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Book I: Chapter XII

THE SACRED THEORY OF THE EARTH

by Thomas Burnet

THE THEORY OF THE EARTH

Book I

Concerning the Deluge, and the Dissolution of the Earth.

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CHAPTER XII

A short review of what hath been already treated of, and in what manner. The several faces and Schemes under which the Earth would appear to a Stranger, that should view it first at a distance, and then more closely, and the Application of them to our subject. All methods, whether Philosophical or Theological, that have been offered by others for the Explication of the Form of the Earth, are examined and refuted. A conjecture concerning the other Planets, their Natural Form and State compared with ours.

WE have finisht the Three Sections of this Book, and in this last Chapter we will make a short review and reflection upon what hath been hitherto treated of, and add some further confirmations of it. The Explication of the Universal Deluge was the first proposal and design of this Discourse, to make that a thing credible and intelligible to the mind of Man: And the full Explication of this drew in the whole Theory of the Earth: Whose original we have deduced from its first Source, and shewed both what was its Primal Form, and how it came into its present Form. The summ of our Hypothesisconcerning the Universal Deluge was this; That it came not to pass, as was vulgarly believed, by any excess of Rains, or any Inundation of the Sea, nor could ever be effected by a meer abundance of Waters; unless we suppose some dissolution of the Earth at the same time, namely when the Great Abysswas broken open. And accordingly we shewed that without such a dissolution, or if the Earth had been always in the same form it is now, no mass of water, any where to be found in the World, could have equaled the height of the Mountains, or made such an universal Deluge. Secondly, we shewed that the form of the Earth at first, and till the Deluge, was such as made it capable and subject to a Dissolution: And thirdly, that such a dissolution being supposed, the Doctrine of the universal Deluge is very reasonable and intelligible; And not only the doctrine of the Deluge, but the same supposition is a Key to all Nature besides, shewing us how our Globe became Terraqueous, what was the original of Mountains, of the Sea-chanel, of Islands, of subterraneous Cavities; Things, which without this supposition, are as unintelligible as the universal Flood it self. And these things reciprocally confirming one another, our Hypothesisof the Deluge is armed both breast and back, by the causes and by the effects.

It remains now, that, as to confirm our Explication of the Deluge, we shewed all other accounts that had been given of it to be ineffectual or impossible, so to confirm our doctrine concerning the dissolution of the Earth, and concerning the original of Mountains, Seas, and all inequalities upon it, or within it, we must examine what causes have been assigned by others, or what accounts given of these things: That seeing their defectiveness, we may have the more assurance and satisfaction in our own method.

And in order to this, let us observe first the general forms under which the Earth may be considered, or under which it doth appear accordingly as we view it more nearly or remotely; And the first of these and the most general is that of a Terraqueous Globe. If a Philosopher should come out of another World out of curiosity to see our Earth, the first discovery or observation he would make would be this, that it was a Terraqueous Globe; Thus much he might observe at a great distance when he came but near the borders of our World. This we discern in the Moon and most of the Planets, that they are divided into Sea and Land, and how this division came, would be his first remark and inquiry concerning our Earth; and how also those subdivisions of Islands, or little Earths which lie in the Water, how these were formed, and that great Chanel that contains them both.

The second form that the Earth appears under, is that of an uneven and Mountainous Globe. When our Traveller had got below the Circle of the Moon, he would discern the bald tops of our Mountains, and the long ranges of them upon our Continents. We cannot from the Earth discern Mountains and Valleys in the Moon, directly, but from the motion of the light and shadows which we see there, we easily collect that there are such inequalities: And accordingly we suppose that our Mountains would appear at a great distance, and the shady Valleys lying under them; and that this curious person that came to view our Earth, would make that his second Enquiry, how those Mountains were formed? and how our Globe came to be so rude and irregular? for we may justly demand how any irregularity came into Nature, seeing all her first motions and her first forms are regular, and whatsoever is not so is but secondary, and the consequence of some degeneracy, or of some decay.

The third visible form of our Earth is that of a broken Globe; not broken throughout, but in the outward parts and Regions of it. This, it may be, you will say, is not a visible form; it doth not appear to the eye, without reasoning, that the surface of the Earth is so broken. Suppose our new Visitant had now passed the middle Region of the Air, and was alighted upon the top of Pick Teneriffefor his first resting place, and that sitting there he took a view of the great Rocks, the wide Sea, and of the shores of Africkand Europe; for we'll suppose his piercing Eye to reach so far; I will not say that at first sight he would pronounce that the surface of this Globe was broken, unless he knew it to be so by comparison with some other Planet like to it; but the broken form and figure of many parts of the Rocks, and the posture in which they lay, or great portions of them, some inclined, some prostrate, some erected, would naturally lead him to that thought, that they were a ruine; He would see also the Islands tore from the Continents, and both the shores of the Continents and their in-land parts in the same disorder and irregular situation. Besides, he had this great advantage in viewing the Earth at a distance, that he could see a whole Hemisphere together, which, as he made his approaches through the Air, would have much what the same aspect and countenance as tis represented with in the great Scheme;} And if any man should accidentally hit upon that Scheme, not knowing or thinking that it was the Earth, I believe his first thought of it would be, that it was some great broken body, or ruined frame of matter; and the original, I am sure, is more manifestly so. But we'll leave our Strange-Philosopher to his own observations, and with him good Guides and Interpreters in his Survey of the Earth, and that he would make a favourable report at his return home, of our little dirty Planet.

In the mean time, let us pursue, in our own way, this Third Ideaof the Earth a little further, as it is a broken Globe. Nature I know hath dissembled and covered this form as much as may be, and time hath helpt to repair some of the old breaches, or fill them up; besides, the changes that have been made by Art and Humane industry, by Agriculture, Planting, and Building Towns, hath made the face of the Earth quite another thing from what it was in its naked rudeness. As mankind is much altered from its Pristine state, from what it was four thousand years ago, or towards the first Ages after the Flood, when the Nations lived in simplicity or barbarousness; So is the Earth too, and both so disguised and transformed, that if one of those Primitive Fathers should rise from the dead, he would scarce know this to be the same World which he lived in before. But to discern the true form of the Earth, whether intire or broken, regular or disordered, we must in the first place take away all those ornaments or additions made by Art or Nature, and view the bare carcass of the Earth, as it hath nothing on it but Rocks and Mountains, Desarts and Fields, and hollow Valleys, and a wide Sea. Then secondly, we must in our imagination empty this Chanel of the Sea, take out all the Waters that hinder the sight of it, and look upon the dry Ditch, measure the depth and breadth of it in our mind, and observe the manner of its construction, and in what a wild posture all the parts of it lie; according as it hath been formerly represented. And lastly, we must take off the cover of all Subterraneous places and deep Caverns, to see the inside of the Earth; and lay bare the roots of Mountains, to look into those holes and Vaults that are under them, filled sometimes with Fire, sometimes with Water, and sometimes with thick Air and Vapours. The object being thus prepared, we are then to look fixedly upon it, and to pronounce what we think of this disfigured mass, whether this Exteriour frame doth not seem to be shattered; and whether it doth more aptly resemble a new-made World, or the ruines of one broken. I confess when this Ideaof the Earth is present to my thoughts, I can no more believe that this was the form wherein it was first produced, than if I had seen the Temple of Jerusalemin its ruines, when defaced and sacked by the Babylonians, I could have perswaded my self that it had never been in any other posture, and that Solomonhad given orders for building it so.

So much for the form of the Earth: It remains now that we examine what causes have been assigned by others of these irregularities in the form of the Earth, which we explain by the dissolution of it; what accounts any of the Ancients have given or attempted to give, how the Earth swelled into Mountains in certain places, and in others was deprest into low Valleys, how the body of it was so broken, and how the Chanel of the Sea was made. The Elements naturally lie in regular forms one above another, and now we find them mixt, confounded and transposed, how comes this disturbance and disordination in Nature? The Explications of these things that have been given by others, may be reduced to two general sorts, Philosophicalor Theological, and we will try them both for our satisfaction.

Of Philosophers none was more concerned to give an account of such things than Epicurus, both because he acknowledged the Origin of the Earth to have been from a Chaos, and also admitted no causes to act in Nature but Matter and Motion: Yet all the account we have from the Epicureansof the form of the Earth, and the great inequalities that are in it, is so slight and trivial, that me-thinks it doth not deserve the name of a Philosophical Explication. They say that the Earth and Water were mixed at first, or rather the Earth was above the Water, and as the Earth was condensed by the heat of the Sun, and the Winds, the Water was squeezed out in certain places, which either it found hollow or made so; and so was the Chanel of the Sea made. Then as for Mountains, while some parts of the Earth shrunk and sunk in this manner, others would not sink, and these standing still while the others fell lower, made the Mountains. How the subterraneous Cavities were made according to them, I do not find.

This is all the Account that Monsieur Gassendi(who seems to have made it his business, as well as his pleasure, to embellish that Philosophy) can help us to out of the EpicureanAuthors, how the Earth came into this form; And he that can content himself with this, is, in my mind, of an humour very easie to be pleased. Do the Sun and the Wind use to squeaze pools of Water out of the Earth, and that in such a quantity as to make an Ocean? They dry the Earth, and the Waters too, and rarifie them into vapours, but I never knew them to be the causes of pressing Water out of the Earth by condensation. Could they compress the Earth any otherwise, than by drying it and making it hard? and in proportion, as it was more dry, would it not the more imbibe and suck up the Water? and how were the great Mountains of the Earth made, in the North and in the South, where the influence of the Sun is not great? what sunk the Earth there, and made the flesh start from the bones? But tis no wonder that Epicurus should give such a mean account of the Origin of the Earth, and the form of its parts, who did not so much as understand the general Figure of the Body of it, that it was Spherical, or that the Heavens encompast it round. One must have a blind love for that Philosophy, and for the conclusions it drives at, not to see its lameness and defects in those first and fundamental parts.

Aristotle, though he was not concerned to give an account how the Earth came into this present form, as he supposed it, Eternal; yet upon another consideration he seems obliged to give some reason how the Elements came into this disorder; seeing he supposeth, that, according to the order of Nature, the Water should lie above the Earth in a Sphere, as the Air doth above the Water, and his Fire above the Air. This he toucheth upon in his Meteors, but so gently and fearfully, as if he was handling hot coals. He saith the Sea is to be considered as the Element, or body of Waters that belongs to this Earth, and that these Waters change places, and the Sea is some Ages in one part of the Globe, and some Ages in another; but that this is at such great distances of time that there can be no memory or record of it. And he seems willing to suppose that the Water was once all over the Earth, but that it dried up in certain places, and continuing in others, it there made the Sea.

What a miserable account is this? As to his change or removal of the Sea-chanel in several Ages, as it is without all proof or probability, if he mean it of the Chanel of the great Ocean, so tis nothing to the purpose here; for the question is not why the Chanel of the Sea is in such a part of the Earth, rather than in another, but why there is any such prodigious Cavity in or upon the Earth any where. And if we take his supposition, that the Element of Water was once higher than the Earth, and lay in a Sphere about it, then let him tell us in plain terms how the Earth got above, or how the Cavity of the Ocean was made, and how the Mountains rise; for this Elementary Earth which lay under the Water, was, I suppose, equal and smooth when it lay there; and what reason was there, that the Waters should be dried in one part of it, more than another, if they were every where of an equal depth, and the ground equal under them? It was not the Climates made any distinction, for there is Sea towards the Poles, as well as under the uator; but suppose they were dried up in certain places, that would make no Mountains, no more than there are Mountains in our dried Marches: And the places where they were not dried, would not therefore become as deep and hollow as the Sea-chanel, and tear the Earth and Rocks in pieces. If you should say that this very Elementary Earth, as it lay under the Waters, was unequal, and was so originally, formed into Mountains and Valleys, and great Cavities; besides that the supposition is altogether irrational in it self, you must suppose a prodigious mass of Water to cover such an Earth; as much as we found requisite for the vulgar Deluge, namely, eight Oceans; and what then is become of the other seven? Upon the whole I do not see that either in Epicurus's way, who seems to suppose that the Waters were at first within the Earth; nor in Aristotle's way, who seems to suppose them upon the Earth, any rational or tolerable account can be given of the present form of the Earth.

Wherefore some modern Authors, dissatisfied, as very well they might be, with these Explications given us by the Ancients concerning the form of the Earth, have pitched upon other causes, more true indeed in their kind, and in their degree, but that fall as much short of those effects to which they would apply them. They say that all the irregularities of the body of the Earth have risen from Earthquakes in particular places, and from Torrents and Inundations, and from eruptions of Fire, or such like causes, whereof we see some instances more or less every Age; And these have made that havock upon the face of the Earth, and turned things up-side down, raising the Earth in some places, and making great Cavities or Chasms in others, so as to have brought it at length into that torn, broken, and disorderly form in which we now see it.

