Georges Louis Leclerc De

Buffon

Buffon's Natural History

PROOF OF THE THEORY OF THE EARTH.

ARTICLE I.

ON THE FORMATION OF THE PLANETS.

Our subject being Natural History, we would willingly dispense with

astronomical observations; but as the nature of the earth is so closely

connected with the heavenly bodies, and such observations being calculated

to illustrate more fully what has been said, it is necessary to give some

general ideas of the formation, motion, figure of the earth and other planets.

The earth is a globe of about three thousand leagues diameter; it is situate

one thousand millions of leagues from the sun, around which it makes its

revolution in three hundred and sixty-five days. This revolution is the result

of two forces; the one may be considered as an impulse from right to left, or

from left to right, and the other an attraction from above downwards, or

beneath upwards, to a common centre. The direction of these two forces, and

their quantities, are so nicely combined and proportioned, that they produce

an almost uniform motion in an ellipse, very near to a circle. Like the other

planets the earth is opaque, it throws out a shadow; it receives and reflects

the light of the sun, round which it revolves in a space of time proportioned

to its relative distance and density. It also turns round its own axis once in

twenty-four hours, and its axis is inclined 66-1/4 degrees on the plane of the

orbit. Its figure is spheroidical, the two axes of which differ about 160th part

from each other, and the smallest axis is that round which the revolution is

made.

These are the principal phenomena of the earth, the result of discoveries

made by means of geometry, astronomy, and navigation. We shall not here

enter into the detail of the proofs and observations by which those facts have

been ascertained, but only make a few remarks to clear up what is still

doubtful, and at the same time give our ideas respecting the formation of the

planets, and the different changes thro' which it is possible they have passed

before they arrived at the state we at present see them.

There have been so many systems and hypotheses framed upon the

formation of the terrestrial globe, and the changes which it has undergone,

that we may presume to add our conjectures to those who have written upon

the subject, especially as we mean to support them with a greater degree of

probability than has hitherto been done: and we are the more inclined to

deliver our opinion upon this subject, from the hope that we shall enable the

reader to pronounce on the difference between an hypothesis drawn from

possibilities, and a theory founded in facts; between a system, such as we are

here about to present, on the formation and original state of the earth, and a

physical history of its real condition, which has been given in the preceding

discourse.

Galileo having found the laws of falling bodies, and Kepler having observed

that the area described by the principal planets in moving round the sun,

and those of the satellites round the planets to which they belong, are

proportionable to the time of their revolutions, and that such periods were

also in proportion to the square roots of the cubes of their distances from the

sun, or principal planets. Newton found that the force which caused heavy

bodies to fall on the surface of the earth, extended to the moon, and retained

it in its orbit; that this force diminished in the same proportion as the square

of the distance increased, and consequently that the moon is attracted by the

earth; that the earth and planets are attracted by the sun; and that in general

all bodies which revolve round a centre, and describe areas proportioned to

the times of their revolution, are attracted towards that point. This power,

known by the name of GRAVITY, is therefore diffused throughout all

matter; planets, comets, the sun, the earth, and all nature, is subject to its

laws, and it serves as a basis to the general harmony which reigns in the

universe. Nothing is better proved in physics than the actual existence of this

power in every material substance. Observation has confirmed the effects of

this power, and geometrical calculations have determined the quantity and

relations of it.

This general cause being known, the effects would easily be deduced from

it, if the action of the powers which produce it were not too complicated. A

single moment's reflection upon the solar system will fully demonstrate the

difficulties that have attended this subject; the principal planets are attracted

by the sun, and the sun by the planets; the satellites are also attracted by their

principal planets, and each planet attracts all the rest, and is attracted by

them. All these actions and reactions vary according to the quantities of

matter and the distances, and produce great inequalities and irregularities.

How is so great a number of connections to be combined and estimated? It

appears almost impossible in such a crowd of objects to follow any particular

one; nevertheless those difficulties have been surmounted, and calculation

has confirmed the suppositions of them, each observation is become a new

demonstration, and the systematic order of the universe is laid open to the

eyes of all those who can distinguish truth from error.

We feel some little stop, by the force of impulsion remaining unknown; but

this, however, does not by any means affect the general theory. We evidently

see the force of attraction always draws the planets towards the sun, they

would fall in a perpendicular line, on that planet, if they were not repelled

by some other power that obliges them to move in a straight line, and which

impulsive force would compel them to fly off the tangents of their respective

orbits, if the force of attraction ceased one moment. The force of impulsion

was certainly communicated to the planets by the hand of the Almighty,

when he gave motion to the universe; but we ought as much as possible to

abstain in physics from having recourse to supernatural causes; and it

appears that a probable reason may be given for this impulsive force,

perfectly accordant with the law of mechanics, and not by any means more

astonishing than the changes and revolutions which may and must happen

in the universe.

