was endangered by an Earthquake of three days continuance that in his eighth Year Rhodes was much distressed by the same Accident That when Dirrachium the City of Dalmatia perished and Rome was in such Danger twelve Cities of Campania were destroyed And that in the twelfth Year of Constantius the greater part of Berytus the City of Phaenicia also miscarried In which Year also happened an Eclipse of the Sun on the sixth Day of the Month Desius The ill Success of Constantius in the Persian War was by the more Orthodox Christians according to the Judgment of Parties concluded to have happened to him because of his adhering to and countenancing the Arian Heresy An. 344. In the fifth Year after the Death of Constantine Marcellus and Probinus being Consuls a Synod was held at Antioch that condemn'd Athanasius and only in Words profess'd to own the Nicene Faith but really to condemn it and substitute another in its room This Impiety God declared against by * Socrat. Hist Eccles l. 2. c. 7 10. Terrible Earthquakes say the Historians of that Time especially at Antioch for above a Year together An. 366. while Procopius's Rebellion was yet but little advanc'd July 21. in the Consulship of the two Emperors Valentinian and Valens there hapned such Horrible Earthquakes throughout the World as neither true Historians have related the like nor Fables themselves represented to us A little after the Day dawn'd there was a great Tempest of Thunder and Lightning which was followed by so dreadful a Trembling of the Earth that the Sea also was shaken therewith and deserted the Shore and its ancient Bounds for a great space and the Depth of its Channels were discovered multitudes of Fish were seen to stick in the Mud and the Unequalness of the Seas Bottom appear'd here Hills and there Valleys which never had before seen the Sun since at the Original of all things they were first overwhelm'd with the Floods Many Ships were left on the dry Ground and Swarms of People flew thither to catch Fish when suddenly the Sea as disdaining to be imprison'd return'd to its former Place with such Fury that not containing it self therein but transported beyond its Bounds by the Violence of its Rage and Motion it overturned Houses and other Buildings innumerable drowned many Thousands of Men and overwhelmed numbers of Ships Great Vessels were by the Violence of these Gusts blown upon the Tops of Houses as it happened at Alexandria and some near two Miles from the Shore as Ammianus Marcellinus who relates these things lib. 26. saw one himself * Howel's Gen. Hist Vol. 2. p. 231. ad An. C. 366. This Prodigy we cannot take to have signified any thing to Procopius's Rebellion so much as that Dreadful Inundation made into the Roman Empire by the Northern Nations which shortly after happened and the Ruin of the Western Provinces which followed thereupon In the Year 430 a great * Tricesimo deinde Anno Theodosii Terrae motus facti sunt ingentes per menses aliquot integros maximarum Praenuntii Mutationum quibus Respublica tum Ecclesiastica tum Mundana mox laboravit ac tantum non occidit Romanum tum Praesulatum accepit Lea qui primus in omnes totius Orbis Christiani Episcopos dominatum sibi aliquem ut Privilegio Petro dato coepit arrogare Cluverius p. 322. Earthquake preceded the Death of one of the best Emperors viz. Theodosius as the Fore-runner of Great Changes Some †Howel 's Hist p. 673. think this the same with that An. 446. which Marcellinus writes to have happened in the Confulship of Aelius and Sepronius which raged in many places and therein overturned many Cities the Wall of Constantinople tho but new built it threw to the Ground with fifty seven Turrets Stones of great Bulk lately plac'd in the Building of the Forum of Taurus fell down Many Towns were ruined and a Pestilent Vapour arose which caused a Plague and this joined with a Famine destroyed many Thousands The Civil Motions and Ruptures in the Roman Empire were agreeable hereunto This Earthquake in the Reign of Theodosius Evagrius * Lib. 1. cap. 17. saith was the Greatest and most memorable of all others Such as by its Greatness rendred inconsiderable all that went before it It afflicted he had almost said the whole World The Earth gaped and swallowed many Villages besides many other nay innumerable Calamities both by Sea and Land Some Fountains were dried up in other Places Water in great quantity broke out where formerly it had not been known Great Trees were torn up by the Roots Heaps of Earth were so shaken together that they were raised into Mountains The Sea cast forth dead Fishes In it many Islands were overwhelmed and sunk Ships sailing in the Sea by a sudden Retrocession of the Water were