These Authors do so far agree with us, as to acknowledge that the present irregular form of the Earth must have proceeded from ruines and dissolutions of one sort or other, but these ruines they make to have been partial only, in this or in that Country, by piece-meal, and in several Ages, and from no other causes but such as still continue to act in Nature, namely, accidental Earthquakes and eruptions of Fires and Waters. These causes we acknowledge as readily as they do, but not as capable to produce so great effects as they would ascribe to them: The surface of the Earth may be a little changed by such accidents as these, but for the most part they rather sink the Mountains than raise new ones: As when Houses are blown up by Mines of powder, they are not set higher, but generally fall lower and flatter: Or suppose they do sometimes raise an Hill, or a little Mount, what's that to the great Mountains of our World, to those long and vast piles of Rocks and Stones, which the Earth can scarce bear? What's that to strong-backt Taurusor Atlas, to the American Andes, or to a Mountain that reacheth from the Pyreneansto the EuxineSea? There's as much difference between these and those factitious Mountains they speak of, as betwixt them and Mole-hills.

And to answer more distinctly to this opinion, as before in speaking of Islands we distinguished betwixt Factitious and Original Islands, so if you please we may distinguish here betwixt Factitious and Original Mountains; and allowing some few, and those of the fifth or sixth magnitude, to have risen from such accidental causes, we enquire concerning the rest and the greatest, what was their Original?

If we should suppose that the seven Hills upon which Romestands, came from ruines or eruptions, or any such causes, it doth not follow that the Alpswere made so too. And as for Mountains, so for the Cavities of the Earth, I suppose there may be disruptions sometimes made by Earthquakes, and holes worn by subterraneous Fires and Waters; but what's that to the Chanel of the Atlantick Ocean, or of the Pacifick Ocean, which is extended an hundred and fifty degrees under the uator, and towards the Poles still further. He that should derive such mighty things from no greater causes, I should think him a very credulous Philosopher. And we are too subject indeed to that fault of credulity in matter of Philosophizing; Many when they have found out causes that are proper for certain effects within such a compass, they cannot keep them there, but they will make them do every thing for them; and extend them often to other effects of a superiour nature or degree, which their activity can by no means reach to. nahath been a burning Mountain ever since and above the memory of Man, yet it hath not destroyed that Island, nor made any new Chanel to the Sea, though it stands so near it. Neither is Vesuviusabove two or three miles distant from the Sea-side, to the best of my remembrance, and yet in so many Ages it hath made no passage to it, neither open nor subterraneous. Tis true some Isthmus's have been thrown down by Earthquakes, and some Lakes have been made in that manner, but what's this to a Ditch nine thousand miles broad? such an one we have upon the Earth, and of a depth that is not measurable; what proportion have these causes to such an instance? and how many thousand Ages must be allowed to them to do their work, more than the Chronology of our Earth will bear?

Besides, when were these great Earthquakes and disruptions, that did such great execution upon the body of the Earth? was this before the Flood or since? If before, then the old difficulty returns, how could there be a Flood, if the Earth was in this Mountainous form before that time? This, I think, is demonstrated impossible in the Second and Third Chapters. If since the Flood, where were the Waters of the Earth before these Earthquakes made a Chanel for them? Besides, where is the History or Tradition that speaks of these strange things, and of this great change of the Earth? hath any writ of the Origins of the Alps? In what year of Rome, or what Olympiadthey were born? or how they grew from little ones? how the Earth groaned when it brought them forth, when its bowels were torn by the ragged Rocks? Do the Chronicles of the Nations mention these things, or ancient fame, or ancient Fables? were they made all at once, or in successive Ages? These causes continue still in Nature, we have still Earthquakes and subterraneous Fires and Waters, why should they not still operate and have the same effects? We often hear of Cities thrown down by Earthquakes, or Countries swallowed up, but whoever heard of a new chain of Mountains made upon the Earth, or a new Chanel made for the Ocean? We do not read that there hath been so much as a new Sinusof the Sea ever since the memory of man: Which is far more feasible than what they pretend. And things of this nature being both strange and sensible, excite admiration and great attention when they come to pass, and would certainly have been remembred or propagated in some way or other, if they had ever happened since the Deluge. They have recorded the foundation of Cities and Monarchies, the appearance of blazing-Stars, the eruptions of fiery Mountains, the most remarkable Earthquakes and Inundations, the great Eclipses or obscurations of the Sun, and any thing that looked strange or prodigy-like, whether in the Heavens or on Earth, and these which would have been the greatest prodigies and greatest changes that ever happened in nature, would these have escaped all observation and memory of men? that's as incredible as the things themselves are.

Lastly, to comprehend all these opinions together, both of the Ancient and Modern Authors, they seem all to agree with us in this, Thatthe Earth was once under another form; otherwise why do they go about to shew the causes how it came into this form. I desire then to know what form they suppose the Earth to have been under before the Mountains were made, the Chanel of the Sea, or subterraneous Cavities. Either they must take that form which we have assigned it before the Deluge, or else they must suppose it covered with Water, till the Sea-chanels were made, and the Mountains brought forth; As in that Fig. pag. 55 . And no doubt it was once in this form, both reason and the authority of Mosesassures us of it; and this is the Test which every opinion must be brought to, how the Earth emerged out of that watery form? and in particular, as to that opinion which we are now examining, the question is, howby Earthquakes, and fiery eruptions, subterraneous Waters, and such like causes, the body of the Earth could be wrought from that form to this present form? And the thing is impossible at first sight; for such causes as these could not take place in such an Earth. As for subterraneous Waters, there could be none at that time, for they were all above ground; and as for subterraneous Exhalations, whether Fiery or Aery, there was no place for them neither, for the Earth when it lay under the Water was a solid uniform mass, compact and close united in its parts, as we have shewn before upon several occasions; no Mines or hollow Vaults for the Vapours to be lodged in, no Store-houses of Fire, nothing that could make Earthquakes, nor any sort of ruines or eruptions: These are Engines that cannot play but in an Earth already broken, hollow, and cavernous. Therefore the Authors of this opinion do in effect beg the question; they assign such causes of the present form of the Earth, as could not take place, nor have any activity until the Earth was in this form: These causes may contribute something to increase the rudeness and inequalities of the Earth in certain places, but they could not be the original causes of it: And that not only because of their disproportion to such effects, but also because of their incapacity, or non-existence at that time when these effects were to be wrought.

Thus much concerning the Philosophical opinions, or the natural Causes that have been assigned for the irregular form of this present Earth. Let us now consider the Theological opinions, how Mountains were made at first, and the wonderful Chanel of the Sea: And these Authors say, God Almighty made them immediately when he made the World; and so dispatch the business in a few words. This is a short account indeed, but we must take heed that we do not derogate from the perfection of God, by ascribing all things promiscuously to his immediate action. I have often suggested that the first order of things is regular and simple, according as the Divine Nature is; and continues so till there is some degeneracy in the moral World; I have also noted upon several occasions, especially in the Lat. Treat. Chap. II the deformity and incommodiousness of the present Earth; and from these two considerations we may reasonably infer, that the present state of the Earth was not Original, but is a state of subjection to Vanity, wherein it must continue till the redemption and restitution of all things.

But besides this general consideration, there are many others, both Natural and Theological against this opinion, which the Authors of it, I believe, will find unanswerable. As first, St. Peter's distinction betwixt the present Earth and the Ante-diluvian; and that in opposition to certain profane persons, who seem to have been of the same opinion with these Authors, namely, that the Heavens and the Earth were the same now that they had been from the beginning, and that there had been no change in Nature, either of late, or in former Ages; These St. Peter confutes and upbraids them with ignorance or forgetfulness of the change that was brought upon Nature at the Deluge, or that the Ante-diluvian Heavens and Earth were of a different form and constitution from the present, whereby that World was obnoxious to a Deluge of Water, as the present is to a Deluge of Fire. Let these Authors put themselves in the place of those Objectors, and see what answer they can make to the Apostle, whom I leave to dispute the case with them. I hope they will not treat this Epistle of St. Peter's so rudely as Didymus Alexandrinusdid, an ancient Christian, and one of St. Jerom's Masters, he was of the same opinion with these Theological Authors, and so fierce in it, that seeing St. Peter's doctrine here to be contrary, he said this Epistle of St. Peter's was corrupted, and was not to be received into the Canon. And all this because it taught that the Heavens and the Earth had changed their form, and would do so again at the Conflagration; so as the same World would be Triform in success of time. We acknowledge his Exposition of St. Peter's words to be very true, but what he makes an argument of the corruption of this Epistle, is rather, in my mind, a peculiar argument of its Divine Inspiration. In the second place, these writers dash upon the old rock, the impossibility of explaining the Deluge; if there were Mountains from the beginning, and the Earth then in the same form as it is now. Thirdly, they make the state of Paradiseas unintelligible as that of the Deluge; For those properties that are assigned to Paradiseby the Ancients, are inconsistent with the present form of the Earth: As will appear in the Second Book. Lastly, they must answer, and give an account of all those marks which we have observed in Nature (both in this Chapter, and the Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh), of fractions, ruines, and dissolutions that have been on the Earth, and which we have shewn to be inexplicable, unless we admit that the Earth was once in another form.

These arguments being premised, let us now bring their opinion close to the Test, and see in what manner these Mountains must have been made according to them, and how the Chanel of the Sea, and all other Cavities of the Earth.}Let us to this purpose consider the Earth again in that transient incompleat form which it had when the Abysse encompast the whole body of it; we both agree that the Earth was once in this state, and they say that it came immediately out of this state into its present form, there being made by a supernatural Power a great Chanel or Ditch in one part of it, which drew off the Waters from the rest, and the Earth which was squeezed and forced out of this Ditch made the Mountains. So there is the Chanel of the Sea made, and the Mountains of the Earth; how the subterraneous Cavities were made according to these Authors, I do not well know. This I confess seems to me a very gross thought, and a way of working very un-God-like; but however let's have patience to examine it.

And in the first place, if the Mountains were taken out of the Chanel of the Sea, then they are equal to it, and would fill it up if they were thrown in again. But these proportions upon examination will not agree; for though the Mountains of the Earth be very great, yet they do not equal by much the great Ocean. The Ocean extends to half the surface of the Earth; and if you suppose the greatest depth of the Ocean to answer the height of the greatest Mountains, and the middle depth to the middle sort of Mountains, the Mountains ought to cover all the dry Land to make them answer to all the capacity of the Ocean; whereas we supposed them upon a reasonable computation to cover but the tenth part of the dry Land; and consequently, neither they, nor the Sea-chanel, could have been produced in this manner, because of their great disproportion to one another. And the same thing appears, if we compare the Mountains with the Abyss, which covered the Earth before this Chanel was made; for this Chanel being made great enough to contain all the Abyss, the Mountains taken out of it must also be equal to all the Abyss, but the aggregate of the Mountains will not answer this by many degrees; for suppose the Abyss was but half as deep as the deep Ocean, to make this Calculus answer, all the dry Land ought to be covered with Mountains, and with Mountains as high as the Ocean is deep, or doubly high to the depth of the Abyss, because they are but upon one half of the Globe. And this is the first argument against the reciprocal production of Mountains and the Sea, their incongruency or disproportion.

Secondly, we are to consider that a great many Mountains of the Earth are far distant from any Seas, as the great in-land Mountains of Asiaand of Africk, and the SarmatickMountains, and others in Europe, how were these great bodies flung thorough the Air from their respective Seas, whence they were taken, to those places where they stand? What appearance is there in common reason, or credibility, that these huge masses of Earth and Stone that stand in the middle of Continents, were dug out of any Seas? We think it strange, and very deservedly, that a little Chapel should be transported from Palestineto Italyover Land and Sea, much more the transportation of Mount Atlasor Taurusthorough the Air, or of a range of Mountains two or three thousand miles long, would surely upon all accounts appear incongruous and incredible: Besides, neither the hollow form of Mountains, nor the stony matter whereof they commonly consist, agrees with that supposition, that they were prest or taken out of the Chanel of the Sea.