The sphere of the sun's attraction does not confine itself to the orbs of the

planets, but extends to a remote distance, always decreasing in the same

ratio as the square of the distance increases; it is demonstrated that the

comets which are lost to our sight, in the regions of the sky, obey this power,

and by it their motions, like that of the planets, are regulated. All these stars,

whose tracts are so different, move round the sun, and describe areas

proportioned to the time; the planets in ellipses more or less approaching a

circle, and the comets in narrow ellipses of a great extent. Comets and

planets move, therefore, by virtue of the force of attraction and impulsion,

which continually acting at one time obliges them to describe these courses;

but it must be remarked that comets pass over the solar system in all

directions, and that the inclinations of their orbits are very different,

insomuch that, although subject like the planets to the force of attraction,

they have nothing in common with respect to their progressive or impulsive

motions, but appear in this respect independent of each other: the planets,

on the contrary, move round the sun in the same direction, and almost in the

same plane, never exceeding 7-1/2 degrees of inclination in their planes, the

most distant from their orbits. This conformity of position and direction in

the motion of the planets, necessarily implies that their impulsive force has

been communicated to them by one and the same cause.

May it not be imagined, with some degree of probability, that a comet falling

into the body of the sun, will displace and separate some parts from the

surface, and communicate to them a motion of impulsion, insomuch that the

planets may formerly have belonged to the body of the sun, and been

detached therefrom by an impulsive force, and which they still preserve.

This supposition appears to be at least as well founded as the opinion of

Leibnitz, who supposes that the earth and planets had formerly been suns;

and his system, of which an account will be given in the fifth article, would

have been more comprehensive and more agreeable to probability, if he had

raised himself to this idea. We agree with him in thinking that this effect was

produced at the time when Moses said that God divided light from darkness;

for, according to Leibnitz, light was divided from darkness when the planets

were extinguished; but in our supposition there was a real physical

separation, since the opaque bodies of the planets were divided from the

luminous matter which composes the sun.

This idea of the cause of the impulsive force of the planets will be found

much less objectionable, when an estimation is made of the analogies and

degrees of probability, by which it may be supported. In the first place, the

motion of the planets are in the same direction, from West to East, and

therefore, according to calculation, it is sixty-four to one that such would not

have been the case, if they had not been indebted to the same cause for their

impulsive forces.

This, probably, will be considerably augmented by the second analogy, viz.

that the inclination of the planes of the orbits do not exceed 7-1/2 degrees;

for, by comparing the spaces, we shall find there is twenty-four to one, that

two planets are found in their most distant places at the same time, and

consequently ⁵, or 7,692,624 to one, that all six would by chance be thus

placed; or, what amounts to the same, there is a great degree of probability

that the planets have been impressed with one common moving force, and

which has given them this position. But what can have bestowed this

common impulsive motion, but the force and direction of the bodies by

which it was originally communicated? It may therefore be concluded, with

great probability, that the planets received their impulsive motion by one

single stroke. This likelihood, which is almost equivalent to a certainty, being

established, I seek to know what moving bodies could produce this effect,

and I find nothing but comets capable of communicating a motion to such

vast bodies.

By examining the course of comets, we shall be easily persuaded, that it is

almost necessary for some of them occasionally to fall into the sun. That of

1680 approached so near, that at its perihelium it was not more distant from

the sun than a sixteenth part of its diameter, and if it returns, as there is every

appearance it will, in 2255, it may then possibly fall into the sun; that must

depend on the rencounters it will meet with in its road, and of the

retardment it suffers in passing through the atmosphere of the sun.

We may, therefore, presume with the great Newton, that comets sometimes

fall into the sun; but this fall may be made in different directions. If they fall

perpendicular, or in a direction not very oblique, they will remain in the sun,

and serve for food to the fire which that luminary consumes, and the motion

of impulsion which they will have communicated to the sun, will produce

no other effect than that of removing it more or less, according as the mass

of the comet will be more or less considerable; but if the fall of the comet is

in a very oblique direction, which will most frequently happen, then the

comet will only graze the surface of the sun, or slightly furrow it; and in this

case it may drive out some parts of matter to which it will communicate a

common motion of impulsion, and these parts so forced out of the body of

the sun, and even the comet itself, may then become planets, and turn round

this luminary in the same direction, and in almost the same plane. We might

perhaps calculate what quantity of matter, velocity, and direction a comet

should have, to impel from the sun an equal quantity of matter to that which

the six planets and their satellites contain; but it will be sufficient to observe

here, that all the planets, with their satellites, do not make the 650th part of

the mass of the sun, because the density of the large planets, Saturn and

Jupiter, is less than that of the sun; and although the earth be four times, and

the moon near five times more dense than the sun, they are nevertheless but

as atoms in comparison with his extensive body.

