons and arguments alledg'd to confirm it and how inconsiderable the Objections against it But yet I do no more affirm it to be true now than I did at first Tho I am apt to think it may as well pass for true and may as easily be maintained to be true as that Hypothesis to which it is compared and which arrogates to it self the glorious Title not only of a true piece of Natural History but also of the greatest and most remarkable that hath yet been since the beginning of the World CHAP. XVI THE principal matter and the only thing to be noted in this Chapter is what our Author omitted in its proper place and is here thought on by him to be answered According to his usual way of mistaking Answ p. 78. he calls it one objection tho there be two very distinct ones He answers the last first and therefore I begin with that Disc p. 311. which was this If the Abyss under the Earth to wave the other things mention'd had been the great Deep meant by Moses it had not had any true or proper Fountains in it And so what will become of all the Fountains of the great Deep His Answer is Answ p. 78. there were fountains in the Abyss as much as Windows in Heaven The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rendred Windows signifies as well Cataracts and it might have been rendred so more properly And indeed in the Margent Gen. 7.11 it is rendred Floodgates which in signification is somewhat nearer to Cataracts Tho that I say would have been the properest reddition in this Text. For Cataracts are high and broken places from whence waters do impetuously rush down And therefore thick and broken Clouds condensed into hardness or an Icy consistency from which prodigious waters by falls from one concameration of them to another came tumbling down in excessive quantities and at last were discharged hideously on the Earth in many places especially about the lofty Mountains were at that time true coelestial Cataracts which by ALMIGHTY GOD were then opened even in a literal sense And therefore these Cataracts or Windows of Heaven by some learned Commentators are expounded to be Nubes densae Copiosae thick and huge Clouds But now in the inclos'd Abyss there were no answerable Fountains broken up no such real Fountains as these were real Cataracts of Heaven and therefore the Answer given is not home to the purpose The other Objection was this Whereas it is said Disc p. 311. Gen. 8.2 That the Fountains of the Deep were stopped the Earth broken down into the Abyss was never made up again He answers those were shut up that is Answ p. 78. ceas'd to act and were put into a condition to continue the Deluge no longer But then if the Stoppage of these Fountains was Figurative the Fountains themselves must be the same And so they were not so real as the Cataracts of Heaven were Nor could they be stopped so properly as our Caverns might be the thing that we argued for and the drift of our Objection was to make it out And as for this answer it rather strengthens the Objection than takes it off CHAP. XVII IN justification of that Positiveness wherewith he was charged in the beginning of this Chapter he makes profession of his belief of the Theory And let them that can do it envy him the satisfaction and benefit of it But if he has no better proofs of its certainty than what he has produced when by his faith he apprehends it for a Reality he may do no better than he did who embrac'd a shadow for the Goddess There are many thousands and they not unlearned who take Legends for truths and equal Tradition to the written Word Who put Apocryphal Books into the holy Canon and give fullest assent to that pregnant absurdity the Doctrine of Transubstantiation But this is so far from changing the Nature of the things that it only betrays the folly of the Persons For it evidently shows the blindness of their Minds that they are so strangely impos'd on and the weakness of their Judgments that can be led captive into such gross and groundless Errors And from these and other Instances we may infer that a strong faith and confident assurance may be no arguments of the objects truth but of the Believers Credulity It is a notable word that Demosthenes spake in his Third Oration to the Olynthians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 See Disc p.
hardly venture to defend them in Smithfield as glorious Witnesses have done the Articles of our Faith The pretended Inconsistency is hitherto invisible and concerning it we may return a non est inventa On he goes therefore as by a melius Inquirendo and makes farther search after it in the ensuing Paragraph The strength it has lies much in the close of it and expresses it self in this Argument Answ p. 69. The Church-way of explaining the Deluge is either rational or irrational If he say it is rational why does he desert it and invent a new one And if he say it is irrational then that dreadful thing which he cannot well endure to speak That the Church of GOD has ever gone on in an irrational way of explaining the Deluge falls flat upon himself The last vital Assertion of the Theory which the Excepter undertook in his Fifteenth