Lastly, We are to consider that the Mountains are not barely laid upon the Earth, as a Tomb-stone upon a Grave, nor stand as Statues do upon a Pedestal, as this opinion seems to suppose; but they are one continued substance with the body of the Earth, and their roots reach into the Abyss; As the Rocks by the Sea-side go as deep as the bottom of the Sea in one continued mass: And tis a ridiculous thing to imagine the Earth first a plain surface, then all the Mountains set upon it, as Hay-cocks in a Field, standing upon their fiat bottoms. There is no such common surface in Nature, nor consequently any such super-additions, tis all one frame or mass, only broken and disjoynted in the parts of it. To conclude, tis not only the Mountains that make the inequalities of the Earth, or the irregularity of its surface, every Country, every Province, every Field hath an unequal and different situation, higher or lower, inclined more or less, and sometimes one way, sometimes another, you can scarce take a miles compass in any place where the surface of the ground continues uniform; and can you imagine that there were Moulds or Stones brought from the Sea-chanel to make all those inequalities? Or that Earthquakes have been in every Country, and in every Field? The inner Veins and Lares of the Earth are also broken as well as the surface. These must proceed from universal causes, and all those that have been alledged, whether from Philosophy or Theology, are but particular or Topical. I am fully satisfied, in contemplation of these things, and so I think every unprejudiced person may be, that to such an irregular variety of situation and construction, as we see every where in the parts of the Earth, nothing could answer but some universal concussion or dislocation, in the nature of a general ruine.

We have now finisht this first part of our Theory, and all that concerns the Deluge or dissolution of the Earth; and we have not only establisht our own Hypothesisby positive arguments, but also produced and examined all suppositions that have been offered by others, whether Philosophical or Theological, for the Explication of the same things; so as nothing seems now to remain further upon this subject. For a conclusion of all, we will consider, if you please, the rest of the Earths, or of the Planets within our Heavens, that appertain to the same common Sun; to see, so far as we can go by rational conjectures, if they be not of the same Fabrick, and have undergone the like fate and forms with our Earth. It is now acknowledged by the generality of Learned Men, that the Planets are Opake bodies, and particularly our next neighbour, the Moon, is known to be a Terraqueous Globe, consisting of Mountains and Valleys, as our Earth does; and we have no reason to believe but that she came into that form by a dissolution, or from like causes as our Earth did. Mercuryis so near the Sun, that we cannot well discern his face, whether spotted or no, nor make a judgment of it. But as for Venusand Mars, if the spots that be observed in them be their Waters or their Sea, as they are in the Moon, tis likely They are also Terraqueous Globes, and in much what a like form with the Moon and the Earth, and, for ought we know, from like causes. Particularly as to Venus, tis a remarkable passage that St. Austin hath preserved out of Varro, he saith, That about the time of the great Deluge there was a wonderful alteration or Catastrophe happened to the Planet Venus, and that she changed her colour, form, figure, and magnitude. This is a great presumption that she suffered her dissolution about the same time that our Earth did. I do not know that any such thing is recorded concerning any of the other Planets, but the body of Mars looks very rugged, broken, and much disordered.

Saturnand Jupiterdeserve a distinct consideration, as having something particular and different from the rest of the Planets. Saturnis remarkable for his Hoopor Ring, which seems to stand off from his body, and would strongly induce one to believe, that the exteriour Earth of that Planet, at its dissolution, did not all fall in, but the Polar parts sinking into the Abyss, the middle or uinoctial parts still subsisted, and bore themselves up in the nature of an Arch about the Planet, or of a Bridge, as it were, built over the Sea of Saturn. Jupiter of all the Planets I take to be most intire, and in an Ante-diluvian state; His Fascir Belts, as they call them, I should guess to be Waters, or the two frigid Zones, where his Waters fall and make two Canals in those parts; such as we shall show to have been in our Earth before it was broke. This Planet without all doubt is turned about its Axis, otherwise how should its Four Moons be carried about it? And this is also collected from the motion of that (permanent) spot that is upon its body; which spot I take to be either a Lake, or a Chasm and Hiatusinto the Abysse of the Planet; that is part of the Abysse open or uncovered, like the Aperture we made in the Seventh Figure. And this might either have been left so, by Providence, at first, for some reasons fitting that Earth, or it may have fain in afterwards, as Plato's Atlantis, or as Sodomand Gomorrha, as some judgment upon part of that World. However that be, as to the Belts of Jupiter, which are the most remarkable Phomenonof that Planet, I take them to be his Zones, and to lie parallel with one another, and I believe also with his uator: But we must first know how his Poles lie, and in what situation with the Ecliptick, and in what Aspect to us, before such things can be certainly determined. In the mean time, if we have guest aright, that Jupiteris in an Ante-diluvian state, I should rather expect to find the Figure of his Body, than of any other of the Planets, to be Oval or Oblong, such as our Earth was before its Deluge. To conclude, seeing all the Planets that are placed in this Heaven, and are the foster-children of this Sun, seem to have some affinity one with another, and have much-what the same countenance, and the same general Phomena; It seems probable that they rise much-what the same way, and after the like manner as our Earth, each one from its respective Chaos; And that they had the same Elementary Regions at first, and an exteriour Orb formed over their Abyss: And lastly, that every one of them hath suffered, or is to suffer its Deluge, as our Earth hath done. These, I say, are probable conjectures according to the Analogy of Reason and Nature, so far as we can judge concerning things very remote and inaccessible.

And these things being thus, and our Theory of the Deluge, and the Dissolution which brought it, having such a general agreement both with our Heavens and our Earth, I think there is nothing but the uncouthness of the thing to some mens understandings, the custom of thinking otherwise, and the uneasiness of entring into a new sett of thoughts, that can be a bar or hindrance to its reception.

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• September 25, 2011
• 0
• Published in The Sacred theory of the Earth
• Written by LC Geerts

Book I: Chapter XI

THE SACRED THEORY OF THE EARTH

by Thomas Burnet

THE THEORY OF THE EARTH

Book I

Concerning the Deluge, and the Dissolution of the Earth.

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CHAPTER XI

Concerning the Mountains of the Earth, their greatness and irregular Form, their Situation, Causes, and Origin.

WE have been in the hollows of the Earth, and the Chambers of the Deep, amongst the damps and steams of those lower Regions; let us now go air our selves on the tops of the Mountains, where we shall have a more free and large Horizon, and quite another face of things will present it self to our observation.

The greatest objects of Nature are, methinks, the most pleasing to behold; and next to the great Concave of the Heavens, and those boundless Regions where the Stars inhabit, there is nothing that I look upon with more pleasure than the, wide Sea and the Mountains of the Earth. There is something august and stately in the Air of these things, that inspires the mind with great thoughts and passions; We do naturally, upon such occasions, think of God and his greatness: and whatsoever hath but the shadow and appearance of INFINITE, as all things have that are too big for our comprehension, they fill and over-bear the mind with their Excess, and cast it into a pleasing kind of stupor and admiration.

And yet these Mountains we are speaking of, to confess the truth, are nothing but great ruines; but such as show a certain magnificence in Nature; as from old Temples and broken Amphitheaters of the Romanswe collect the greatness of that people. But the grandeur of a Nation is less sensible to those that never see the remains and monuments they have left, and those who never see the mountainous parts of the Earth, scarce ever reflect upon the causes of them, or what power in Nature could be sufficient to produce them. The truth is, the generality of people have not sence and curiosity enough to raise a question concerning these things, or concerning the Original of them. You may tell them that Mountains grow out of the Earth like Fuzz-balls, or that there are Monsters under ground that throw up Mountains as Moles do Mole-hills; they will scarce raise one objection against your doctrine; or if you would appear more Learned, tell them that the Earth is a great Animal, and these are Wens that grow upon its body. This would pass current for Philosophy; so much is the World drowned in stupidity and sensual pleasures, and so little inquisitive into the works of God and Nature.

There is nothing doth more awaken our thoughts or excite our minds to enquire into the causes of such things, than the actual view of them; as I have had experience my self when it was my fortune to cross theAlps and AppennineMountains; for the sight of those wild, vast and indigested heaps of Stones and Earth, did so deeply strike my fancy, that I was not easie till I could give my self some tolerable account how that confusion came in Nature. Tis true, the height of Mountains compared with the Diameter of the Earth is not considerable, but the extent of them and the ground they stand upon, bears a considerable proportion to the surface of the Earth; and if from Europewe may take our measures for the rest, I easily believe, that the Mountains do at least take up the tenth part of the dry land. The Geographers are not very careful to describe or note in their Charts, the multitude or situation of Mountains; They mark the bounds of Countries, the site of Cities and Towns, and the course of Rivers, because these are things of chief use to civil affairs and commerce, and that they design to serve, and not Philosophy or Natural History. But Cluveriusin his description of Ancient Germany, Switzerlandand Italy, hath given Maps of those Countries more approaching to the natural face of them, and we have drawn (at the end of this Chapter) such a Map of either Hemisphere, without marking Countries or Towns, or any such artificial things; distinguishing only Land and Sea, Islands and Continents, Mountains and not Mountains; and tis very useful to imagine the Earth in this manner, and to look often upon such bare draughts as shew us Nature undrest; for then we are best able to judge what her true shapes and proportions are.

Tis certain that we naturally imagine the surface of the Earth much more regular than it is; for unless we be in some Mountainous parts, there seldom occur any great inequalities within so much compass of ground as we can, at once, reach with our Eye; and to conceive the rest, we multiply the same Idea, and extend it to those parts of the Earth that we do not see; and so fancy the whole Globe much more smooth and uniform than it is. But suppose a man was carried asleep out of a Plain Country, amongst the Alps, and left there upon the top of one of the highest Mountains, when he waked and looked about him, he would think himself in an inchanted Country, or carried into another World; Every thing would appear to him so different to what he had ever seen or imagined before. To see on every hand of him a multitude of vast bodies thrown together in confusion, as those Mountains are; Rocks standing naked round about him; and the hollow Valleys gaping under him; and at his feet it may be, an heap of frozen Snow in the midst of Summer. He would hear the thunder come from below, and see the black Clouds hanging beneath him; Upon such a prospect, it would not be easie to him to perswade himself that he was still upon the same Earth; but if he did, he would be convinced, at least, that there are some Regions of it strangely rude, and ruine-like, and very different from what he had ever thought of before. But the inhabitants of these wild places are even with us; for those that live amongst the Alpsand the great Mountains, think that all the rest of the Earth is like their Country, all broken into Mountains, and Valleys, and Precipices; They never see other, and most people think of nothing but what they have seen at one time or another.

These Alpswe are speaking of are the greatest range of Mountains in Europe; and tis prodigious to see and to consider of what extent these heaps of Stones and Rubbish are; one way they overspread Savoyand Dauphin and reach through Franceto the PyreneanMountains, and so to the Ocean. The other way they run along the skirts of Germany, through Stiria, Pannonia, and Dalmatia, as far as Thraceand the Black Sea. Then backwards they cover Switzerlandand the parts adjacent; and that branch of them which we call the Appennines, strikes through Italy, and is, as it were, the back-bone of that Country. This must needs be a large space of ground which they stand upon; Yet tis not this part of Europeonly that is laden with Mountains, the Northern part is as rough and rude in the face of the Country, as in the manners of the people; Bohemia, Silesia, Denmark, Norway, Sweedland, Lapland, and Iseland, and all the coasts of the Baltick Sea, are full of Clifts, and Rocks, and Crags of Mountains: Besides the RipheanMountains in Muscovy, which the Inhabitants there use to call the Stone girdle, and believe that it girds the Earth round about.

Nor are the other parts of our Continent more free from Mountains than Europe, nor other parts of the Earth than our Continent: They are in the New World as well as the Old; and if they could discover two or three New Worlds or Continents more, they would still find them there. Neither is there any Original Island upon the Earth, but is either all a Rock, or hath Rocks and Mountains in it. And all the dry Land, and every Continent, is but a kind of Mountain: though that Mountain hath a multitude of lesser ones, and Valleys, and Plains, and Lakes, and Marshes, and all variety of grounds.

In America, the Andes, or a ridge of Mountains so called, are reported to be higher than any we have, reaching above a thousand Leagues in length, and twenty in breadth, where they are the narrowest. In Africkthe Mountain Atlas, that for its height was said to bear the Heavens on its back, runs all along from the Western Sea to the borders of ypt, parallel with the Mediterranean. There also are the Mountains of the Moon, and many more whereof we have but an imperfect account, as neither indeed of that Country in the remote and inner parts of it. Asiais better known, and the Mountains thereof better describ'd: Taurus, which is the principal, was adjudged by the ancient Geographers the greatest in the World. It divides Asia into two parts, which have their denomination from it: And there is an Anti-Taurusthe greater and the less, which accordingly divide Armeniainto greater and less. Then the CruciformMountains of Imaus, the famous Caucasus, the long Chains of Tartaryand China, and the Rocky and Mountainous Arabia. If one could at once have a prospect of all these together, one would be easily satisfied, that the Globe of the Earth is a more rude and indigested Body than tis commonly imagined; If one could see, I say, all the Kingdoms and Regions of the Earth at one view, how they lie in broken heaps; The Sea hath overwhelmed one half of them, and what remains are but the taller parts of a ruine. Look upon those great ranges of Mountains in Europeor in Asia, whereof we have given a short survey, in what confusion do they lie? They have neither form nor beauty, nor shape, nor order, no more than the Clouds in the Air. Then how barren, how desolate, how naked are they? how they stand neglected by Nature? neither the Rains can soften them, nor the Dews from Heaven make them fruitful.