However inconsiderable the 650th part may be, yet it certainly at first

appears to require a very powerful comet to separate even that much from

the body of the sun; but if we reflect on the prodigious velocity of comets in

their perihelion, a velocity so much the greater as they approach nearer the

sun; if, besides, we pay attention to the density and solidity of the matter of

which they must be composed, to suffer, without being destroyed, the

inconceivable heat they endure; and consider the bright and solid light

which shines through their dark and immense atmospheres, which

surround, and must obscure them, it cannot be doubted that the comets are

composed of extremely solid and dense matters, and that they contain a

greater quantity of matter in a small compass; that consequently a comet of

no extraordinary bulk may have sufficient weight and velocity to displace

the sun, and give a projectile motion to a quantity of matter, equal to the

650th part of the mass of this luminary. This perfectly agrees with what is

known concerning the density of planets, which always decreases as their

distance from the sun is increased, they having less heat to support; so that

Saturn is less dense than Jupiter, and Jupiter much less than the earth;

therefore if the density of the planets be, as Newton asserts, proportionable

to the quantity of heat which they have to support, Mercury will be seven

times more dense than the earth, and twenty-eight times denser than the sun;

and the comet of 1680 would be 28,000 times denser than the earth, or 112,000

times denser than the sun, and by supposing it as large as the earth, it would

contain nearly an equal quantity of matter to the ninth part of the sun, or by

giving it only the 100th part of the size of the earth, its mass would still be

equal to the 900th part of the sun. From whence it is easy to conclude, that

such a body, though it would be but a small comet, might separate and drive

off from the sun a 900th or a 650th part, particularly if we attend to the

immense velocity with which comets move when they pass in the vicinity of

the sun.

Besides this, the conformity between the density of the matter of the planets,

that of the sun deserves some attention. It is well known, that, both on and

near the surface of the earth, there are some matters 14 or 1500 times denser

than others. The densities of gold and air are nearly in this relation. But the

internal parts of the earth and planets are composed of a more uniform

matter, whose comparative density varies much less; and the conformity in

the density of the planets and that of the sun is such, that of 650 parts which

compose the whole of the matter of the planets, there are more than 640 of

the same density as the matter of the sun, and only ten parts out of these 650

which are of a greater density, for Saturn and Jupiter are nearly of the same

density as the sun, and the quantity of matter which these planets contain, is

at least 64 times greater than that of the four inferior planets, Mars, the Earth,

Venus, and Mercury. We must therefore admit, that the matter of which the

planets are generally composed is nearly the same as that of the sun, and

that consequently the one may have been separated from the other.

But it may be said, if the comet, by falling obliquely on the sun, drove off the

matter which compose the planets, they, instead of describing circles of

which the sun is the centre, would, on the contrary, at each revolution, have

returned to the same point from whence they departed, as every projectile

would which might be thrown off with sufficient force from the surface of

the earth, to oblige it to turn perpetually: for it is easy to demonstrate that

such, in that instance, would be the case, and therefore that the projection of

the planets from the sun cannot be attributed to the impulsion of a comet.

To this I reply, that the matter which composes the planets did not come

from the sun, in ready formed globes, but in the form of torrents, the motion

of the anterior parts of which were accelerated by that of the posterior; and

that the attraction of the anterior parts also accelerated the motion of the

posterior, and that this acceleration produced by one or other of these causes,

or perhaps by both, might be so great as to change the original direction of

the motion occasioned by the impulse of the comet, from which cause a

motion has resulted, such as we at present observe in the planets; especially

when it is considered the sun is displaced from its station by the shock of the

comet. An example will render this more reasonable; let us suppose, that

from the top of a mountain a musket ball is discharged, and that the strength

of the powder was sufficient to send it beyond the semi-diameter of the

earth, it is certain that this ball would pass round the earth, and at each

revolution return to the spot from whence it had been discharged: but, if

instead of a musket-ball, we suppose a rocket had been discharged, wherein

the action of the fire being durable, would greatly accelerate the motion of

impulsion; this rocket, or rather the cartouch which contained it, would not

return to the same place like the musket-ball, but would describe an orbit,

whose perigee would be much farther distant from the earth, as the force of

acceleration would be greater, and have changed the first direction.

Thus, provided there had been any acceleration in the motion of impulsion

communicated to the torrent of matter by the fall of the comet, it is probable

that the planets formed in this torrent, acquired the motion which we know

they have in the circles and ellipsis of which the sun is the centre and focus.

The manner in which the great eruptions of volcanos are made, may afford

us an idea of this acceleration of motion. It has been remarked that when

Vesuvius begins to roar and eject the inflamed matter it contains, the first

cloud has but a small degree of velocity, but which is soon accelerated by the

impulse of the second; the second by the action of a third, and so on, until

the heavy mass of bitumen, sulphur, cinders, melted metal, and huge stones,

appear like massive clouds, and although they succeed each other nearly in

the same directions, yet they greatly change that of the first, and drive it far

beyond what it would have reached of itself.

In answer to this objection, it may be further observed, that the sun having

been struck by the comet, received a degree of motion by the impulse, which

displaced it from its former situation; and that although this motion of the

sun is at present too little sensible for the notice of astronomers, nevertheless

it may still exist, and the sun describe a curve round the centre of gravity of

the whole system and if this is so, as I presume it is, we see perfectly that the

planets, instead of returning near the sun at each revolution, will, on the

contrary, have described orbits, the points of the perihelion of which will be

as far distant from the sun, as it is itself from the place it originally occupied.