left on dry Ground In conclusion many Places of Bithynia the Hellespont and both the Phrygia's were grievously distress'd This Disaster a long time and sorely afflicted the World * Lib. 14. cap. 46. Nicephorus writes that it continued six Months and that in a manner without Interruption that it reached Alexandria but especially afflicted Antioch Besides the Countries mentioned by Evagrius it invaded the greatest part of the East and spared not many Regions of the West He adds that the People of Constantinople not daring to stay in the City for fear of the fall of Houses continued together with the Emperour and Proclus their Patriarch in the Fields instant in Prayer for the removal of so heavy a Judgment Theodosius when delivered from the Danger of the Earthquake presently betook himself to repair the Walls of Constantinople c. When * Theodoret l. 5. c. 34. Chrysostom was banish'd in the beginning of the fifth Century by the Emperour Arcadius from the Church of Constantinople the same Night was a great Earthquake that shook the Emperor's Palace and threatned the Ruine of it on which Messengers were sent to recal him An. 458. Evagrius writes of a great †Howel 's Hist p. 202. Earthquake that happened at Antioch which the Citizens had sad cause to remember Before it began some of the Inhabitants were seized with an extraordinary Madness such as seemed to exceed all Ferity of wild Beasts and to be the Prelude to that Calamity which followed on the fourth Day of the Month Gorpiaeus which the Romans call September about the fourth Hour of the Night and the fifty sixth Year of the Life of Leo. It overturned almost all the Buildings of the new City which was well peopled and none of it forsaken or empty being curiously built by the Magnificence of Emperours who strove to exceed each other in the Adornment of it The first and second Fabricks in the Palace were also cast down the rest standing together with a Bath which having formerly been neglected now when by the Earthquake the rest were choaked up stood the Citizens in very good stead Many other
quam Plinius a Terrae motu immunem fecit primo ipso Motore e vivis amoto cum suis omnibus Incolis immotisque adeo Judeae rupibus in tam insolenti Commutatione non moveretur Et vero cum Dominus dedit vocem suam mota est Terra ut canit divinus Vates quantò putamus ampliùs commotam esse cum Dominus dedit Animam suam Dydimus may be credited Or the Extent of that whereby †Cluverius mibi p. 214. twelve Cities of Asia fell at once Gassendus in the Life of Peireskius reports that at the Mountain Semo in Aethiopia there happened a burning at the same time with that of Vesuvius in Campania An. 1633. So that not only Vesuvius communicates with Aetna by subterraneous Vaults but also Aetna with the Mountains of Syria the Tunnels running under the Depths of the Mediterranean Sea and those with the Arabian and lastly the Arabian with Mount Semo in Aethiopia And we read of other Instances particularly by the Earthquake in France and Switzerland May 12. 1682. which reach'd as far as Collen in Germany and was perceiv'd in Lionnois Dauphiny and Beaujolois at Mets in Lorrain in Provence c. That the Cities of Orleans Troyes Sens Chalons Joinville Reims Soissons Laon Moscon Dole Strasburgh c. felt it especially Remiremont on the Moselle The whole World almost trembled at once by the Earthquake An. 1116. And by the Earthquake An. 1601. Asia Hungary Italy Germany and France are said to have trembled at one time that Earthquake extending from Asia to that Sea that washes the French Shores the whole Length of Europe in a quarter of an Hour besides some Asiatick Regions it shook Hungary Germany Italy and France This is affirmed by good Writers saith Mr. * Of the Effects of Languid Motion p. 49 50. Boyle and Mr. †Physico-Theological Discourses p. 215. Fromond Meteor l. 4. cap. ult Art 4. Dr. Tho. Burnet 's Theory of the Earth p. 119 120. Ray relating from Josephus Acosta an Earthquake in Peru that reach'd for 160 Leagues And Fournier gives an Account of one in Peru that reach'd 300 Leagues along the Sea-shore and 70 Leagues Inland and levell'd the Mountains all along as it went threw down Cities turn'd the Rivers out of their Channels and made an universal Havock and Confusion All this he saith was done within the space of seven or eight Minutes Some have observ'd that most People had their Heads affected with an unusual Giddiness before they apprehended or understood any thing of the Earthquake The Time of it also may be observed by you of this City viz. the second Week in September to Remember you of a former Judgment by Fire in the first Week of that Month. Now think a little what would have become of us if