I have given this short account of the Mountains of the Earth, to help to remove that prejudice we are apt to have, or that conceit, That the present Earth is regularly formed. And to this purpose I do not doubt but that it would be of very good use to have naturalMaps of the Earth, as we noted before, as well as civil; and done with the same care and judgment. Our common Maps I call Civil, which note the distinction of Countries and of Cities, and represent the Artificial Earth as inhabited and cultivated: But natural Maps leave out all that, and represent the Earth as it would be if there was not an Inhabitant upon it, nor ever had been; the Skeleton of the Earth, as I may so say, with the site of all its parts. Methinks also every Prince should have such a Draught of his own Country and Dominions, to see how the ground lies in the several parts of them, which highest, which lowest; what respect they have to one another, and to the Sea; how the Rivers flow, and why; how the Mountains stand, how the Heaths, and how the Marches are placed. Such a Map or Survey would be useful both in time of War and Peace, and many good observations might be made by it, not only as to Natural History and Philosophy, but also in order to the perfect imEvidencement of a Countrey. But to return to our Mountains.

As this Survey of the multitude and greatness of them may help to rectifie our mistakes about the form of the Earth, so before we proceed to examine their causes, it will be good to observe farther, that these Mountains are placed in no order one with another, that can either respect use or beauty; And if you consider them singly, they do not consist of any proportion of parts that is referrable to any design, or that hath the least footsteps of Art or Counsel. There is nothing in Nature more shapeless and ill-figured than an old Rock or a Mountain, and all that variety that is among them, is but the various modes of irregularity; so as you cannot make a better character of them, in short, than to say they are of all forms and figures, except regular. Then if you could go within these Mountains, (for they are generally hollow,) you would find all things there more rude, if possible, than without: And lastly, if you look upon an heap of them together, or a Mountainous Country, they are the greatest examples of confusion that we know in Nature; no Tempest or Earthquake puts things into more disorder. Tis true, they cannot look so ill now as they did at first; a ruine that is fresh looks much worse than afterwards, when the Earth grows discoloured and skined over. But I fancy if we had seen the Mountains when they were new-born and raw, when the Earth was fresh broken, and the waters of the Deluge newly retied, the fractions and confusions of them would have appeared very gastly and frightful.

After this general Survey of the Mountains of the Earth and their properties, let us now reflect upon the causes of them. There is a double pleasure in Philosophy, first that of Admiration, whilst we contemplate things that are great and wonderful, and do not yet understand their Causes; for though admiration proceed from ignorance, yet there is a certain charm and sweetness in that passion. Then the second pleasure is greater and more intellectual, which is that of distinct knowledge and comprehension, when we come to have the Key that unlocks those secrets, and see the methods wherein those things come to pass that we admired before; The reasons why the World is so or so, and from what causes Nature, or any part of Nature, came into such a state; and this we are now to enquire after as to the Mountains of the Earth, what their original was, how and when the Earth came into this strange frame and structure? In the beginning of our World, when the Earth rise from a Chaos, twas impossible it should come immediately into this Mountainous form; because a mass that is fluid, as a Chaos is, cannot lie in any other figure than what is regular; for the constant laws of Nature do certainly bring all Liquors into that form: And a Chaos is not called so from any confusion or brokenness in the form of it, but from a confusion and mixture of all sorts of ingredients in the composition of it. So we have already produced, in the precedent Chapters, a double argument that the Earth was not originally in this form, both becaute it rise from a Chaos, which could not of it self, or by any immediate concretion, settle into a form of this nature, as hath been shown in the Fourth and Fifth Chapters; as also because if it had been originally made thus, it could never have undergone a Deluge, as hath been Evidenced in the Second and Third Chapters. If this be then a secondary and succedaneous form, the great question is from what causes it arises.

Some have thought that Mountains, and all other irregularities in the Earth, have rise from Earthquakes, and such like causes; others have thought that they came from the universal Deluge; yet not from any dissolution of the Earth that was then, but only from the great agitation of the waters, which broke the ground into this rude and unequal form. Both these causes seem to me very incompetent and insufficient. Earthquakes seldom make Mountains, they often take them away, and sink them down into the Caverns that lie under them; Besides, Earthquakes are not in all Countries and Climates as Mountains are; for, as we have observed more than once, there is neither Island that is original, nor Continent any where in the Earth, in what latitude soever, but hath Mountains and Rocks in it. And lastly, what probability is there, or how is it credible, that those vast tracts of Land which we see filled with Mountains both in Europe, Asiaand Africa, were raised by Earthquakes, or any eruptions from below. In what Age of the World was this done, and why not continued? As for the Deluge, I doubt not but Mountains were made in the time of the general Deluge, that great change and transformation of the Earth happened then, but not from such causes as are pretended, that is, the bare rowling and agitation of the waters; For if the Earth was smooth and plain before the Flood, as they seem to suppose as well as we do, the waters could have little or no power over a smooth surface to tear it any way in pieces, no more than they do a meadow or low ground when they lie upon it; for that which makes Torrents and Land-floods violent, is their fall from the Mountains and high Lands, which our Earth is now full of, but if the Rain fell upon even and level ground, it would only sadden and compress it; there is no possibility how it should raise Mountains in it. And if we could imagine an universal Deluge as the Earth is now constituted, it would rather throw down the Hills and Mountains than raise new ones; or by beating down their tops and loose parts, help to fill the Valleys, and bring the Earth nearer to evenness and plainness.

Seeing then there are no hopes of explaining the Origin of Mountains, either from particular Earthquakes, or from the general Deluge, according to the common notion and Explication of it; these not being causes answerable to such vast effects; Let us try our Hypothesisagain; which hath made us a Chanel large enough for the Sea, and room for all subterraneous Cavities, and I think will find us materials enough to raise all the Mountains of the Earth. We suppose the great Arch or circumference of the first Earth to have fallen into the Abyss at the Deluge, and seeing that was larger than the surface it fell upon, tis absolutely certain, that it could not all fall flat, or lie under the water: Now as all those parts that stood above the water made dry Land, or the present habitable Earth, so such parts of the dry Land as stood higher than the rest, made Hills and Mountains; And this is the first and general account of them, and of all the inequalities of the Earth. But to consider these things a little more particularly; There is a double cause and necessity of Mountains, first this now mentioned, because the exteriour Orb of the Earth was greater than the interiour which it fell upon, and therefore it could not all fall flat; and secondly, because this exteriour Orb did not fall so flat and large as it might, or did not cover all the bottom of the Abyss, as it was very capable to do; but as we shewed before in explaining the Chanel of the Ocean, it left a gaping in the middle, or an Abyss-chanel, as I should call it; and the broader this Abyss-chanel was, the more Mountains there would be upon the dry Land; for there would be more Earth, or more of the falling Orb left, and less room to place it in, and therefore it must stand more in heaps.

In what parts of the Earth these heaps would lie, and in what particular manner, it cannot be expected that we should tell; but all that we have hitherto observ'd concerning Mountains, how strange soever and otherwise unaccountable, may easily be explained, and deduced from this original; we shall not wonder at their greatness and vastness, seeing they are the ruines of a broken World; and they would take up more or less of the dry Land, according as the Ocean took up more or less space of our Globe: Then as to their figure and form, whether External or Internal, tis just such as answers our expectation, and no more than what the Hypothesisleads us to; For you would easily believe that these heaps would be irregular in all manner of ways, whether considered apart, or in their situation to one another. And they would lie commonly in Clusters and in Ridges, for those are two of the most general postures of the parts of a ruine, when they fall inwards. Lastly, we cannot wonder that Mountains should be generally hollow; For great bodies falling together in confusion, or bearing and leaning against one another, must needs make a great many hollownesses in them, and by their unequal Applications empty spaces will be intercepted. We see also from the same reason, why mountainous Countries are subject to Earthquakes; and why Mountains often sink and fall down into the Caverns that lie under them; their joynts and props being decayed and worn, they become unable to bear their weight. And all these properties you see hang upon one and the same string, and are just consequences from our supposition concerning the dissolution of the first Earth. And there is no surer mark of a good Hypothesis, than when it doth not only hit luckily in one or two particulars, but answers all that it is to be applied to, and is adequate to Nature in her whole extent.

But how fully or easily soever these things may answer Nature, you will say, it may be, that all this is but an Hypothesis; that is, a kind of fiction or supposition that things were so and so at first, and by the coherence and agreement of the Effects with such a supposition, you would argue and Evidence that they were really so. This I confess is true, this is the method, and if we would know any thing in Nature further than our senses go, we can know it no otherwise than by an Hypothesis. When things are either too little for our senses, or too remote and inaccessible, we have no way to know the inward Nature, and the causes of their sensible properties, but by reasoning upon an Hypothesis. If you would know, for example, of what parts Water, or any other Liquor consists, they are too little to be discerned by the Eye, you must therefore take a supposition concerning their invisible figure and form, and if that agrees and gives the reason of all their sensible qualities, you understand the nature of Water. In like manner, if you would know the nature of a Comet, or of what matter the Sun consists, which are things inaccessible to us, you can do this no otherwise than by an Hypothesis; and if that Hypothesisbe easie and intelligible, and answers all the Phomenaof those two bodies, you have done as much as a Philosopheror as Humane reasoncan do. And this is what we have attempted concerning the Earth and concerning the Deluge; We have laid down an Hypothesisthat is easie and perspicuous, consisting of a few things, and those very intelligible, and from this we have given an account how the Old World was destroyed by a Deluge of water, and how the Earth came into this present form; so distinguished and interrupted with Sea and Land, Mountains and Valleys, and so broken in the surface and inward parts of it.

Fig 1

But to speak the Truth, this Theory is something more than a bare Hypothesis; because we are assured that the general ground that we go upon is true, namely, that the Earth rise at first from a Chaos; for besides Reason and Antiquity, Scripture it self doth assure as of that; and that one point being granted, we have deduced from it all the rest by a direct chain of consequences, which I think cannot be broken easily in partpart or link of it. Besides, the great hinge of this Theory upon which all the rest turns, is the distinction we make of the Antediluvian Earth and Heavens from the Post-diluvian, as to their form and constitution.

Fig. 2

And it will never be beaten out of my head, but that St. Peterhath made the same distinction sixteen hundred years since, and to the very same purpose; so that we have sure footing here again, and the Theory riseth above the character of a bare Hypothesis. And whereas an Hypothesisthat is clear and proportioned to Nature in every respect, is accounted morally certain, we must in equity give more than a moral certitude to this Theory. But I mean this only as to the general parts of it; for as to particularities, I look upon them only as problematical, and accordingly I affirm nothing therein but with a power of revocation, and a liberty to change my opinion when I shall be better informed. Neither do I know any Author that hath treated a matter new, remote, and consisting of a multitude of particulars, who would not have had occasion, if he had lived to have seen his Hypothesisfully examined, to have changed his mind and manner of explaining things, in many material instances.

To conclude both this Chapter and this Section, we have here added a Map or Draught of the Earth, according to the Natural face of it, as it would appear from the Moon, if we were a little nearer to her; or as it was at first after the Deluge, before Cities were built, distinctions of Countries made, or any alterations by humane industry. Tis chiefly to expose more to view the Mountains of the Earth, and the proportions of Sea and Land, to shew it as it lies in it self, and as a Naturalist ought to conceive and consider it. Tis true, there are far more Mountains upon the Earth than what are here represented, for more could not conveniently be placed in this narrow Scheme; But the best and most effectual way of representing the body of the Earth as it is by Nature, would be, not in plain Tables, but by a rough Globe, expressing all the considerable inequalities that are upon the Earth. The smooth Globes that we use, do but nourish in us the conceit of the Earth's regularity, and though they may be convenient enough for Geographical purposes, they are not so proper for Natural Science; nothing would be more useful, in this respect, than a rough Globe of the largest dimensions, wherein the Chanel of the Sea should be really hollow, as it is in Nature, with all its unequal depths according to the best soundings, and the shores exprest both according to matter and form, little Rocks standing where there are Rocks, and Sands and Beaches in the places where they are found; And all the Islands planted in the Sea-chanel in a due form, and in their solid dimensions. Then upon the Land should stand all the ranges of Mountains, in the same order or disorder that Nature hath set them there; And the in-land Seas, and great Lakes, or rather the beds they lie in, should be duly represented; as also the vast desarts of Sand as they lie upon the Earth. And this being done with care and due Art, would be a true Epitome or true model of our Earth. Where we should see, besides other instructions, what a rude Lump our World is, which we are so apt to dote upon.