It may also be said, that if this acceleration of motion is made in the same

direction, no change in the perihelion will be produced: but can it be thought

that in a torrent, the particles of which succeed each other, there has been no

change of direction; it is, on the contrary, very probable that a considerable

change did take place, sufficient to cause the planets to move in the course

they at present occupy.

It may be further urged, that if the sun had been displaced by the shock of a

comet, it would move uniformly, and that hence this motion being common

to the whole system, no alteration was necessary; but might not the sun

before the shock have had a motion round the centre of the cometry system,

to which primitive motion the stroke of the comet may have added or

diminished? and would not that fully account for the actual motion of the

planets?

If these suppositions are not admitted, may it not be presumed, that in the

stroke of the comet against the sun, there was an elastic force which raised

the torrent above the surface of the sun, instead of directly impelling it?

which alone would be sufficient to remove the perihelion, and give the

planets the motion they have retained. This supposition is not without

probability, for the matter of the sun may possibly be very elastic, since light,

the only part of it we are acquainted with, seems, by its effects, to be perfectly

so. I own that I cannot say whether it is by the one or the other of these

reasons, that the direction of the first motion of the impulse of the planets

has changed, but they suffice to shew that such an alteration is not only

possible but even probable, and that is sufficient for my purpose.

But, without dwelling any longer on the objections which might be made, I

shall pursue the subject, and draw the fair conclusions on the proofs which

analogies might furnish in favour of my hypothesis: let us, therefore, first see

what might happen when these planets, and particularly the earth, received

their impulsive motion, and in what state they were after having been

separated from the sun. The comet having, by a single stroke, communicated

a projectile motion to a quantity of matter equal to the 650th part of the sun's

mass, the light particles would of course separate from the dense, and form,

by their mutual attraction, globes of different densities: Saturn being

composed of the most gross and light parts, would be the most remote from

the sun: Jupiter being more dense than Saturn, would be less distant, and so

on. The larger and least solid planets are the most remote, because they

received an impulsive motion stronger than the smallest, and more dense:

for, the force of impulsion communicating itself according to the surface, the

same stroke would have moved the grosser and lighter parts of the matter

of the sun with more velocity than the smallest and more weighty; a

separation therefore will be made of the dense parts of different degrees, so

that the density of the sun being equal to 100, that of Saturn will be equal to

67, that of Jupiter to 94-1/2, that of Mars to 200, that of the Earth to 400, that

of Venus to 800, and that of Mercury to 2800. But the force of attraction not

communicating like that of impulsion, according to the surface, but acting

on the contrary on all parts of the mass, it will have checked the densest

portions of matter; and it is for this reason that the densest planets are the

nighest the sun, and turn round that planet with greater rapidity than the

less dense planets, which are also the most remote.

Jupiter and Saturn, which are the largest and principal planets of the solar

system, have retained the relation between their density and impulsive

motions, in the most exact proportions; the density of Saturn is to that of

Jupiter as 67 to 94-1/2 and their velocities are nearly as 88-2/3 to 120-1/72,

or as 67 to 90-11/16; it is seldom that pure conjectures can draw such exact

relations. It is true, that by following this relation between the velocity and

density of planets, the density of the earth ought to be only as 206-7/18, and

not 400, which is its real density; from hence it may be conceived, that our

globe was formerly less dense than it is at present. With respect to the other

planets, Mars, Venus, and Mercury, as their densities are known only by

conjecture, we cannot be certain whether this circumstance will destroy or

confirm our hypothesis. The opinion of Newton is, that density is so much

the greater, as the heat to which the planet is exposed is the stronger; and it

is on this idea that we have just said that Mars is one time less dense than

the Earth, Venus one time, Mercury seven times, and the comet in 1680,

28,000 times denser than the earth: but this proportion between the density

of the planets and the heat which they sustain, seems not well founded,

when we consider Saturn and Jupiter, which are the principal objects; for,

according to this relation between the density and heat, the density of Saturn

would be about 4-7/18, and that of Jupiter as 14-17/22, instead of 67 and 94-

1/2, a difference too great to be admitted, and must destroy the principles

upon which it was founded. Thus, notwithstanding the confidence which

the conjectures of Newton merit, I can but think that the density of the

planets has more relation with their velocity than with the degree of heat to

which they are exposed. This is only a final cause, and the other a physical

relation, the preciseness of which is remarkable in Jupiter and Saturn: it is

nevertheless true, that the density of the earth, instead of being 206-7/8, is

found to be 400, and that consequently the terrestrial globe must be

condensed in this ratio of 206-7/8 to 400.