it had lasted but a few Minutes more How near were we to Ruine How soon can God do the like again if his Calls to Repentance be not obeyed And how impossible is it for all the Great Men of the World as to cause such a thing so to hinder or prevent it or to preserve themselves or us if God should thus visit us in his Anger another time CHAP. VIII Many Examples of Terrible Earthquakes in other Parts of the World formerly and of late IT hath been observ'd by Divers what Plato mentions in his Timaeus of a vast Island without the Straits of Gibraltar called Atlantis and bigger than Africa and Asia together which in one Day and Night by a violent Earthquake and mighty Flood and Inundation of Water was wholly overwhelmed and drown'd in the Sea Earthquakes have made way for the Irruption of the Sea in divers Places Our Island of * See Mr. Ray of the Primitive Chaos chap. 5. Great Britain is suppos'd to be broken off from the Continent in France by that means and Sicily from Italy Many Rivers have chang'd their Channels and many Countries have been turn'd into Desarts by Earthquakes By that means the River * Purchas out of Strabo l. 15. Indus in Asia that receives fifteen other Rivers into it did change its Channel and the neighbouring Country turn'd into a Wilderness Diodorus Siculus †Lib. 2. mentions more than twenty thousand Lacedemonians that perish'd in Sparta by an Earthquake that was of long Continuance In the 7th Year of the Reign of Herod by an Earthquake in ‖ Josephi Antiqu. Jud. l. 15. c. 7. Judea ten thousand Men and a vast Multitude of Cattel were destroyed 'T is about two thousand and sixty six Years ago that there hapned (*) Orosius l. 3. c. 3. Diod. Sic. l. 15. §. 48. one in Achaia which almost utterly destroyed it and which was attended with Inundations which in the very Heart of Corinth delug'd the Cities of Helice and Buris of which (†) Metamorphosis l. 15. Ovid makes mention Si quaeras Helicen Burin Achaeidas Vrbes Invenies sub aquis adhuc ostendere Nautae Inclinata solent cum Moenibus Oppida mersis He that for Helice or Buris seeks Achaean Cities fam'd among the Greeks Deep under Water sunk may find 'em now And Seamen they that oft the Ocean plough Now over lofty Towns we sail they cry That once survey'd the Secrets of the Sky Tyre and Sydon in Phaenicia suffered exceedingly by Earthquakes and an infinite Number of People buried under their Ruines And Strabo mentions a City situate above Sidon that was wholly swallowed up by an Earthquake Twelve Cities in one Night in Asia * Lib. 1. c. 84. Pliny mentions But S. †De Miraculis SS l. 2. c. 3. if that Book be his Augustine is cited for what is more strange that in a famous Earthquake an hundred Cities of Lybia were demolished In Trajan's time the City of Antioch was swallowed up An. 105. and a great part of Asia with it and some other Earthquakes there I have already ‖ Chap. 2. p. 76. mentioned The Terror of that in the time of the Emperor Trajan is described by several (*) Dion Cass Trajan §. 18. Historians An. 177. Smyrna in Asia was overthrown by an Earthquake as a few Years since it was again (†) Eusebius towards the rebuilding whereof the Emperour Antoninus forgave ten Years Tribute Ammianus (‖) Lib. 17 26. Marcellinus speaks of very dreadful Earthquakes that happen'd in Macedonia in the time of the Emperour Constantius And of one that he saith was Universal in the time of the Emperour Dioclesian And * Lib. 4. c. 16. Sozomen gives an Account that An. 358. the City of Nicomedia was overthrown by an Earthquake which made the Council appointed by Constantius to meet there to be put off to another Year The City of †Socrates l. 4. c. 11. Nice in Bithynia was ruined and almost all the Inhabitants destroyed twelve Years after this saith Socrates An. D. 557. There was a violent Earthquake at ‖ Le Sieur Agathias
had yet a worse Fate scarce any part of it is now standing tho situate on an high Rock almost inaccessible on all sides but by one narrow Passage The mighty Hardness of the Rock seem'd to have secur'd it from the Hazard of Earthquakes but it felt the Shake of the 9th and on the 11th of January it was in a moment laid in heaps the number of the Inhabitants is computed about seven thousand and very few are escaped Augusta a City well situated and adorned with large and safe Harbours a Place of good Trade for Corn. The Inhabitants reckoned near six thousand of whom we have account of none left many kill'd on the 9th more on the 10th and the rest buried by the overturning of the Town on the 11th Lentini the ancient Leontium famous for a beautiful Lake on which it stood a Place of about three thousand Families and a Place of tolerable Trade by Fishing and Salt