Chapter is this That neither Noah 's Flood nor the present form of the Earth can be explained in any other method that is rational nor by any other causes that are intelligible besides those which the Theory assigns Whence follows what I cannot well endure to speak said the Excepter that the Church of GOD has ever gone on in an irrational way of explaining the Deluge Now says the Answerer this charge falls flat upon himself and he attempts to prove it by the Argument produced But we take it off with this direct and plain Reply First we say that the Church way of explaining the Deluge is very rational For it implies no more than GOD's creating Waters sufficient for it and his annihilating them again which is not in the least inconsistent with reason or repugnant to it Tho evident it is that his vital Assertion expressly condemns this way in which GOD's Church has ever gone as both irrational and unintelligible at once Methinks an excuse or defence of this should have been more seasonable than what we here meet with Unless he thinks that so black a blemish can be fastned on the wisest and noblest Society in the whole World without offence or means that the Readers Judgment for his unadvised rashness should pass upon him in course by nihil dicit Secondly we say that we do not desert or reject the Church-way of explaining the Deluge We allow indeed as he notes That it may be disgustful to the best and soundest Philosophic Judgments Disc p. 313. and the reasons are given why But then it is manifest that we shut out Philosophy from ruling in this Case as being in a good degree miraculous Ib. p. 355. The Flood was a Miracle in good measure Or had so much miracle running through it and interwoven with it that all passages in it are not to be accounted for by Reason and Philosophy And truly where Nature was over-rul'd by Providence it is but fit that Philosophy should give place to Omnipotence And whereas he observes that we say that by our Hypothesis Answ p. 68. we are excused from running to those Causes or Methods which seem unreasonable to some and unintelligible to others and unsatisfactory to most This is no proof that the Excepter deserts the Churches way of Explaining the Deluge For however some or others may think it unreasonable and unintelligible as the Theorist makes it and how unsatisfactory soever some of the causes or methods alledg'd by the Excepter may be to most yet the Excepter is of the mind that the Churches method is very rational and easy to be understood And tho he farther remarks that the Excepter says that the ordinary Supposition that the Mountains were covered with water in the Deluge Ib. brings on a necessity of setting up a new Hypothesis for explaining the Flood yet that necessary new Hypothesis which the Excepter means will plainly show that he justifies and defends the Church-Hypothesis instead of deserting it For it is only this We must suppose that the Mountains of Ararat whereon the Ark rested in the height of the Deluge were then the highest Mountains in the World but since that time they are either worn down or sunk and settled lower than some others Admit but this and then Scripture Geography and the Churches method of explaining the Flood will all be reconcil'd and the usual Hypothesis will stand clear of material Difficulties and Objections Thirdly we say that tho we invented a new Hypothesis it was not set up in competition with this of the Church but in comparison with that of the Theory and in Confutation of its last vital Assertion For it makes it evident that there is another way of explaining Noah's Flood both rational in its method and intelligible in its causes Disc p. 300. l. 18. at least as rational and intelligible as his And as such a Comparative Hypothesis as we have made it it may possibly stand almost as long as the Theorist's which draws more and greater Absurdities after it Especially if it should have but a Second Edition to support it on the one side and a Review to prop it up on the other and have many things left out of it and have one word in it explain'd by another and have here and there a Contradiction allow'd it c. And thus the Excepter is freed from the objected inconsistency with himself and good sense This same Reply will take off those Objections also which are brought on by the Answerer at the bottom of his seventieth Page as being of near affinity with what he last alledged Having thus made his general Observations he comes now to Particulars The first he pitches upon is the Height of the Deluge-waters which we set at fifteen Cubits above the highest parts of the common Surface of the Earth making it the Foundation of our Hypothesis and supposing it to rest upon Scripture and to be supported by that This therefore he says Answ p. 69. must needs raise our Curiosity to see that place of Scripture which has been overlookt by all the Learned hitherto But if learned mens overlooking this Text as to the sense that we apply it to be a just Objection against our alledging it how much more strongly must the same Objection come against the Theorist for alledging so many Texts as he does in confirmation of such new and strange notions as none of the learned could ever see contained in them or confirmed by them but always overlookt them as to such meanings Answ p. 67. Then he urges Scripture says plainly that the Mountains were covered with waters Ib. p. 69. and how could fifteen Cubits reach to the tops of the Mountains This Objection is fully answered in our Discourse only thus much may be here put in Chap. 16. Pagr 3. Gen. 7.20 As the high Mountains were covered with Waters so the Camp of Israel was covered with Quails Yet those Quails which covered the Camp Exod. 16.13 were but two Cubits high upon the face of the Earth Numb 11.31 Now if