But have not the condensations of the planets some relation with the

quantity of the heat of the sun which they sustain? If so, Saturn, which is the

most distant from that luminary, will have suffered little or no condensation;

and Jupiter will be condensed from 90-11/16 to 94-1/2. Now the heat of the

sun in Jupiter being to that of the sun upon the earth as 14-17/22 are to 400,

the condensations ought to be in the same proportion. For instance, if Jupiter

be condensed, as 90-11/16 to 94-1/2, and the earth had been placed in his

orbit, it would have been condensed from 206-7/8 to 215-990/1451, but the

earth being nearer the sun, and receiving a heat, whose relation to that which

Jupiter receives is from 400 to 14-17/22, the quantity of condensation it

would have experienced on the orbit of Jupiter by the proportion of 400 to

14-17/22, which gives nearly 234-1/3 for the quantity which the earth would

be condensed. Its density was 206-7/8, by adding the quantity of its acquired

condensation, we find 400-7/8 for its actual density, which nearly

approaches the real density 400, determined to be so by the parallax of the

moon. As to other planets, I do not here pretend to give exact proportions,

but only approximations, to point out that their densities have a strong

relation to their velocity in their respective orbits.

The comet, therefore, by its oblique fall upon the surface of the sun, having

driven therefrom a quantity of matter equal to the 650th part of its whole

mass; this matter, which must be considered in a liquid state, will at first

have formed a torrent, the grosser and less dense parts of which will have

been driven the farthest, and the smaller and more dense, having received

only the like impulsion, will remain nearest its source; the force of the sun's

attraction would inevitably act upon all the parts detached from him, and

constrain them to circulate around his body, and at the same time the mutual

attraction of the particles of matter would form themselves into globes at

different distances from the sun, the nearest of which necessarily moving

with greater rapidity in their orbits than those at a distance.

But another objection may be started, and it may be said, if the matter which

composes the planets had been separated from the sun, they, like him, would

have been burning and luminous bodies, not cold and opaque, for nothing

resembles a globe of fire less than a globe of earth and water; and by

comparison, the matter of the earth and planets is perfectly different from

that of the sun?

To this it may be answered, that in the separation the matter changed its

form, and the light or fire was extinguished by the stroke which caused this

motion of impulsion. Besides, may it not be supposed that if the sun, or a

burning star, moved with such velocity as the planet, that the fire would

soon be extinguished; and that is the reason why all luminous stars are fixed,

and that those stars which are called new, and which have probablychanged

places, are frequently extinguished and lost? This remark is somewhat

confirmed by what has been observed in comets; they must burn to the

centre when they pass to their perihelium: nevertheless they do not become

luminous themselves, they only exhale burning vapours, of which they leave

a considerable part behind them in their course.

I own, that in a medium where there is very little or no resistance, fire may

subsist and suffer a very great motion without being extinguished: I also

own, that what I have just said extends only to the stars which totally

disappear, and not to those which have periodical returns, and appear and

disappear alternately without changing place in the heavens. The

phenomena of these stars has been explained in a very satisfactory manner

by M. de Maupertuis, in his discourse on the figures of the planets. But the

stars which appear and afterwards disappear entirely, must certainly have

been extinguished, either by the velocity of their motion, or some other

cause. We have not a single example of one luminous star revolving round

another; and among the number of planets which compose our system, and

which move round the sun with more or less rapidity, there is not one

luminous of itself.

It may also be added, that fire cannot subsist so long in the small as in large

masses, and that the planets must have burnt for some time after they were

separated from the sun, but were at length extinguished for want of

combustible matter, as probably would be the sun itself, and for the same

reason; but in a length of time as far beyond that which extinguished the

planets, as it exceeds in quantity of matter. Be this as it may, the matter of

which the planets are formed being separated from the sun, by the stroke of

a comet, that appears a sufficient reason for the extinction of their fires.

The earth and planets at the time of their quitting the sun, were in a state of

total liquid fire; in this state they remained only as long as the violence of the

heat which had produced it; and which heat necessarily underwent a

gradual decay: it was in this state of fluidity that they took their circular

forms, and that their regular motions raised the parts of their equators, and

lowered their poles. This figure, which agrees so perfectly with the laws of

hydrostatics, I am of opinion with Leibnitz, necessarily supposes that the

earth and planets have been in a state of fluidity, caused by fire, and that the

internal part of the earth must be a vitrifiable matter, of which sand, granite,

&c. are the fragments and scoria.

It may, therefore, with some probability, be thought that the planets

appertained to the sun, that they were separated by a single stroke, which

gave to them a motion of impulsion, and that their position at different

distances from the sun proceeds only from their different densities. It now

only remains, to complete this theory, to explain the diurnal motion of the

planets, and the formation or the satellites; but this, far from adding

difficulties to my hypothesis, seems, on the contrary, to confirm it.

For the diurnal motion, or rotation, depends solely on the obliquity of the

stroke, an oblique impulse therefore on the surface of a body will necessarily

give it a rotative motion; this motion will be equal and always the same, if

the body which receives it is homogeneous, and it will be unequal if the body

is composed of heterogeneous parts, or of different densities; hence we may

conclude that in all the planets the matter is homogeneous, since their

diurnal motions are equal, and regularly performed in the same period of

time. Another proof that the separation of the dense or less dense parts were

originally from the sun.