Mines was reduc'd to Ashes on the 11th and it is not known if any of the Inhabitants be saved The Water of the Lake is now become brackish and of a salt and bituminous Taste and vast numbers of Fish are every day found dead on the Shore Calatgirone a pretty Town containing about 7000 People and well built most of hewn Stone on the 11th a fifth part of the Town was overturned and two Monasteries and 't is thought no fewer than two thousand Souls were destroyed Mineo felt both the Shake of the 9th and 11th on the former the Heavens were serene scarce a Cloud appearing above the Horizon but on the 11th there was a Storm of Thunder and Lightning for six Hours At both times several Houses a large Church were overturned and it 's thought near four thousand of the Inhabitants are perished Monreal or Morreal was shaken and shattered and Palermo the Seat of the Vice-Roy but not above 100 People kill'd Pasceni consisting of about 200 Families the richest of any little Town in Sicily hath not one single House left standing nor one single Person sav'd Patuzolo a bigger Town underwent the same Fate the number of Inhabitants about 1000 at least It is not known that any are saved So for Furla whose Inhabitants we reckon'd to be near a thousand Souls The like for Sciorti which by the Shake of the 11th is a vast Heap of Ruins only a Church belonging to a Benedictine Nunnery is intire we know of none of the Inhabitants sav'd and they are reckon'd to amount to two thousand Souls The same Fate befel Militello no inconsiderable Town probably containing about six thousand People whereof no one is left to give tidings how its Calamity came about Luochela fared somewhat better many about half of the People left the Town on the Shake of the 9th of January when a great part of the Houses fell The Castle was swallowed up in a moment in sight of the People and a considerable Lake is in the place where the Castle stood The rest of the Town and Inhabitants were utterterly destroyed on the 11th Of two thousand People one half perished There was little Damage done in Palonia another well-built Town but that besides feeling the Shake on the 9th and the Church shattered the Dome was thrown down on the 11th which broke the high Altar to pieces and crush'd to Death some 300 People with the Priest that was saying Mass The like almost for Buchino a considerable Village Scodia a Burgh about the bigness of the other was greatly shaken on the 11th and about 150 People kill'd by the fall of the Church in the time of Mass In a deep Lake within 2 miles of it 2 miles about by the Shake of the 11th there opened a large Casma near the midst of the Lake which swallowed up the Water which by that of the 9th was lessened and left the whole Channel dry Land which continues so Another Village called Chivramonte had its Houses shattered by the Shake of the 9th but overturned altogether on the 11th and the Inhabitants buried in the Ruins computed between 3 and 400. Monterusso was considerably shaken on the 9th and on the 11th 200 People who fled into the Castle were with it buried in the Ground and the Place where it stood is now a Pool of Water of a brinish Taste The beautiful Town of Vizzini containing about 3500 Souls though it lay on a rising Hill made up of nothing but hardest Stones of the nature of Marble was yet shaken on the 9th and swallowed up with the Inhabitants on the 11th who thought the Danger had then been over The large Village of Modica containing about 1400 People was so suddenly swallowed up on the 9th that no one Person escap'd Since this hundred Years this Village hath twice changed its Seat by Earthquakes the People till now saving themselves Several Rivers and Rivulets near this and other Places in Sicily are covered by Hills in the form of a Vault or natural Bridg thrown over them by the Earthquake This Earthquake caused the fall of some Houses at Bisenti and the bruising to death of about 100 Persons Francofonte suffered more by Lightning and Thunder for three days than by the shake of the Earthquake Carlontini a Town of good Trade and well inhabited containing about 4000 People a sixth part of 'em perished in the Earthquake on the 11th the rest escaped by the warning on the 9th Ragusa a beautiful Town its Situation Buildings Churches Monasteries and Territories about it combine to make it a sort of Terrestrial Paradise felt many Shakings on the 8th with Lightning and Thunder but on the 11th the biggest Street in the Town the Town-house two Churches and many Houses were overturned or swallowed up The least Calculation of People that perish'd is eight thousand of whom the Citizens of the best Quality make up a great part of that Number