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• September 25, 2011
• 0
• Published in The Sacred theory of the Earth
• Written by LC Geerts

Book I: Chapter X

THE SACRED THEORY OF THE EARTH

by Thomas Burnet

THE THEORY OF THE EARTH

Book I

Concerning the Deluge, and the Dissolution of the Earth.

---

CHAPTER X

Concerning the Chanel of the Sea, and the Original of it: The Causes of its irregular form and unequal depths: As also of the Original of Islands, their situation, and other properties.

WE have hitherto given an account of the Subterraneous Regions, and of their general form; We now come above ground to view the surface of the Globe, which we find Terraqueous, or divided into Sea and Land: These we must survey, and what is remarkable in them as to their frame and structure, we must give an account of from our Hypothesis, and shew to be inaccountable from any other.

As for the Ocean, there are two things considerable in it, the Water and the Chanel that contains it. The Water, no doubt is as ancient as the Earth and contemporary with it, and we suppose it to be part of the great Abysse wherein the World was drowned; the rest lying covered under the hollow fragments of Continents and Islands. But that is not so much the subject of our present discourse as the Chanel of the Ocean, that vast and prodigious Cavity that runs quite round the Globe, and reacheth, for ought we know, from Pole to Pole, and in many places is unsearchably deep: When I present this great Gulf to my imagination, emptied of all its waters, naked and gaping at the Sun, stretching its jaws from one end of the Earth to another, it appears to me the most ghastly thing in Nature. What hands or instruments could work a Trench in the body of the Earth of this vastness, and lay Mountains and Rocks on the side of it, as Ramparts to enclose it?

But as we justly admire its greatness, so we cannot at all admire its beauty or elegancy, for ’tis as deformed and irregular as it is great. And there appearing nothing of order or any regular design in its parts, it seems reasonable to believe that it was not the work of Nature, according to her first intention, or according to the first model that was drawn in measure and proportion, by the Line and by the Plummet, but a secondary work, and the best that could be made of broken materials. And upon this supposition ’tis easie to imagine, how upon the dissolution of the primæval Earth the Chanel of the Sea was made, or that huge Cavity that lies between the several Continents of the Earth; which shall be more particularly explained after we have viewed a little better the form of it, and the Islands that lie scattered by its shores.

There is no Cavity in the Earth, whether open or Subterraneous, that is comparably so great as that of the Ocean, nor would any appear of that deformity if we could see it empty. The inside of a Cave is rough and unsightly; The beds of great Rivers and great Lakes when they are laid dry, look very raw and rude; The Valleys of the Earth, if they were naked, without Trees and without Grass, nothing but bare ground and bare stones, from the tops of their Mountains would have a ghastly aspect; but the Sea-chanel is the complex of all these; here Caves, empty Lakes, naked Valleys are represented as in their original, or rather far exceeded and out-done as to all their irregularities; for the Cavity of the Ocean is universally irregular, both as to the shores and borders of it; as to the uncertain breadth and the uncertain depth of its several parts, and as to its ground and bottom and the whole mould: If the Sea had been drawn round the Earth in regular figures and borders, it might have been a great beauty to our Globe, and we should reasonably have concluded it a work of the first Creation, or of Nature's first production; but finding on the contrary all the marks of disorder and disproportion in it, we may as reasonably conclude, that it did not belong to the first order of things, but was something succedaneous, when the degeneracy of Mankind, and the judgments of God had destroyed the first World, and subjected the Creation to some kind of Vanity.

Nor can it easily be imagined, if the Sea had been always, and the Earth, in this Terraqueousform, broke into Continents and Islands, how Mankind could have been propagated at first through the face of the Earth, all from one head and from one place. For Navigation was not then known, at least as to the grand Ocean, or to pass from Continent to Continent; And, I believe, Noah's Ark was the first Ship, or Vessel of bulk, that ever was built in the World; how could then the Posterity of Adamoverflow the Earth, and stock the several parts of the World, if they had been distant or separate then, as they are now, by the interposal of the great Ocean? But this consideration we will insist upon more largely in another place; let us reflect upon the irregularities of the Sea-chanel again, and the possible causes of it.

If we could imagine the Chanel of the Sea to have been made as we may imagine the Chanels of Rivers to have been, by long and insensible attrition, the water wearing by degrees the ground under it, by the force it hash from its descent and course, we should not wonder at its irregular form; but ’tis not possible it should have had any such original; whence should its waters have descended, from what Mountains, or from what Clouds? Where is the spring-head of the Sea? what force could eat away half the surface of the Earth, and wear it hollow to an immeasurable depth? This must not be from feeble and lingring causes, such as the attrition of waters, but from some great violence offered to Nature, such as we suppose to have been in the general Deluge, when the frame of the Earth was broken. And after we have a little surveyed the Sea-coast, and so far as we can, the form of the Sea-chanel, we shall the more easily believe that they could have no other original than what we assign.

The shores and coasts of the Sea are no way equal or uniform, but go in a line uncertainly crooked and broke; indented and jaged as a thing torn, as you may see in the Maps of the Coasts and the Sea-charts; and yet there are innumerable more inequalities than are taken notice of in those draughts; for they only mark the greater Promontories and Bays; but there are besides those a multitude of Creeks and out-lets, necks of Land and Angles, which break the evenness of the shore in all manner of ways. Then the height and level of the shore is as uncertain as the line of it; ’Tis sometimes high and sometimes low, sometimes spread in sandy Plains, as smooth as the Sea it self, and of such an equal height with it, that the waves seem to have no bounds but the meer figure and convexity of the Globe; In other places ’tis raised into banks and ramparts of Earth, and in others ’tis walled in with Rocks; And all this without any order that we can observe, or any other reason than that this is what might be expected in a ruine.

As to the depths and soundings of the Sea, they are under no rule nor equality any more than the figures of the Shores; Shallows in some places, and Gulfs in others; beds of Sands sometimes, and sometimes Rocks under water; as Navigators have learned by a long and dangerous experience: And though we that are upon dry Land, are not much concerned how the Rocks and the Shelves lie in the Sea, yet a poor Ship-wreckt Mariner, when he hath run his Vessel upon a Rock in the middle of the Chanel, expostulates bitterly with Nature, who it was that placed that Rock there, and to what purpose? was there not room enough, saith he, upon the Land, or the Shore, to lay your great Stones, but they must be thrown into the middle of the Sea, as it were in spite to Navigation? The best Apology that can be made for Nature in this case, so far as I know, is to confess that the whole business of the Sea-chanel is but a ruine, and in a ruine things tumble uncertainly, and commonly lie in confusion: Though to speak the truth, it seldom happens, unless in narrow Seas, that Rocks or Banks or Islands lie in the middle of them, or very far from the Shores.

Having viewed the more visible parts of the Chanel of the Sea, we must now descend to the bottom of it, and see the form and contrivance of that; but who shall guide us in our journey, while we walk, as Jobsaith, in the search of the deep? Or who can make a description of that which none hath seen? It is reasonable to believe, that the bottom of the Sea is much more rugged, broken and irregular than the face of the Land; There are Mountains, and Valleys, and Rocks, and ridges of Rocks, and all the common inequalities we see upon Land; besides these, ’tis very likely there are Caves under water, and hollow passages into the bowels of the Earth, by which the Seas circulate and communicate one with another, and with Subterraneous waters; Those great Eddeesand infamous Syrtesand Whirlpools that are in some Seas, as the Baltickand the Mediterranean, that suck into them and overwhelm whatever comes within their reach, show that there is something below that sucks from them in proportion, and that drinks up the Sea as the Sea drinks up the Rivers. We ought also to imagine the Shores within the water to go inclined and sloping, but with great inequality; there are many Shelves in the way, and Chambers, and sharp Angles; and many broken Rocks and great Stones lie tumbled down to the bottom.

’Tis true these things affect us little, because they are not exposed to our senses; and we seldom give our selves the trouble to collect from reason what the form of the invisible and inaccessible parts of the Earth is; Or if we do sometimes, those Idea's are faint and weak, and make no lasting impression upon our imagination and passions; but if we should suppose the Ocean dry, and that we lookt down from the top of some high Cloud upon the empty Shell, how horridly and barbarously would it look? And with what amazement should we see it under us like an open Hell, or a wide bottomless pit? So deep, and hollow, and vast; so broken and confused, so every way deformed and monstrous. This would effectually waken our imagination, and make us inquire and wonder how such a thing came in Nature; from what causes, by what force or engines could the Earth be torn in this prodigious manner? did they dig the Sea with Spades, and carry out the molds in hand-baskets? where are the entrails laid? and how did they cleave the Rocks asunder? if as many Pioneers as the Army of Xerxes, had been at work ever since the beginning of the World, they could not have made a ditch of this greatness. According to the proportions taken before in the Second Chapter, the Cavity or capacity of the Sea-chanel will amount to no less than 4639090 cubical miles. Nor is it the greatness only, but that wild and multifarious confusion which we see in the parts and fashion of it, that makes it strange and inaccountable; ’tis another Chaos in its kind, who can paint the Scenes of it? Gulfs, and Precipices, and Cataracts; Pits within Pits, and Rocks under Rocks, broken Mountains and ragged Islands, that look as if they had been Countries pulled up by the roots, and planted in the Sea.

If we could make true and full representations of these things to our selves, I think we should not be so bold as to make them the immediate product of Divine Omnipotence; being destitute of all appearance of Art or Counsel. The first orders of things are more perfect and regular, and this Decorumseems to be observed afterwards, Nature doth not fall into disorder till Mankind be first degenerate and leads the way. Monsters have been often made an argument against Providence; if a Calf have two heads, or five legs, streight there must not be a God in Heaven, or at least not upon Earth; and yet this is but a chance that happens once in many years, and is of no consequence at all to the rest of the World: but if we make the standing frame of Nature monstrous, or deformed and disproportioned, and to have been so not by corruption and degeneracy, but immediately by Divine Creation or Formation, it would not be so easie to answer that objection against Providence. Let us therefore prevent this imputation, and supposing, according to our Theory, that these things were not originally thus, let us now explain more distinctly how they came to pass at the Deluge, or upon the dissolution of the first Earth.

And we will not content our selves with a general answer to these observations concerning the Sea-chanel, as if it was a sufficient account of them to say they were the effects of a ruine; there are other things to be considered and explained besides this irregularity, as the vast hollowness of this Cavity, bigger incomparably than any other belonging to the Earth; and also the declivity of the sides of it, which lie shelving from top to bottom; For notwithstanding all the inequalities we have taken notice of in the Chanel or the Sea, it hath one general form, which may, though under many differences, be observed throughout, and that is, that the shores and sides within the water lie inclined, and you descend by degrees to the deepest part, which is towards the middle. This, I know, admits of many exceptions, for sometimes upon a rocky shore, or among rocky Islands the Sea is very deep close to the Rocks, and the deeper commonly the higher and steeper the Rocks are. Also where the descent is more leisurely, ’tis often after a different manner, in some Coasts more equal and uniform, in others more broken and interrupted, but still there is a descent to the Chanel or deepest part, and this in the deep Ocean is fathomless; And such a deep Ocean, and such a deep Chanel there is always between Continents. This, I think, is a property as determinate as any we can pitch upon in the Chanel of the Sea, and with those other two mentioned, its vast Cavity and universal irregularity, is all one can desire an account of as to the form of it; we will therefore from this ground take our rise and first measures for the Explication of the Sea-chanel.

Fig. 1


Fig. 2


Fig 3


Let us suppose then in the dissolution of the Earth when it began to fall, that it was divided only into three or four fragments, according to the number of our Continents; but those fragments being vastly great could not descend at their full breadth and expansion, or at least could not descend so fast in the middle as towards the extremities; because the Air about the edges would yield and give place easily, not having far to go to get out of the way; but the Air that was under the middle of the fragment could not without a very swift motion get from under the concave of it, and consequently its descent there would be more resisted and suspended; but the sides in the mean time would continually descend, bending the fragment with their weight, and so making it of a lesser compass and expansion than it was before: And by this means there would be an interval and distance made between the two falling fragments, and a good part of the Abysse, after their descent, would lie uncovered in the middle betwixt them; as may be seen in this Figure, where the fragments A. B. bending downwards in their extremities, separate as they go, and after they are fain leave a good space in the Abysse betwixt them, altogether uncovered; This space is the main Chanel of the great Ocean, lying betwixt two Continents; and the inclining sides shew the declivity of the Shores.

This we have represented here only in a Ring or Circle of the Earth, in the first Figure ; but it may be better represented in a broader surface, as in the second Figure , where the two fragments A. B. that are to make the two opposite Continents, fall in like double Doors opening downwards, the Hinges being towards the Land on either side, so as at the bottom they leave in the middle betwixt them a deep Chanel of water, a. a. a. such as is betwixt all Continents; and the Water reaching a good height upon the Land on either side, makes Sea there too, but shallower, and by degrees you descend into the deepest Chanel.