But the obliquity of the stroke might be such, as to separate from the body

of the principal planet a small part of matter, which would of course

continue to move in the same direction; these parts would be united,

according to their densities, at different distances from the planet, by the

force of their mutual attraction, and at the same time follow its course round

the sun, by revolving about the body of the planet, nearly in the plane of its

orbit. It is plain, that those small parts so separated are the satellites: thus the

formation, position, and direction of the motions of the satellites perfectly

agree with our theory; for they have all the same motion in concentrical

circles round their principal planet; their motion is in the same direction, and

that nearly in the plane of their orbits. All these effects, which are common

to them, and which depend on an impulsive force, can proceed only from

one common cause, which is, impulsive motion, communicated to them by

one and the same oblique stroke.

What we have just said on the cause of the motion and formation of the

satellites, will acquire more probability, if we consider all the circumstances

of the phenomena. The planets which turn the swiftest on their axis, are

those which have satellites. The earth turns quicker than Mars in the relation

of about 24 to 15; the earth has a satellite, but Mars has none. Jupiter, whose

rapidity round its axis is five to six hundred times greater than that of the

earth, has four satellites, and there is a great appearance that Saturn, which

has five, and a ring, turns still more quickly than Jupiter.

It may even be conjectured with some foundation, that the ring of Saturn is

parallel to the equator of the planet, so that the plane of the equator of the

ring, and that of Saturn, are nearly the same; for by supposing, according to

the preceding theory, that the obliquity of the stroke by which Saturn has

been set in motion was very great, the velocity around the axis will, at first,

have been in proportion as the centrifugal force exceeds that of gravity, and

there will be detached from its equator and neighbouring parts, a

considerable quantity of matter, which will necessarily have taken the figure

of a ring, whose plane must be nearly the same as that of the equator of the

planet; and this quantity of matter having been detached from the vicinity

of the equator of Saturn, must have lowered the equator of that planet, which

causes that, notwithstanding its rapidity, the diameters of Saturn cannot be

so unequal as those of Jupiter, which differ from each other more than an

eleventh part.

However great the probability of what I have advanced on the formation of

the planets and their satellites may appear to me, yet, every man has his

particular measurement, to estimate probabilities of this nature; and as this

measurement depends on the strength of the understanding to combine

more or less distant relations, I do not pretend to convince the incredulous.

I have not only thought it my duty to offer these ideas, because they appear

to me reasonable, and calculated to clear up a subject, on which, however

important, nothing has hitherto been written, but because the impulsive

motion in the planets enter at least as one half of the composition of the

universe, which gravity alone cannot unfold. I shall only add the following

questions to those who are inclined to deny the possibility of my system.

1. Is it not natural to imagine, that a body in motion has received that motion

by the stroke of another body?

2. Is it not very probable, that when many bodies move in the same direction,

that they have received this direction by one single stroke, or by many

strokes directed in the same manner?

3. Is it not more probable that when many bodies have the same direction in

their motion, and are placed in the same plane, that they received this

direction and this position by one and the same stroke, rather than by a

number?

4. At the time a body is put in motion by the force of impulsion, is it not

probable that it receives it obliquely, and, consequently, is obliged to turn on

its axis so much the quicker, as the obliquity of the stroke will have been

greater? If these questions should not appear unreasonable, the theory, of

which we have presented the outlines, will cease to appear an absurdity.

Let us now pass on to something which more nearly concerns us, and

examine the figure of the earth, on which so many researches and such great

observations have been made. The earth being, as it appears by the equality

of its diurnal motion and the constancy of the inclination of its axis,

composed of homogeneous parts, which attract each other in proportion to

their quantity of matter, it would necessarily have taken the figure of a globe

perfectly spherical, if the motion of impulsation had been given it in a

perpendicular direction to the surface; but this stroke having been obliquely

given, the earth turned on its axis at the moment it took its form; and from

the combination of this impulsive force, the attraction of the parts, there has

resulted a spheroid figure, more elevated under the great circle of rotation,

and lower at the two extremities of the axis, and this because the action of

the centrifugal force proceeding from the diurnal rotation must diminish the

action of gravity. Thus, the earth being homogeneous, and having received

a rotative motion, necessarily took a spheroidical figure, the two axes of

which differ a 230th part from each other. This may be clearly demonstrated,

and does not depend on any hypothesis whatever. The laws of gravity are

perfectly known, and we cannot doubt that bodies attract each other in a

direct ratio of their masses, and in an inverted ratio, at the squares of their

distances; so likewise we cannot doubt, that the general action of any body

is not composed of all the particular actions of its parts. Thus each part of

matter mutually attracts in a direct ratio of its mass and an inverted ratio of

its distance, and from all these attractions there results a sphere when there

is no rotatory motion, and a spheroid when there is one. This spheroid is

longer or shorter at the two extremities of the axis of rotation, in proportion

to the velocity of its diurnal motion, and the earth has then, by virtue of its

rotative velocity, and of the mutual attraction of all its parts, the figure of a

spheroid, the two axes of which are as 229 to 230 to one another.

Thus, by its original constituent, by its homogeneousness, and independent

of every hypothesis from the direction of gravity, the earth has taken this

figure of a spheroid at its formation, and agreeable to mechanical laws: its

equatorial diameter was raised about 6-1/2 leagues higher than under the

poles.