Specafurno a Town of considerable Bigness on the Side of a Hill all planted with Vineyards and well inhabited fell under the same Calamity partly by Lightning and Thunder on the 10th and the whole Town in a Moment's time on the 11th About a Mile from the Town was a pleasant fresh Water Lake on the South side which is now almost all dry Land the Fish dead on the Shore and the Water of a brinish Taste and now of a black Colour The People that perish'd there are computed to be at least three thousand five hundred about three hundred only saved themselves the Day before The Town Scichilo that hath within 50 Years been eight times in hazard of an Earthquake felt this on the 8th of January and within 24 Hours there succeeded above 20 Shakes the last still exceeding the first in Violence but on the 11th the whole Town in less than two Moments vanish'd out of Sight in the room of it is now a stinking Pool of Water And of six or seven thousand Inhabitants of this pleasant Town it is thought there is no one saved Besides a
were kindled by it Psal 18.7 8. I will shake the Heavens and the Earth shall remove out of its place in the VVrath of the Lord of Hosts and in the Day of his fierce Anger Isa 13.13 This is brought in after God had said ver 11. I will punish the VVorld for their Evil and the VVicked for their Inquity I will cause the Arrogancy of the Proud to cease and will lay low the Haughtiness of the Terrible Again Tremble thou Earth at the Presence of the Lord at the Presence of the God of Jacob Psal 114.7 VVho can stand before his Indignation or abide the Fierceness of his Anger His Fury burns like Fire and the Rocks are thrown down by him Nahum 1.6 Thou shalt be visited by the Lord of Hosts with Thunder and with Earthquakes Isa 29.6 that is penally and judicially visited There are other Considerations that should make this Judgment of Earthquakes the more affecting As the little Warning they are commonly attended with and the surprizing Effects that follow able to astonish the most valiant Men of War and make the most couragious Spirits sink and fall For so they are represented as trembling on this Account 1 Sam. 14.15 When the Judgment comes unexpectedly as a Thief in the Night When God visits a People by terrible things in Righteousness and such as they looked not for When to use the Prophet's words Isa 5.14 Hell has enlarged it self and opened her Mouth without measure and their Glory and their Multitude and their Pomp and he that rejoiceth descends into it When there is no Time to flee or Method to escape or Possibility to resist when no Sanctuary or Refuge remains no Shelter is to be found in the highest Towers or the lowest Cellars when the Earth opens on a sudden and becomes the Grave of whole Families Streets and Cities and effects this in less time than you are able to tell the story of it either sending out a Flood of Waters to drown or vomiting out Flames of Fire to consume them or closing again upon them that they die by Suffocation or Famine if not by the Ruins of their own Dwelling When Parents and Children Husbands and Wives Masters and Servants Magistrates and Ministers and People without difference or distinction in the midst of Health and Peace and Business are buried in a Common Ruin and pass All together into the Eternal World and there is only the difference of a few Hours or Minutes between a famous City and none at all They that have been in the Neighbourhood of such Tragedies and beheld the dismal Effects of such a Judgment on Others and yet have been preserved cannot but consider it with trembling Our own serious Thoughts may help to affect us in like manner Thus the late Earthquake at Jamaica happened in a clear Day without Warning or Suspicion and in the space of three minutes the Town of Port-Royal was shaken and shattered to pieces and sunk into the Sea and the greatest part of it under Water Now if it be dreadful to have our Country the Seat of VVar as they whose Case that is will tell us and we must presently grant this is yet more dismal that in the midst of Peace brings a worse Ruine than the Extremity of War If a raging Pestilence be dreadful that sweeps away thousands in a Day and ten thousands in a Night as some of you can remember If a consuming Fire be an amazing Judgment which you of this City have experienced an Earthquake is not less but more so when Houses and Inhabitants Towns and Cities and Countries are all destroyed at one Stroke in a few Minutes Dat signum Ruina Death is the only Presage of such a Judgment without giving Leisure to prepare for another World or Opportunity to look for any Shelter in this Who doth not start at the thought of such a Trembling of the Earth The more