This gives an account of two things that we mentioned to be considered and explained as to the Sea, how the great Cavity of its Chanel was made, and how it was made in that general form of declivity in its sides from the Land: The third thing was the irregularities of it, both as to its various depths, and as to the form of the shores and of the bottom. And this is as easily and naturally explained from the same supposition as the former two; for though we have hitherto represented the fragments A. B. as even and regular after their fall, because that was most simple, and there was no occasion then to represent them otherwise, yet we must suppose that as soon as in their fall they hit upon the top or bottom of the Abysse, that great force and weight with which they descended broke off all the Edges and extremities, and so made innumerable ruptures and inequalities in the shores, and as many within the Sea and at the bottom; where the broken Rocks and lumps of Earth would lie in all imaginable disorder; as you may conceive from the third Figure . For when the motion came on a sudden to be obstructed, the load of the fragment still pressing it forwards, such a concussion arise as made thousands of lesser fragments, of all shapes and magnitudes, and in all postures and forms, and most of them irregular. And by these fractions and secondary ruines the line of the shores was broken, and the level of them too; In some places they would stand high, in others low, sometimes rough and sometimes even, and generally crooked, with Angles and in-lets, and uncertain windings. The bottom also, by the same stroke, was diversified into all manner of forms, sometimes Rocky with Pits and Gulfs, and sometimes spread in plain beds, sometimes shallow and sometimes deep; for those differences would depend only upon the situation of the secondary fragments; and so it might come to pass, that some places near the shore might be excessive deep when a Rock or Rocks stood in a steep posture, as (Figure 3. ) b. b. b. and, on the contrary, sometimes places much more advanced into the Ocean, might be less deep, where a fragment of Earth lay under water, or one bore up another, as c. c. c. but these cases would not be very frequent. To conclude, there are no properties of the Sea-chanel, that I know of, nor differences or irregularities in the form of it, which this Hypothesisdoth not give a fair account of: And having thus far opened the way, and laid down the general grounds for their Explication, other things that are more minute, we leave to the curiosity of particular Genius's; being unwilling to clog the Theory at first with things that may seem unnecessary. We proceed now to the consideration of Islands.

We must in the first place distinguish between OriginalIslands and FactitiousIslands; Those I call factitious, that are not of the same date and Antiquity with the Sea, but have been made some at one time, some at another, by accidental causes, as the aggestion of Sands and Sand-beds, or the Sea leaving the tops of some shallow places that lie high, and yet flowing about the lower skirts of them; These make sandy and plain Islands, that have no high Land in them, and are but mock-Islands in effect. Others are made by divulsion from some Continent, when an Isthmus or the neck of a Promontory running into the Sea, sinks or falls in, by an Earthquake or otherwise, and the Sea entring in at the gap passeth through, and makes that Promontory or Country become an Island. Thus the Island Sicilyis supposed to have been made, and all Africamight be an Island, if the Isthmus between the Mediterraneanand the red Sea should sink down. And these Islands may have Rocks and Mountains in them, if the Land had so before. Lastly, there are Islands that have been said to rise from the bottom of the Sea; History mentions such in both the Archipelago's, Ægæanand Indian; and this seems to argue that there are great fragments or tracts of Earth that lie loose at the bottom of the Sea, or that are not incorporated with the ground; which agrees very well with our Explication of the Sea-chanel.

But besides these Islands and the several sorts of them, there are others which I call Original; because they could not be produced in any of the forementioned ways, but are of the same Origin and Antiquity with the Chanel of the Sea; and such are the generality of our Islands; They were not made of heaps of Sands, nor torn from any Continent, but are as ancient as the Continents themselves, namely, ever since the Deluge, the common Parent of them both. Nor is there any difficulty to understand how Islands were made at the dissolution of the Earth, any more than how Continents were made; for Islands are but lesser Continents, or Continents greater Islands; and according as Continents were made of greater masses of Earth or greater fragments standing above the Water, so Islands were made of less, but so big always, and in such a posture, as to bear their tops above the water. Yet though they agree thus far, there is a particular difference to be taken notice of as to their Origin; for the Continents were made of those three or four primary masses into which the falling Orb of the Earth was divided, but the Islands were made of the fractures of these, and broken off by the fall from the skirts and extremities of the Continents; We noted before, that when those great masses and primary fragments came to dash upon the Abysse in their fall, the sudden stop of the motion, and the weighty bulk of the descending fragment broke off all the edges and extremities of it, which edges and extremities broken off made the Islands; And accordingly we see that they generally lie scattered along the sides of the Continents, and are but splinters, as it were, of those greater bodies. ’Tis true, besides these, there were an infinite number of other pieces broke off that do not appear, some making Rocks under water, some shallows and banks in the Sea; but the greatest of them when they fell either one upon another, or in such a posture as to prop up one another, their heads and higher parts would stand out of the water and make Islands.

Thus I conceive the Islands of the Sea were at first produced; we cannot wonder therefore that they should be so numerous, or far more numerous than the Continents; These are the Parents, and those are the Children; Nor can we wonder to see along the sides of the Continents several Islands or sets of Islands, sown, as it were, by handfuls, or laid in trains; for the manner of their generation would lead us to think they would be so placed. So the AmericanIslands lie scattered upon the Coast of that Continent; the Maldivianand Philipineupon the East-Indianshore, and the Hesperidesupon the Africk; and there seldom happen to be any towards the middle of the Ocean, though, by an accident, that also might come to pass. Lastly, it suits very well with out Explication, that there should be Mountains and Rocks, sometimes in clusters, sometimes in long chains, in all Islands; (as we find there are in all that are true and Original) for ’tis that makes them high enough to appear above the water, and strong enough to continue and preserve themselves in that high situation.

And thus much may suffice for a summary Explication of the causes of the Sea-chanel and Islands, according to our Hypothesis.

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• September 25, 2011
• 0
• Published in The Sacred theory of the Earth
• Written by LC Geerts

Book I: Chapter IX

THE SACRED THEORY OF THE EARTH

by Thomas Burnet

THE THEORY OF THE EARTH

Book I

Concerning the Deluge, and the Dissolution of the Earth.

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CHAPTER IX

The Second Part of this Discourse, proving the same Theory from the Effects and present Form of the Earth. First, by a general Scheme of what is most remarkable in this Globe, and then by a more particular Induction; beginning with an Account of Subterraneous Cavities and Subterraneous Waters.

WE have now finisht our explication of the Universal Deluge, and given an account, not only of the possibility of it, but of its Causes; and of that form and structure of the Earth, whereby the Old Worldwas subject to that sort of Fate. We have not beged any Principles or Suppositions for the proof of this, but taking that common ground, which both Mosesand all Antiquity presents to us, viz. That this Earth rose from a Chaos; We have from that deduced, by an easie train of consequences, what the first Form of it would be; and from that Form, as from a nearer ground, we have by a second train of consequences made it appear, that at some time or other that first Earth would be subject to a dissolution, and by that dissolution to a Deluge. And thus far we have proceeded only by the intuition of causes, as is most proper to a Theory; but for the satisfaction of those that require more sensible arguments, and to compleat our proofs on either hand, we will now argue from the Effects; And from the present state of Nature, and the present form of the Earth, Evidence that it hath been broken, and undergone such a dissolution as we have already described, and made the immediate occasion of the Deluge. And that we may do this more perspicuously and distinctly, we will lay down this Proposition to be Evidenced, viz. That the present form and structure of the Earth, both as to the surface and as to the Interiour parts of it, so far as they are known and accessible to us, doth exactly answer to our Theory concerning the form and dissolution of the first Earth, and cannot be explained upon any other Hypothesis.

Oratours and Philosophers treat Nature after a very different manner; Those represent her with all her graces and ornaments, and if there be any thing that is not capable of that, they dissemble it, or pass it over slightly. But Philosophers view Nature with a more impartial eye, and without favour or prejudice give a just and free account, how they find all the parts of the Universe, some more, some less perfect. And as to this Earth in particular, if I was to describe it as an Oratour, I would suppose it a beautiful and regular Globe, and not only so, but that the whole Universe was made for its sake; that it was the darling and favourite of Heaven, that the Sun shined only to give it light, to ripen its Fruit, and make fresh its Flowers; And that the great Concave of the Firmament, and all the Stars in their several Orbs, were designed only for a spangled Cabinet to keep this Jewel in. This IdeaI would give of it as an Oratour; But a Philosopher that overheard me, would either think me in jest, or very injudicious, if I took the Earth for a body so regular in it self, or so considerable, if compared with the rest of the Universe. This, he would say, is to make the great World like one of the Heathen Temples, a beautiful and magnificent structure, and of the richest materials, yet built only for a little brute Idol, a Dog, or a Crocodile, or some deformed Creature, placed in a corner of it.

We must therefore be impartial where the Truth requires it, and describe the Earth as it is really in it self; and though it be handsome and regular enough to the eye in certain parts of it, single tracts and single Regions; yet if we consider the whole surface of it, or the whole Exteriour Region, ’tis as a broken and confused heap of bodies, placed in no order to one another, nor with any correspondency or regularity of parts: And such a body as the Moon appears to us, when ’tis looked upon with a good Glass, rude and ragged; as it is also represented in the modern Maps of the Moon; such a thing would the Earth appear if it was seen from the Moon. They are both in my judgment the image or picture of a great Ruine, and have the true aspect of a World lying in its rubbish.

Our Earth is first divided into Sea and Land, without any regularity in the portions, either of the one or the other; In the Sea lie the Islands, scattered like limbs torn from the rest of the body; great Rocks stand reared up in the waters; The Promontories and Capes shoot into the Sea, and the Sinus's and Creeks on the other hand run as much into the Land; and these without any order or uniformity. Upon the other part of our Globe stand great heaps of Earth or stone, which we call Mountains; and if these were all placed together, they would take up a very considerable part of the dry Land; In the rest of it are lesser Hills, Valleys, Plains, Lakes, and Marishes, Sands and Desarts, &c. and these also without any regular disposition. Then the inside of the Earth, or inward parts of it, are generally broken or hollow, especially about the Mountains and high Lands, as also towards the shores of the Sea, and among the Rocks. How many Holes and Caverns, and strange Subterraneous passages do we see in many Countries; and how many more may we easily imagine, that are unknown and unaccessible to us?

This is the pourtraicture of our Earth, drawn without flattery; and as oddly as it looks, it will not be at all surprizing to one that hath considered the foregoing Theory; For ’tis manifest enough, that upon the dissolution of the first Earth, and its fall in to the Abysse, this very face and posture of things, which we have now described, or something extreamly like it, would immediately result. The Sea would be opened, and the face of the Globe would be divided into Land and Water: And according as the fragments fell, some would make Islands or Rocks in the Sea, others would make Mountains or Plains upon the Land; and the Earth would generally be full of Caverns and hollownesses, especially in the Mountainous parts of it. And we see the resemblance and imitation of this in lesser ruines, when a Mountain sinks and falls into Subterraneous water; or which is more obvious, when the Arch of a Bridge is broken, and falls into the water, if the water under it be not so deep as to overflow and cover all its parts, you may see there the image of all these things in little Continents, and Islands, and Rocks under water: And in the parts that stand above the water, you may see Mountains, and Precipices, and Plains, and most of the varieties that we see and admire in the parts of the Earth. What need we then seek any further for the Explication of these things? Let us suppose this Arch as the great Arch of the Earth, which once it had, and the water under it as the Abysse, and the parts of this ruine to represent the parts of the Earth; There will be scarce any difference but of lesser and greater, the same things appearing in both. But we have naturally that weakness or prejudice, that we think great things are not to be explained from easie and familiar instances; We think there must be something difficult and operose in the explication of them, or else we are not satisfied; whether it is that we are ashamed to see our ignorance and admiration to have been so groundless, or whether we fancy there must be a proportion between the difficulty of the explication, and the greatness of the thing explained; but that is a very false Judgment, for let things be never so great, if they be simple, their explication must be simple and easie; And on the contrary, some things that are mean, common, and ordinary, may depend upon causes very difficult to find out; for the difficulty of explaining an effect doth not depend upon its greatness or littleness, but upon the simplicity or composition of its causes. And the effects and Phænomenawe are here to explain, though great, yet depending upon causes very simple, you must not wonder if the Explication, when found out, be familiar and very intelligible.