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word of righteousness Psal 119.123 or as some render it and not improperly the word of bounty or kindness Fraudulent dealing makes Confidence shie and they that have been chous'd will be cautelous after it If one says he will give me but two Guineas and basely deceives me when he tells me he designs a thousand for me in reason I must think he puts a trick upon me So if GOD brake promise with the Antediluvians in a lesser matter how could they expect he should perform a greater His unfair disappointing them of a temporal blessing would rather have flung them into fatal despair of his everlasting Mercy His imposing on them so openly once would have aw'd their faith into such fear and diffidence that they could no more have reli'd upon his broken fidelity No more than they could believe that he made Adam and them to be Lords of the Fish and Soveraigns of the Sea when neither he nor they saw one or the other to their dying day And thus for the Credit of contradicting Scripture in Natural things we see what the tendency of it is and how excellent the products of it will be It turns the most solemn Grants of Heaven into shameful Mockeries and besides the dishonour it brings to GOD le ts in fatal despondency upon men So much for the first piece of his apology the second part of it follows And here in way of farther answer to the Charge of contradicting Scripture Answ p. 81. he is dispos'd to observe how far the Excepter himself in such natural things hath contradicted Scripture And because the Excepter us'd dreadful Sentences towards the Theorist he goes about to show that he hath made himself obnoxious to them And that this might be done the more fairly we must says he state the case truly And he does it thus Whether to go contrary to the letter of Scripture in things that relate to the Natural World â—b be destroying the Foundations of Religion affronting Scripture and blaspheming the H. GHOST Now however he pretends to state this case truly it is evident that he does it falsly For it is not going contrary to the letter of Scripture that draws such evil consequences after it but going contrary to the letter of Scripture where it is to be literally understood This Circumstance therefore which was left out should have been taken into the Case And this is the great oversight of the Theorist going contrary to Scripture in Natural things where it is to be taken in a literal sense By this means he exposeth himself But the Excepter is guilty of no such procedure and therefore the Scriptures alledg'd against him can take no hold of him In demonstration of as much let us but consider the first of them that he cites in his Answer which is Psal 19.5 Ib. The whole verse runs thus being spoken by David of the Sun Which is as a Bridegroom coming out of his Chamber and rejoyceth as a strong man to run a race So that according to the letter of this Text the Sun moves But says the Answerer the Sun stands still and the Earth moves Ib. according to the Excepter's Doctrine Very true But yet that Doctrine is not contrary to this Scripture for the reason just now suggested even because its meaning is not literal For which reason also the alledging it is improper and insignificant And that its meaning cannot be literal it proves irrafragably for its self For take it in that sense and what a numerous throng of ridiculous Absurdities will issue from it upon the acception Then the Sun must be a man and must be upon his Marriage and must be drest in fine clothes as a Bridegroom is Then he must come out of a Chamber and must give no more light and cast no more heat than a Bridegroom does Then he must have life too and he must have sense he must have passions and he must have leggs else how can he rejoyce and rejoice as a strong man to run a race So that in short what is here said of the Sun's motion needs not be literally understood It may be spoken only quoad apparentiam vel ad captum vulgi according to appearance or common apprehension And the like may be said of the rest of those Scriptures which the Answer quotes to the same purpose either in the Body or the Margent of it What therefore was said before we may think still that the alledging this Text was improper and superfluous And the Answerer himself confirms this thought For he says p. 85. that we all leave the literal sense in certain cases and therefore that alone is no sufficient