a Man knows the more is his Astonishment He hangeth the Earth upon nothing Job 26.7 For a Man to feel the Earth which hangeth upon nothing but as some vast Ball in the midst of a thin yielding Air totter under him how can his Soul chuse but be possess'd with a secret Fright and Confusion Methinks I tremble but to think of such a Trembling I design not saith Bishop Hall * Sermon on Psalm 60.2 to astonish you with the Relation of the fearful Effects which Earthquakes have produc'd in all Ages as it were easy to do out of Histories and Philosophical Discourses where you may see Rocks torn in pieces Mountains not cast down only but removed Hills raised not out of Vallies only but out of Seas Fires breaking out of Waters Stones and Cinders belched up Rivers changed Seas dislodg'd Earth opening Towns swallowed up and many other such hideous Events Of which kind our own Memory can furnish us with maany at home altho these colder Climates are more rarely infested with such frightful Accidents In what Condition can a Man be safe saith Seneca * Epist 23. Nat. Quaest lib. 5. c. 1. speaking of Earthquakes when the World it self is shaken and the only thing that passes for fixed and unmovable in the Universe trembles and deceives us Whither shall we fly for Security if wheresoever we are the Danger be still under our Feet Upon the cracking of an House every Man takes himself to his Heels and leaves all to save himself But what Retreat is there where that which should support us fails us when the Foundation not only of Cities but even of the World it self opens and wavers What Help or what Comfort where Fear it self can never carry us off An Enemy may be kept at a distance with a Wall a Castle may put a stop to an Army a Port may protect us from the Fury of a Tempest Fire it self doth not follow him that runs away from it a Vault may defend us against Thunder and we may quit the Place in a Pestilence There is some Remedy in all these Evils Or however no Man ever knew a whole Nation destroyed by Lightning A Plague may unpeople a Town but it will not carry it away There is no Evil of such an Extent so Inevitable so Greedy and so publickly Calamitous as an Earthquake For it does not only devour Houses Families and single Towns but ruines whole Countries and Nations either overturning or swallowing them up without so much as leaving any Footstep or Mark of what they were Some People have a greater Horror for this Death than any other To be taken away Alive out of the number of the Living as if all Mortals by what Means soever were not to come to the same End Death And 't is not a Pin matter whether I am crush'd to pieces by one Stone or by a whole Mountain whether I perish by the fall of an House or under the Burden of the whole Earth whether I be swallowed up alone or with a thousand more for company We
Evening When I liv'd in Asia an Earthquake was almost as common as the yearly Revolution of Summer and Winter and we took as little notice of it as we did of Lightning Hail or Rain But now I have been so long disus'd to these Convulsions of the Globe that I am become like the rest of the World timorous and astonished my Mind at first stagger'd as much as my Body When I was walking cross my Chamber and felt the Floor rock under me with that singular kind of Motion which no humane Art or Force can imitate I soon concluded 't was an Earthquake but knew not how to bear that Thought with Indifference Death is familiar to me in any other Figure but that of being so surprizingly buried alive it appeared to me very horrible to sink on a sudden into an unknown Grave I knew not whither Perhaps I might fall into some dark Lake of Water or it may be I might be drench'd in a River of Fire or be dash'd on a Rock for who can tell the Disposition of the Caverns below or what sort of Apartments he shall find under the Surface of the Earth We walk on the Battlements of a Marvellous Structure a Globe full of Tremendous Secrets We had News here of an Earthquake which had overthrown part of the Pyrenean Mountains some days before this happened at Paris but few regarded it Calamities at a Distance frighten No Body Yet those which we feel put us all in Fears In another Letter he saith The Earthquake lately in these Parts hath put all France into a great Consternation astonished every Body and encreased the Thoughtfulness of the Wise The first Effects of it were felt by the Inhabitants of the Pyrenees which are certain Mountains dividing France and Spain There it did great Mischief overwhelming sâ—me Medicinal Baths many Houses and destroying Hundreds of People Only one Mosque or Church which sunk into the Caverns below was thrown up again and stands very