And this is so intelligible, and so easily deducible from the forementioned causes, that a Man born blind or brought up all his life in a Cave, that had never seen the face of the Earth, nor ever heard any description of it, more than that it was a great Globe, having this Theory proposed to him, or being instructed what the form of the first Earth was, how it stood over the waters, and then how it was broke and fell into them, he would easily of his own accord foretel what changes would arise upon this dissolution; and what the new form of the Earth would be. As in the first place he would tell you, that this second Earth would be distinguished and checkered into Land and Water; for the Orb which fell being greater than the circumference it fell upon, all the fragments could not fall flat and lie drowned under water; and those that stood above, would make the dry Land or habitable part of the Earth. Then in the second place, he would plainly discern that these fragments that made the dry Land, could not lie all plain and smooth and equal, but some would be higher and some lower, some in one posture and some in another, and consequently would make Mountains, Hills, Valleys, and Plains, and all other varieties we have in the situation of the parts of the Earth. And lastly, a blind man would easily divine that such a great ruine could not happen but there would be a great many holes and cavities amongst the parts of it, a great many intervals and empty places in the rubbish, as I may so say; for this we see happens in all ruines more or less; and where the fragments are great and hard, ’tis not possible they should be so adjusted in their fall, but that they would lie hollow in many places, and many unfilled spaces would be intercepted amongst them; some gaping in the surface of the Earth, and others hid within; so as this would give occasion to all sorts of fractures and cavities either in the skin of the Earth, or within its body. And these Cavities, that I may add that in the last place, would be often filled with Subterraneous waters, at least at such a depth; for the foundations of the Earth standing now within the waters, so high as those waters reached they would more or less propagate themselves every way.

Thus far our Blind man could tell us what the new World would be, or the form of the Earth upon the great dissolution; and we find his reasonings and inferences very true, these are the chief lineaments and features of our Earth; which appear indeed very irregular and very inaccountable when they are lookt upon naked in themselves, but if we look upon them through this Theory, we see as in a glass all the reasons and causes of them. There are different Genius's of men, and different conceptions, and every one is to be allowed their liberty as to things of this nature; I confess, for my own part, when I observe how easily and naturally this Hypothesisdoth apply it self to all the particularities of this Earth, hits and falls in so luckily and surprizingly with all the odd postures of its parts, I cannot, without violence, bear off my mind from fully assenting to it: And the more odd and extravagant, as I may so say, and the more diversified the effects and appearances are, to which an Hypothesisis to be applied, if it answers them all and with exactness, it comes the nearer to a moral certitude and infallibility. As a Lock that consists of a great deal of workmanship, many Wards, and many odd pieces and contrivances, if you find a Key that answers to them all, and opens it readily, ’tis a thousand to one that ’tis the true Key, and was made for that purpose.

An eminent Philosopher of this Age, Monsieur des Cartes, hath made use of the like Hypothesisto explain the irregular form of the present Earth; though he never dreamed of the Deluge, nor thought that first Orb built over the Abysse, to have been any more than a transient crust, and not a real habitable World that lasted for more than sixteen hundred years, as we suppose it to have been. And though he hath, in my opinion, in the formation of that first Orb, and upon the dissolution of it, committed some great oversights, whereof we have given an account in the Latin Treatise however he saw a necessity of such a thing, and of the disruption of it, to bring the Earth into that form and posture wherein we now find it.

Thus far we have spoken in general concerning the agreement and congruity of our supposition with the present face of the Earth, and the easie account it gives of the causes of it. And though I believe to ingenuous persons that are not prejudiced by the forms and opinions of the Schools against every thing that looks like a novelty or invention, thus much might be sufficient; yet for the satisfaction of all, we will, as a farther proof of our Theory, or that part of it which concerns the dissolution of the Earth, descend to a particular explication of three or four of the most considerable and remarkable things that occur in the fabrick of this present Earth; namely, the great Chanel of the Ocean; Subterraneous Cavities and Subterraneous Waters;and lastly, Mountains and Rocks. These are the wonders of the Earth as to the visible frame of it; and who would not be pleased to see a rational account of these? of their Origin, and of their properties; Or who would not apEvidence of that Hypothesis, when they see that Nature in her greatest and strangest works may easily be understood by it, and is in no other way intelligible.

We will speak first of Subterraneous Cavities and Waters, because they will be of easier dispatch, and an introduction to the rest.

That the inside of the Earth is hollow and broken in many places, and is not one firm and united mass, we have both the Testimony of Sence and of easie Observations to Evidence: How many Caves and Dens and hollow passages into the ground do we see in many Countries, especially amongst Mountains and Rocks; and some of them endless and bottomless so far as can be discovered. We have many of these in our own Island, in Derbishire, Somersetshire, Wales, and other Counties, and in every Continent or Island they abound more or less. These hollownesses of the Earth the Ancients made prisons, or storehouses for the winds, and set a God over them to confine them, or let them loose at his pleasure. For some Ages after the Flood, as all Antiquity tells us, These were the first houses men had, at least in some parts of the Earth; here rude mortals sheltered themselves, as well as they could, from the injuries of the Air, till they were beaten out by wild beasts that took possession of them. The Ancient Oracles also used to be given out of these Vaults and recesses under ground, the Sibylshad their Caves, and the DelphickOracle, and their Temples sometimes were built upon an hollow Rock. Places that are strange and solemn strike an awe into us, and incline us to a kind of superstitious timidity and veneration, and therefore they thought them fit for the seats and residences of their Deities. They fansied also that streams rise sometimes, or a sort of Vapour in those hollow places, that gave a kind of Divine fury or inspiration. But all these uses and employments are now in a great measure worn out, we know no use of them but to make the places talkt on where they are, to be the wonders of the Countrey, to please our curiosity to gaze upon and admire; but we know not how they came, nor to what purpose they were made at first.

It would be very pleasant to read good descriptions of these Subterraneous places, and of all the strange works of Nature there; how she furnisheth these dark neglected Grottoes; they have often a little Brook runs murmuring through them, and the roof is commonly a kind of petrefied Earth or Icy fret-work; proper enough for such rooms. But I should be pleased especially to view the Sea-caves, or those hollow Rocks that lie upon the Sea, where the waves roll in a great way under ground, and wear the hard Rock into as many odd shapes and figures as we see in the Clouds. ’Tis pleasant also to see a River in the middle of its course throw it self into the mouth of a Cave, or an opening of the Earth, and run under ground sometimes many miles; still pursuing its way through the dark pipes of the Earth, till at last it find an out-let. There are many of these Rivers taken notice of in History in the several parts of the Earth, as the Rhonein France, Guadianain Spain, and several in Greece, Alpheus, Lycus, and Eracinus; then Nigerin Africa, Tigrisin Asia, &c. And I believe if we could turn Derwent, or any other River into one of the holes of the Peak, it would groap its way till it found an issue, it may be in some other County. These subterraneous Rivers that emerge again, shew us that the holes of the Earth are longer and reach farther than we imagine, and if we could see into the ground, as we ride or walk, we should be affrighted to see so often Waters or Caverns under us.

But to return to our dry Caves; these commonly stand high, and are sometimes of a prodigious greatness: Strabo mentions some in the Mountains towards Arabia, that are capable to receive four thousand men at once. The Cave of Engedihid Davidand six hundred men, so as Saul, when he was in the mouth of it, did not perceive them. In the Mountains of the Traconitesthere are many of these vast dens and recesses, and the people of that Country defended themselves a long time in those strong Holds against Herodand his Army; They are placed among such craggy Rocks and Precipices, that, as Josephus ells us, Herodwas forc’t to make a fort of open chests, and in those by chains of Iron he let down his Souldiers from the top of the Mountains to go fight them in their dens. I need add no more instances of this kind; In the Natural History of all Countries, or the Geographical descriptions of them, you find such places taken notice of, more or less; yet if there was a good collection made of the chief of them in several parts, it might be of use, and would make us more sensible how broken and torn the body of the Earth is.

There are subterraneous Cavities of another nature, and more remarkable, which they call Volcano's, or fiery Mountains; that belch out flames and smoke and ashes, and sometimes great stones and broken Rocks, and lumps of Earth, or some metallick mixture; and throw them to an incredible distance by the force of the eruption. These argue great vacuities in the bowels of the Earth, and magazines of combustible matter treasured up in them. And as the Exhalations within these places must be copious, so they must lie in long Mines or Trains to do so great execution, and to last so long. ’Tis scarce credible what is reported concerning some eruptions of Vesuviusand Ætna. The Eruptions of Vesuviusseem to be more frequent and less violent of late; The flame and smoke break out at the top of the Mountain, where they have eaten away the ground and made a great hollow, so as it looks at the top, when you stand upon the brims of it, like an Amphitheater, or like a great Caldron, about a mile in circumference, and the burning Furnace lies under it. The outside of the Mountain is all spread with Ashes, but the inside much more; for you wade up to the mid-leg in Ashes to go down to the bottom of the Cavity, and ’tis extreamly heavy and troublesome to get up again. The inside lies sloping, and one may safely go down if it be not in a raging fit; but the middle part of it or center, which is a little raised like the bottom of a Platter, is not to be ventured upon, the ground there lies false and hollow, there it always smoaks, and there the Funnel is supposed to be; yet there is no visible hole or gaping any where when it doth not rage. Naplesstands below in fear of this fiery Mountain, which hath often covered its Streets and Palaces with its Ashes; and in sight of the Sea (which lies by the side of them both) and as it were in defiance to it, threatens at one time or another, to burn that fair City. History tells us, that some eruptions of Vesuviushave carried Cinders and Ashes as far as Constantinople; this is attested both by Greekand LatinAuthors; particularly, that they were so affrighted with these Ashes and darkness, that the Emperor left the City, and there was a day observed yearly for a memorial of this calamity or prodigy.

Ætnais of greater fame than Vesuvius, and of greater fury, all Antiquity speaks of it; not only the Greeksand Romans, but as far as History reacheth, either real or fabulous, there is something recorded of the Fires of Ætna. The Figure of the Mountain is inconstant, by reason of the great consumptions and ruines it is subject to; The Fires and Æstuations of it are excellently described by Virgil, upon occasion of Æneashis passing by those Coasts.

------Horrificis juxta tonat Ætnaruinis;
Interdumque atram prorumpit ad æthera nubem,
Turbine fumantem piceo & candente favillâ;
Attollitque globos flammarum & sydera lambit;
Interdum scopulos, avolsáque viscera Montis
Erigit eructans, liquefactáque saxa sub auras
Cum gemitu glomerat, fundóque exæstuat imo.

Fama est Enceladisemustum fulmine corpus
Urgeri mole hâc, ingentémque insuper Ætnam
Impositam, ruptis flammam expirare caminis.
Et fessum quoties mutet latus, intremere omnem
Murmure Trinacriam& cœlum subtexere fumo.

------Ætna, whose ruines make a thunder;
Sometimes black clouds of smoak, that rowl about
Mingled with flakes of fire, it belches out.
And sometimes Balls of flame it darts on high,
Or its torn bowels flings into the Sky.
Within deep Cells under the Earth, a store
Of fire-materials, molten Stones, and Ore,
It gathers, then spews out, and gathers more.

Enceladuswhen thunder-struck by Jove,
Was buried here, and Ætnathrown above;
And when, to change his wearied side, he turns,
The Island trembles and the Mountain burns.

Not far from Ætnalies Strombolo, and other adjacent Islands, where there are also such magazines of Fire; and throughout all Regions and Countries in the West-Indies and in the East, in the Northern and Southern parts of the Earth, there are some of these Volcano's, which are sensible evidences that the Earth is incompact and full of Caverns; besides the roarings, and bellowings that use to be heard before an eruption of these Volcano's, argue some dreadful hollowness in the belly or under the roots of the Mountain, where the Exhalations struggle before they can break their prison.

The subterraneous Cavities that we have spoke of hitherto, are such as are visible in the surface of the Earth, and break the skin by some gaping Orifice; but the Miners and those that work under ground, meet with many more in the bowels of the Earth, that never reach to the top of it: Burrows, and Chanels, and Clefts, and Caverns, that never had the comfort of one beam of light since the great fall of the Earth. And where we think the ground is firm and solid, as upon Heaths and Downs, it often betrays its hollowness, by sounding under the Horses feet and the Chariot-wheels that pass over it. We do not know when and where we stand upon good ground, if it was examined deep enough; and to make us further sensible of this, we will instance in two things that argue the unsoundness and hollowness of the Earth in the inward recesses of it, though the surface be intire and unbroken; These are Earthquakesand the communication of Subterraneous waters and Seas: Of which two we will speak a little more particularly.