charge against any man And thus he is so kind or complaisant as to censure and take off his own Objection and to save us the trouble of confuting his Argument by baffling it himself And which is kinder yet he tells us p. 84. the truth is if we should follow the Vulgar style and literal sense of Scripture we must renounce Philosophy and natural Experience And so by a pretty and unusual sort of method the skain which he ruffled he brings to rights again First he observ'd that we contradicted Scripture Then he show'd wherein we did it Then he charg'd us for so doing Then he proclaim'd his Charge insufficient And lastly he allows the very thing he attaqu'd For he makes it necessary to contradict Scripture in some Cases and not to follow its literal sence in all things Unless we will renounce Philosophy and Experience A thing which the Excepter is loth to do As to the Instances he brings of the Sun 's raising Mountains and the Moon 's hindring the formation of the Earth they are so far from being Arguments against the Excepter that they are but meer mistakes of his own as we have here shewed But another Argument he has found out tho by an odd way of invention or mustered up to bring up the Rear Chap. 3d. and 10th in this Battalion And by it he intends to make an absolute conquest of us and to beat us down into humble subjection to his own sentiment in which he thus triumphs over us tho before the Victory Answ p. 82. This I think is truly to contradict Scripture Here therefore I trow he goes upon good grounds and treads sure For should his heels fly up as they have frequently done his fall would be the worse for running so high against his adversary as he calls the Excepter in the foregoing Paragraph And pray what is this last Argument Why the Excepter in his new Hypothesis makes the Waters of the Deluge to be but fifteen Cubits higher than the Plain or common surface of the Earth Which Scripture affirms expressly to have covered the tops of the highest hills And again he vouches it The Scripture says they covered the tops of the highest Mountains But this the Scripture does not do It does not affirm
expressly that the Waters covered the Tops of the highest Hills It does not say that they covered the tops of the highest Mountains And therefore for the Answerer to say it did affirm and say so expressly This I think is truly to force and falsify Scripture And thus his ill fortune haunts him still and where he thought to have catcht his adversary in a Net he only hampers and intangles himself For he relapses unhappily into his old infirmity and asserts what is not For where is it that Scripture says that the waters of the Flood did cover the tops of the highest Hills Yet he twice together asserts it did Two Untruths and so his recidivation is double and two untruths he tells at once 'T is confest Scripture says that the Mountains at the Flood were covered with waters But so it says also as we have observed that the Camp of Israel in the Wilderness was covered with Quails But as Quails two Cubits high upon the ground could not cover the Tops of the highest Tents so Waters fifteen Cubits high upon the Earth might not cover the Tops of the highest Hills For certain Scripture does not say it does not affirm expressly that they did Yet by this the Gentleman gives us to understand that what the Scripture says and expressly affirms is to be believed and ought to be received And then why is the being of a Sea before the Flood rejected and Adam's dominion over its fish denied I instance often in that Sea because I find it is of the Substance of the Theory and a piece of one of its Vital Assertions that the primitive Earth was without a Sea Ib. These Observations says the Answerer I know are of small use unless perhaps to the Excepter himself But without a perhaps the Replicant finds they are of no use at all unless to the Observator May he that made them make the best use of them Here he takes occasion to reflect upon the Literal Style of Scripture And the last Head he speaks to and the only head that concerns us is of such things as belong to the Natural World Ib. p. 84. And to this he says may be reduc'd innumerable Instances where we leave the literal sence if inconsistent with Science or Experience What meant he then to charge us with going contrary to the Letter of Scripture for supposing the fixedness of the Sun and the motion of the Earth by his own confession before that charge was incompetent and by his own Rule here it must be impertinent By and by he has this Fling but I know not at whom Some men out of love to their own ease 〈◊〉 and in defence of their ignorance are not only for a Scripture-Divinity but also for a Scripture-Philosophy For my own part as I hate too lazy a Philosophy so I despise too busy a one Sound Philosophy is a noble thing and let all advance in it as far as they can the more expert Philosophers they are the wiser and better they are like to be But still we must remember that true Philosophy being bounded by the Light of Nature must never interfere with Revelation As on the one side it should not be slothful so