firm but in another Place This is look'd upon as a great Miracle especially by the French who have disputed with the Spaniard for this Church as standing on the Frontier Line but now is remov'd near half a League within the acknowledg'd Limits of France The Matter of Fact is all I urge this Testimony for his Remarks here and in many other places not being such as a Serious Christian will approve If France and Britain and Germany have had few Earthquakes in comparison of other Places of the East yet Italy hath often smarted under such Calamities Among many Instances I 'le recite some besides those already mentioned An. Dom. 801. While Charles the Great was in Italy there was an Earthquake * Le Sieur Hist del Eglise c. Vol. 7. p. 2 3. 4o. with great Noises on the last of April which shook all France and Germany but especially Italy it overthrew several Towers and even Mountains and the Church of St. Paul at Rome was destroyed by it Whereupon Pope Leo the Third appointed three Days before the Ascension solemn Fasts and Processions These Prodigies were followed with furious Tempests and contagious Diseases which affected the Cattel throughout Italy so that the most of their Beasts died An. 1180. An Earthquake ruined a great part of the City of Naples An. 1222. There were such ‖ Cent. Magdeburg Vol. 3. Cent. 13. cap. 13. Earthquakes in Italy and Lombardy that the Cities and Towns were forsaken and the People kept abroad in the Fields in Tents many Houses and Churches were thrown down and many were thereby crush'd to Death The Earth trembled twice a day in Lombardy for fourteen days together Besides two Cities in Cyprus destroyed by Earthquakes this Year The City of * B. Corio Hist Milanese p. 164. Brescia was then almost ruin'd An. 1276. In July the same Month when Adrian the 4th was made Pope and within a few days after was †Corio Ib. p. 268. Il che si prese per indicio de' grandissimi fatti a dreadful Earthquake at Milan and all the Country round about Which Pope died the next August and in September Another succeeded by the Name of John the 21st An. 1348. This Year was so famous for forty eight Earthquakes and for Contagious Diseases in Italy and other parts of Europe that * Cluver ad An. 1348. p. 516. Albertus Argentinensis saith from the time of the Flood was not such a Season of Mortality Haud inde a Diluvio regnasse tantam vim morborum mortium putet An. 1397. On St. Stephen's Day all Lombardy †B. Corio Hist Milanese p. 542. was shaken by an unusual Earthquake which destroyed very many Buildings c. An. 1456. There arose upon the Sea of Ancona together with a thick gloomy Cloud that extended above two Miles a Tempest of Wind Water Fire Lightning and Thunder which piercing to the most deep Abysses of the Sea forc'd up the Waves with a most dreadful Fury and carried all before it upon the Land which caused so dreadful an Earthquake some time after that the Kingdom of Naples was ruined and all ‖ Monthly Mercury March 1693. p. 90. Italy carried the dismal Marks of it A Million of Houses and Castles were buried in their own Ruine above thirty thousand People were crush'd to pieces and a huge Mountain overturn'd into the Lake de la Garde An. 1473. There was such an Earthquake at * Corio Hist Milanese p. 820. Milan and the Country round about as the like was not known in the Memory of any then Living there An. 1590. The Election of Pope Vrban the Seventh who in 10 Months made room for Gregory the 14th was signalized by an †Cluverius ad An. 1590. p. 625. Earthquake by which Austria Moravia and Bohemia trembled accompanied with a prodigious Drought that Summer Upon which ensued a Famine and Pestilence with such Havock in Italy that in one Year there died at Rome sixty thousand Persons An. 1629. The Divine Anger broke out upon Italy by such horrible * Cluverius p. 680. Earthquakes that in Apulia seventeen thousand Persons were destroyed An. 1638. Athanasius Kircher the Jesuit in his Preface to his Mundus Subterrancus gives a sad Narrative of a dismal †Cited by Mr. Bay p. 185. Earthquake in Calabria wherein himself was and out of which he hardly escap'd with his Life Nothing to be seen in the whole Country he passed by for two hundred Miles in length but the Carcasses of Cities and the horrible Ruines of Villages the Inhabitants wandring about in the open Fields being half dead with Fear and Expectation of what might follow But most remarkable was the Subversion of the noted Town of St. Eufemia which was quite lost out of their sight and absorp'd and instead thereof nothing left but a stinking Lake c. Italy and Sicily abound with subterraneous Fires especially in the Southern Parts which have broke out so often as to be called