Earthquakes are too evident demonstrations of the hollowness of the Earth, being the dreadful effects or consequences of it; for if the body of the Earth was sound and compact, there would be no such thing in Nature as an Earthquake. They are commonly accompanied with an heavy dead sound, like a dull thunder, which ariseth from the Vapours that are striving in the womb of Nature when her throes are coming upon her. And that these Caverns where the Vapours lie are very large and capacious, we are taught sometimes by sad experience; for whole Cities and Countries have been swallowed up into them, as Sodomand Gomorrha, and the Region of Pentapolis, and several Cities in Greece, and in Asia, and other parts. Whole Islands also have been thus absorpt in an Earthquake; the pillars and props they stood upon being broken, they have sunk and faln in as an house blown up. I am also of opinion that those Islands that are made by divulsion from a Continent, as Sicilywas broken off from Italy, and Great Britain, as some think, from France, have been made the same way; that is, the Isthmus or necks of Land that joyned these Islands with their Continents before, have been hollow, and being either worn by the water, or shaked by an Earthquake, have sunk down, and so made way for the Sea to overflow them, and of a Promontory to make an Island. For it is not at all likely that the neck of Land continued standing, and the Sea overflowed it, and so made an Island; for then all those passages between such Islands, and their respective Continents would be extreamly shallow and unnavigable, which we do not find them to be. Nor is it any more wonder if such a neck of Land should fall, than that a Mountain should sink, or any other tract of Land, and a Lake rise in its place, which hath often happened. Platosupposeth his Atlantisto have been greater than Asiaand Africatogether, and yet to have sunk all into the Sea; whether that be true or no, I do not think it impossible that some arms of the Sea or Sinus's might have had such an original as that; and I am very apt to think, that for some years after the Deluge, till the fragments were well setled and adjusted, great alterations would happen as to the face of the Sea and the Land; many of the fragments would change their posture, and many would sink into the water that stood out before, the props failing that bore them up, or the joynts and corners whereby they leaned upon one another; and thereupon a new face of things would arise, and a new Deluge for that part of the Earth. Such removes and interchanges, I believe, would often happen in the first Ages after the Flood; as we see in all other ruines there happen lesser and secondary ruines after the first, till the parts be so well poised and setled, that without some violence they scarce change their posture any more.

But to return to our Earthquakes, and to give an instance or two of their extent and violence: Plinymentions one in the Reign of Tiberius Cæsarthat struck down twelve Cities of Asiain one night, And Fourniergives us an account of one in Peru, that reacht three hundred leagues along the Sea-shore, and seventy leagues in-land; and leveled the Mountains all along as it went, threw down the Cities, turned the Rivers out of their Chanels, and made an universal havock and confusion; And all this, he saith, was done within the space of seven or eight minutes.

There must be dreadful Vaults and Mines under that Continent, that gave passage to the Vapours, and liberty to play for nine hundred miles in length, and above two hundred in breadth. Asiaalso hath been very subject to these desolations by Earthquakes; and many parts in Europe, as Greece, Italy, and others. The truth is, our Cities are built upon ruines, and our Fields and Countries stand upon broken Arches and Vaults, and so does the greatest part of the outward frame of the Earth, and therefore it is no wonder if it be often shaken; there being quantities of Exhalations within these Mines, or Cavernous passages, that are capable of rarefaction and inflammation; and, upon such occasions, requiring more room, they shake or break the ground that covers them. And thus much concerning Earthquakes.

A second observation that argues the hollowness of the Earth, is the communication of the Seas and Lakes under ground. The Caspianand MediterraneanSeas, and several Lakes, receive into them great Rivers, and yet have no visible out-let: These must have subterraneous out-lets, by which they empty themselves, otherwise they would redound and overflow the brims of their Vessel. The Mediterranean is most remarkable in this kind, because ’tis observed that at one end the great Ocean flows into it through the straits of Gibralter, with a sensible current, and towards the other end about Constantinoplethe Pontusflows down into it with a stream so strong, that Vessels have much ado to stem it; and yet it neither hath any visible evacuation or out-let, nor overflows its banks. And besides that it is thus fed at either end, it is fed by the navel too, as I may so say; it sucks in, by their Chanels, several Rivers into its belly, whereof the Nileis one very great and considerable. These things have made it a great Problem, What becomes of the water of the Mediterranean Sea?And for my part, I think, the solution is very easie, namely, that it is discharged by Subterraneous passages, or conveyed by Chanels under the ground into the Ocean. And this manner of discharge or conveyance is not peculiar to the Mediterranean, but is common to it with the CaspianSea, and other Seas and Lakes, that receive great Rivers into them, and have no visible issue.

I know there have been proposed several other ways to answer this difficulty concerning the efflux or consumption of the waters of the Mediterranean; some have supposed a double current in the strait of Gibralter, one that carried the water in, and another that brought it out; like the Arteries and Veins in our Body, the one exporting our bloud from the heart, and the other re-importing it: So they supposed one current upon the surface, which carried the water into the Mediterranean, and under it at a certain depth a counter-current, which brought the water back into the Ocean. But this hath neither proof nor foundation; for unless it was included in pipes, as our bloud is, or consisted of liquors very different, these cross currents would mingle and destroy one another. Others are of opinion, that all the water that flows into the Mediterranean, or a quantity equal to it, is consumed in Exhalations every day; This seems to be a bolder supposition than the other, for if so much be consumed in Vapours and Exhalations every day as flows into this Sea, what if this Sea had an out-let, and discharged by that, every day, as much as it received; in a few days the Vapours would have consumed all the rest; and yet we see many Lakes that have as free an out-let as an in-let, and are not consumed, or sensibly diminisht by the Vapours. Besides, this reason is a Summer-reason, and would pass very ill in Winter, when the heat of the Sun is much less powerful: At least there would be a very sensible difference betwixt the height of the waters in Summer and Winter, if so much was consumed every day as this Explication supposeth. And the truth is, this want of a visible out-let is not a property belonging only to the MediterraneanSea, as we noted before, but is also in other Seas and great Lakes, some lying in one Climat and some in another, where there is no reason to suppose such excessive Exhalations; And though ’tis true some Rivers in Africk, and in other parts of the Earth, are thus exhaled and dried up, without ever flowing into the Sea (as were all the Rivers in the first Earth) yet this is where the sands and parched ground suck up a great part of them; the heat of the Climat being excessively strong, and the Chanel of the River growing shallower by degrees, and, it may be, divided into lesser branches and rivulets; which are causes that take no place here. And therefore we must return to our first reason, which is universal, for all seasons of the Year and all Climats; and seeing we are assured that there are Subterraneous Chanels and passages, for Rivers often fall into the ground, and sometimes rise again, and sometimes never return; why should we doubt to ascribe this effect to so obvious a cause? Nay, I believe the very Ocean doth evacuate it self by Subterraneous out-lets; for considering what a prodigious mass of water falls into it every day from the wide mouths of all the Rivers of the Earth, it must have out-lets proportionable; and those Syrtesor great Whirlpools that are constant in certain parts or Sinus's of the Sea, as upon the Coast of Norwayand of Italy, arise probably from Subterraneous out-lets in those places, whereby the water sinks, and turns, and draws into it whatsoever comes within such a compass; and if there was no issue at the bottom, though it might by contrary currents turn things round, within its Sphere, yet there is no reason from that why it should suck them down to the bottom. Neither does it seem improbable, that the currents of the Sea are from these in-draughts, and that there is always a submarine inlet in some part of them, to make a circulation of the Waters. But thus much for the Subterraneous communication of Seas and Lakes.

And thus much in general concerning subterraneous Cavities, and concerning the hollow and broken frame of the Earth. If I had now magick enough to show you at one view all the inside of the Earth, which we have imperfectly described; if we could go under the roots of the Mountains, and into the sides of the broken rocks; or could dive into the Earth with one of those Rivers that sink under ground, and follow its course and all its windings till it rise again, or led us to the Sea, we should have a much stronger and more effectual Ideaof the broken form of the Earth, than any we can excite by these faint descriptions collected - from Reason. The Ancients I remember used to represent these hollow Caves and Subterraneous Regions in the nature of a Worldunder-ground, and supposed it inhabited by the Nymphs, especially the Nymphsof the waters and the Sea-Goddesses; so Orpheussung of old; and in imitation of him Virgilhath made a description of those Regions; feigning the Nymph Cyreneto send for her son to come down to her, and made her a visit in those shades where mortals were not admitted.

Duc age, duc ad nos, fas illi limina Divûm
Tangere, ait: Simul alta jubet discedere latè
Flumina, quà juvenis gressus inferret, at ilium
Curvata in montis faciem circumstitit unda,
Accepítque sinu vasto, misítque sub amnem.
Jámque domum mirans Genetricis & humida regna,
Speluncísque lacos clausos, lucósque sonantes,
Ibat, & ingenti motu stupefactus aquarum
Omnia sub magnâ labentia flumina terrâ
Spectabat diversa locis; Phasímque Licúmque, &c.
Et Thalami matris pendentia pumice tecta, &c.

Come lead the Youth below, bring him to me,
The Gods are pleas'd our Mansions he should see;
Streight she commands the floods to make him way,
They open their wide bosom and obey;
Soft is the path, and easie is his tread,
A watry Arch bends o’er his dewy head;
And as he goes he wonders, and looks round,
To see this new-found Kingdom under ground.
The silent Lakes in hollow Caves he sees,
And on their banks an echoing grove of Trees;
The fall of waters ’mongst the Rocks below
He hears, and sees the Rivers how they flow:
All the great Rivers of the Earth are there,
Prepar'd, as in a womb, by Nature's care.
Last, to his mother's bed-chamber he's brought,
Where the high roof with Pumice-stone is wrought, &c.

If we now could open the Earth as this Nymphdid the Water, and go down into the bosom of it, see all the dark Chambers and Apartments there, how ill contrived, and how ill kept, so many holes and corners, some filled with smoak and fire, some with water, and some with vapours and mouldy Air; how like a ruine it lies gaping and torn in the parts of it; we should not easily believe that God created it into this form immediately out of nothing; It would have cost no more to have made things in better order; nay, it had been more easie and more simple; and accordingly we are assured that all things were made at first in Beauty and proportion. And if we consider Nature and the manner of the first formation of the Earth, ’tis evident that there could be no such holes and Caverns, nor broken pieces, made then in the body of it; for the grosser parts of the Chaos falling down towards the Center, they would there compose a mass of Earth uniform and compact, the water swimming above it; and this first mass under the water could have no Caverns or vacuities in it; for if it had had any, the Earthy parts, while the mass was liquid or semiliquid, would have sunk into them and filled them up, expelling the Air or Water that was there; And when afterwards there came to be a crust or new Earth formed upon the face of the Waters, there could be no Cavities, no dens, no fragments in it, no more than in the other; And for the same general reason, that is, passing from a liquid form into a concrete or solid leisurely and by degrees, it would flow and settle together in an entire mass; There being nothing broken, nor any thing hard, to bear the parts off from one another, or to intercept any empty spaces between them.

’Tis manifest then that the Earth could not be in this Cavernous form originally, by any work of nature; nor by any immediate action of God, seeing there is neither use nor beauty in this kind of construction: Do we not then, as reasonably, as aptly, ascribe it to that desolation that was brought upon the Earth in the general Deluge? When its outward frame was dissolved and fell into the great Abysse: How easily doth this answer all that we have observed concerning the Subterraneous Regions? That hollow and broken posture of things under ground, all those Caves and holes, and blind recesses, that are otherwise so inaccountable, say but that they are a Ruine, and you have in one word explained them all. For there is no sort of Cavities, interior or exterior, great or little, open or shut, wet or dry, of what form or fashion soever, but we might reasonably expect them in a ruine of that nature. And as for the Subterraneous waters, seeing the Earth fell into the Abysse, the pillars and foundations of the present (exteriour) Earth must stand immersed in water, and therefore at such a depth from the surface every where, there must be water found, if the soil be of a nature to admit it. ’Tis true, all Subterraneous waters do not proceed from this original, for many of them are the effects of Rains and melted Snows sunk into the Earth; but that in digging any where you constantly come to water at length, even in the most solid ground this cannot proceed from these Rains or Snows, but must come from below, and from a cause as general as the effect is; which can be no other in my judgment than this, that the roots of the exteriour Earth stand within the old Abysse, whereof, as a great part lies open in the Sea, so the rest lies hid and covered among the fragments of the Earth; sometimes dispersed and only moistning the parts, as our bloud lies in the flesh, and in the habit of the body; sometimes in greater or lesser masses, as the bloud in our Vessels. And this I take to be the true account of Subterraneous waters as distinguished from Fountains and Rivers, and from the matter and causes of them.

Thus much we have spoke to give a general Ideaof the inward parts of the Earth, and an easie Explication of them by our Hypothesis; which whether it be true or no, if you compare it impartially with Nature, you will confess at least, that all these things are just in such a form and posture as if it was true.

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• September 25, 2011
• 0
• Published in The Sacred theory of the Earth
• Written by LC Geerts