on the other side it must not be pragmatical Scripture is no enemy to Philosophy and Philosophy by no means must affront Scripture GOD allows men the freest use of their Reason but 't is unreasonable they should oppose it to Inspiration and by using it confront his authority who gave them it So concern'd was Plato to shun all such indecency that being in his Timaeus to debate concerning the Universe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whether it were made or not made he thought it necessary to invoke all the GODS and Goddesses that what should be said might be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 agreeable to them and spoken consistently Change but the Object of the petition and the matter of it will be fit for any Philosophers Litany Direct the address to the One True GOD and there can be no fault in its application And let Notions be squar'd by the Rules that it contains and then Philosophy may take its liberty Scripture allows it sufficient latitude and the Christian Church will do no less So I am sure she did of old For then in her earlier and purer times she was so far from discouraging Philosophy that she took mens passing through its Schools to be a laudable preparative or qualification for their preferment Witness Origen cont Cel. l. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. We will not turn away young men from those that teach Philosophy but where they have been exercis'd and have gone the round with them I will try to advance them higher c. But if any will abuse this noble liberty they must answer it to him who is philosophorum Deus as Tertullian told Marcion the GOD of Philosophers And if we would not aggravate our account here we must take heed of one thing Of entertaining Philosophy with trifling Notions For if once we suffer it to seed upon such trash we may expect it will soon get a surfeit and fall sick of Phantsy and that 's a Disease which commonly rises up into paroxysms of extravagance And then the vital heat of reason as I may call it turns into a violent and raging Fever And so the fire that should be kept orderly on the hearth furiously flies up to the house top And the flame which should burn only upon the Altar consumes the Temple Then he Observers Vpon the whole you see it is no fault to recede from the literal sence of Scripture but the fault is when we leave it without a just cause As it is no fault for a man to separate from a Church but to do it without a just cause is a real fault The beginning of this Observation does still farther justifie us against his late insufficient Charge And the rest of it gives us occasion to enquire what just cause he had to recede from the literal sence of Scripture as in too many instances he has done For if he left that sence without just cause he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 condemn'd by a sentence out of his own mouth The Letter of Scripture plainly says that GOD made two great Lights that He gave Adam Dominion over the Fish of the Sea that Tubal Cain was an Instructer of every Artificer in Brass and Iron That the Fountains of the Great Deep were broken up and the Windows of Heaven open'd the same day Now pray what good reason or what just cause is there for his departing from the Literal sence of Scripture in these things For to recede from it without Cause is as real a fault by his own confession as it is without cause to separate from a Church And therefore as causless separation from a Church is criminous Schism so causeless recession from that sence of Scripture must be culpable desertion And so if
the Aereal Heavens perisht do think that they perisht any otherwise than by the Water 's rising up into the lowest Regions of the Air. And that place of Bede which the Review cites seems to speak the common sense as well as his own which gives us to understand that the Heavens perished p. 25. cunctis aeris hujus turbulenti spatiis aquarum accrescentium altitudine consumptis All the spaces of this turbulent Air being taken up by the heighth of the swelling waters According to which the Heavens perished just as the Air does in a Vessel when it fills with Water But let out the Water and the Air immediately returns into it So the lowest Heavens that perished at the Flood by standing in the Water when that was dried up presently recovered their first Aereal Constitution again The Last reason is answered in the 4th of the foregoing Exceptions And from what has been here said Answers may with ease be made to those Considerations which the Review alledges in proof of a Diversity or Opposition made by S. Peter betwixt the Ancient Heavens and Earth and the Present But farther yet the Review observes that S. Paul also implys that triple Creation which S. Peter expresses p. 10 11. For Rom. 8.20 21 he tells us of a Creation that will be redeemed from vanity which are the new Heavens and new Earth to come A Creation in subjection to vanity which is the present State of uhe World And a Creation that was subjected to vanity in hopes of being restored which was the first Paradisiacal Creation But by Creation or