I shall dwell on this article, because there are still geometricians who think

that the figure of the earth depends upon theory, and this from a system of

philosophy they have embraced, and from a supposed direction of gravity.

The first thing we have to demonstrate is, the mutual attraction of every part

of matter, and the second the homogeneousness of the terrestrial globe; if we

clearly prove, that these two circumstances are really so, there will no longer

be any hypothesis to be made on the direction of gravity: the earth will

necessarily have the figure Newton decided in favour of, and every other

figure given to it by virtue of vortexes or other hypotheses, will not be able

to subsist.

It cannot be doubted, that it is the force of gravity which retains the planets

in their orbits; the satellites of Saturn gravitate towards Saturn, those of

Jupiter towards Jupiter, the Moon gravitates towards the Earth: and Saturn,

Jupiter, Mars, the Earth, Venus, and Mercury, gravitate towards the Sun: so

likewise Saturn and Jupiter gravitate towards their satellites, the Earth

gravitates towards the Moon, and the Sun towards the whole of the planets.

Gravitation is therefore general and mutual in all the planetary system, for

action cannot be exercised without a re-action; all the planets, therefore, act

mutually one on the other. This mutual attraction serves as a foundation to

the laws of their motion, and is demonstrated to exist by its effects. When

Saturn and Jupiter are in conjunction, they act one on the other, and this

attraction produces an irregularity in their motion round the Sun. It is the

same with the Earth and the Moon, they also mutually attract each other; but

the irregularities of the motion of the Moon, proceeds from the attraction of

the Sun, so that the Earth, the Sun, and the Moon, mutually act one on the

other. Now this mutual attraction of the planets, when the distances are

equal, is proportional to their quantity of matter, and the same force of

gravity which causes heavy matter to fall on the surface of the Earth, and

which extends to the Moon, is also proportional to the quantity of matter;

therefore the total gravity of a planet is composed of the gravity of each of

its parts; from whence all the parts of the matter, either in the Earth or in the

planets, mutually attract each other and the Earth, by its rotation round its

own axis, has necessarily taken the figure of a spheroid, the axes of which

are as 229 to 230. The direction of the weight must be perpendicular to the

Earth's surface; consequently no hypothesis, drawn from the direction of

gravity, can be sustained, unless the general attraction of the parts of matter

be denied; but the existence of this mutual attraction is demonstrated by

observations, and the experiment of pendulums prove, that its extension is

general; therefore we cannot support an hypothesis on the direction of

gravity without going against experience and reason.

Let us now proceed to examine whether the matter of which the terrestrial

globe is composed be homogeneous. I admit, that if it is supposed the globe

is more dense in some parts than in others, the direction of gravity must be

different from what we have just assigned, and that the figure of the Earth

would also differ agreeable to those suppositions. But what reason have we

to make these suppositions? Why, for example, should we suppose that the

parts near the centre are denser than those which are more remote? Are not

all the particles which compose the globe collected together by their mutual

attraction? hence, each particle is a centre, and there is no reason to believe,

that the parts which surround the centre are denser than those which are

about any other point. Besides, if one considerable part of the globe was

denser than another, the axis of rotation would be found near the dense

parts, and an inequality would ensue in the diurnal revolution; we should

remark an inequality in the apparent motion of the fixed stars; they would

appear to move more quick or slow in the zenith, or horizon, according as

we should be placed on the denser or lighter parts of the earth; and the axis

of the globe no longer passing through the centre of gravity, would also very

sensibly change its position: but nothing like this ever happens; on the

contrary, the diurnal motion of the earth is equal and uniform. At all parts

of the Earth's surface, the stars appear to move with the same velocity at all

heights, and if there be any rotation in its axis, it is so trifling as to have

escaped observation: it must therefore be concluded, that the globe is

homogeneous, or nearly so in all its parts.

If the earth was a hollow and void globe, and the crust of which, for example,

not more than two or three miles thick; it would produce these effects. 1. The

mountains would be such considerable parts of the whole thickness of the

crust, that great irregularities in the motions of the Earth would be

occasioned by the attraction of the Moon and Sun: for when the highest parts

of the globe, as the Cordeliers, should have the Moon at noon, the attraction

would be much stronger on the whole globe than when she was in the

meridian of the lowest parts. 2. The attraction of mountains would be much

more considerable than it is in comparison with the attraction of the whole

globe, and experiments made at the mountain of Chimboraco, in Peru,

would in this case give more degrees than they have given seconds for the

deviation of the plumb line. 3. The weight of bodies would be greater on the

tops of high mountains than on the planes; so that we should feel ourselves

considerably heavier, and should walk with more difficulty in high than in

low places. These observations, with many others that might be added, must

convince us, that the inner parts of the globe is not void, but filled with a

dense matter.