Creature here to understand the Heavens and Earth must be improper For first it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the whole Creation or every Creature that is here spoken of v. 22d And where does that signify the material Heavens and Earth in Scripture Secondly the Creature mention'd is capable of waiting and of earnest expectation and of hope and of pain and of groaning as the verse cited and the context show Yea it seems to be capable of groaning as we our selves do v. 23. Which is above the power of Matter tho never so subtil or celestial Thirdly the Creature here is to be delivered from bondage into glorious liberty v. 21. And this again is a Character which falls not in with the Heavens and Earth He says indeed that the Creature that will be Redeemed from Vanity is the new Heavens and new Earth to come But how will they supposing them come into the Paradisiacal State be delivered from vanity For even then they can be in no better condition than the first Paradisiacal Heavens and Earth were as coming but into a state of Renovation or Restitution And they were so far from being freed from Vanity that they were subject to corruption and perished at the Deluge as the Theorist holds And truly so must the last Paradisiacal ones too unless it be prevented The new Earth if it stands long enough must be dissolved and lose its Form and the new Heavens must be changed at another Deluge and lose their Constitution Or if the day of Judgment should happen first and hinder this yet where would be their Redemption or Deliverance here phantsied For still they would be vain and corruptible in their Nature as Enoch and Elias were both Mortal tho neither died To which add that the Theory l. 4. p. 219 220. plants Gog and Magog in the New Earth and allows them to grow numerous there as the sand by the Sea And so it can no more be redeem'd or deliver'd from Moral Vanity and Corruption upon it than from Natural Vanity and Corruptibility in it Lastly This Creature of the Apostles is to be delivered into the glorious liberty of the Children of God v. 21. now the liberty of GOD's Children is Moral Spiritual and Divine which is not compleated but in the future exalted state of bliss Where being heirs of GOD and joint heirs with CHRIST we shall be glorified with him v. 17th But such a liberty as this is no way compatible to things meerly Physical and so the Heavens and Earth tho never so new and paradisiacal must not pretend to it cannot partake of it Thus we see that the Theorists Interpretation of this Place of Scripture is not right and therefore of necessity we must look out for some other Creature as here intended Nor need we search much to find one Preach the Gospel to every Creature said the H. JESUS to his Apostles S. Mar. 16.15 Here the word is the same with S. Paul's to the Romans But Heavens and Earth cannot possibly be meant by it because to them there must be no Preaching But by every Creature the Heathen World may fitly be understood And so this Precept or Commission given to the Apostles is parallel to that in the last chapter of S. Matthew go and teach all Nations And then by the Vanity to which the Creature was Subject and the Bondage of Corruption from which they were to be delivered we must understand See Dr. Hammonds Annotations on the place Idolatry to which the Gentiles were miserably inslaved And that indeed in Scripture is emphatically exprest by Vanity and Corruption So the Apostles Act. 15th having preached to Idolaters declare the end of their Doctrine was to turn them from their VANITIES And Moses in Deuteronomy does usually point at Idolatry by mens CORRUPTING themselves And if we frame the Exposition of S. Paul's words to this sense it will run very smoothly through the whole Paragraph without any considerable check or Difficulty Review p. 11. But after S. Paul he brings in S. John also to countenance his Phantsie of this triple State of Heavens and Earth For he speaks of the new Heavens and new Earth with that distinguishing Character that the Earth was without a Sea And as this distinguisheth it from the present Earth so being a Restitution or Restauration it must be the same with some former Earth c. To this we Answer The one and twentieth Chapter of the Apocalyps where we meet with S. Johns new Heavens and Earth consists of two very glorious Scenes The New Heavens and Earth make the first and the holy City or the New Jerusalem the latter But this City being Allegorical we have no reason to think that the new Heavens down from which and the new Earth down to which it came should be otherwise Also this Allegation does no more prove The Triple State of Heavens and Earth or that the primitive Earth was without a Sea than it proves there shall be a City built of pure Gold whose twelve Gates shall be twelve Pearls in a Literal sense according to the tenour of that chapter And now let us offer but Two short Exceptions which will not fail to subvert the chief Scripture-basis of the whole Theory of the Earth as the Review calls it p. 13th by showing that S. Peter's words as well as S. Paul's and S. John's are