On the other hand, if below the depth of two or three miles, the earth was

filled with a matter much more dense than any known, it would necessarily

occur, that every time we descended to moderate depths, we should weigh

much more, and the motion of pendulums would be more accelerated than

in fact they are when carried from an eminence into a plain: thus, we may

presume that the internal part of the Earth is filled with a matter nearly

similar to that which composes its surface. What may complete our

determination in favour of this opinion is, that in the first formation of the

globe, when it took its present spheroidical figure, the matter which

composed it was in fusion, and, consequently, all its parts were

homogeneous, and nearly equally dense. From that time the matter on the

surface, although originally the same with the interior, has undergone a

variety of changes by external causes, which has produced materials of such

different densities; but it must be remarked, that the densest matters, as gold

and metals, are also those the most seldom to be met with, and consequently

the greatest part of the matter at the surface of the globe has not undergone

any very great changes with relation to its density; the most common

materials, as sand and clay, differ very little, insomuch, that we may

conjecture, with great probability, that the internal part of the earth is

composed of a vitrified matter, the density of which is nearly the same as

that of sand, and that consequently the terrestrial globe in general may be

regarded as homogeneous.

Notwithstanding this, it may be urged, that although the globe was

composed of concentrical strata of different densities, the diurnal motion

might be equally certain, and the uniform inclination of the axis as constant

and undisturbed as it could be, on the supposition of its being composed of

homogeneous matter. I acknowledge it, but I ask at the same time, if there is

any reason to believe that strata of different densities do exist? If these

conclusions be not rather a desire to adjust the works of Nature to our own

ideas? And whether in physics we ought to admit suppositions which are

not founded on observations or analogy?

It appears, therefore, that the earth, by virtue of the mutual attraction of its

parts and its diurnal motion, assumed the figure of a spheroid; that it

necessarily took that form from being in a state of fluidity; that, agreeable to

the laws of gravity and of a centrifugal force, it could have no other figure:

that in the moment of its formation as at present, there was a difference

between the two diameters equal to a 230th part, and that, consequently,

every hypothesis in which we find greater or less difference are fictions

which merit no attention.

But it may be said, if this theory is true, and if 229 to 230 is the just relation

of the axis, why did the mathematicians, sent to Lapland and Peru, agree to

the relation of 174 to 175? From whence does this difference arise between

theory and practice? And is it not more reasonable to give the preference to

practice and measures, especially when we have been taken by the most able

mathematicians of Europe, and with all necessary apparatus to establish the

result.

To this I answer, that I have paid attention to the observations made at the

equator and near the polar circle; that I have no doubt of their being exact,

and that the earth may possibly be elevated an 175th part more at the equator

than at the poles. But, at the same time, I maintain my theory, and I see

clearly how the two conclusions may be reconciled. This difference is about

four leagues in the two axes, so that the parts at the equator are raised two

leagues more than they ought to be, according to my theory; this height

answers exactly to the greatest inequalities on the surface of the globe,

produced by the motion of the sea, and the action of the fluids. I will explain;

it appears that when the earth was formed, it must necessarily have taken,

by virtue of the mutual attraction of its parts, and the action of the centrifugal

force, a spheroidical figure, the axes of which differ a 230th part: the original

earth must have had this figure, which it took when it was fluid, or rather

liquified by the fire; but after its formation the vapours which were extended

and rarefied, as in the atmosphere and tail of a comet, became condensed,

and fell on the surface in form of air and water: and when these waters

became agitated by the flux and reflux, the matters were, by degrees, carried

from the poles towards the equatorial parts; so that the poles were lowered

about a league, and those of the equator raised in the same proportion; this

was not suddenly done, but by degrees in succession of time; the earth being

also exposed to the action of the winds, air, and sun; all these irregular causes

concurred with the flux and reflux to furrow its surface, hollow it into

valleys, and raise it into mountains; and producing other inequalities and

irregularities, of which, nevertheless, the greatest thickness does not exceed

one league at the equator; this inequality of two leagues, is, perhaps, the

greatest which can be on the surface of the earth, for the highest mountains

are scarce above one league in height, and there is much probability of the

sea's not being more at its greatest depth. The theory is therefore true, and

practice may be so likewise; the earth at first could not be raised above 6-1/2

leagues more at the equator than the poles, but the changes which have

happened to its surface might afterwards raise it still more. Natural History

wonderfully confirms this opinion, for we have proved in the preceding

discourse that the flux and reflux, and other motions of the water, have

produced mountains and all the inequalities on the surface of the globe, that

this surface has undergone considerable changes, and that at the greatest

depths, as well as on the greatest heights, bones, shells and other wrecks of

animals, which inhabit the sea and earth, are met with.

It may be conjectured, from what has been said, that to find ancient earth,

and matters which have never been removed from the spot in which they

were first placed, we must dig near the poles, where the bed of the earth

must be thinner than in the Southern climates.

On the whole, if we strictly examine the measures by which the figure of the

earth is determined, we shall perceive this hypothesis enters into such

determination; for it supposes the earth to have the figure of a regular curve,

whereas from the constant changes the earth is continually undergoing from

a variety and combination of causes, it is almost impossible that it should

have retained any regular figure, and hence the poles might, originally, only

be flattened a 230th part, as Newton says, and as my theory requires.

Besides, although we had exactly the length of the degree at the polar circle

and equator, have we not also the length of the degree as exactly in France?

And the measure of M. Picard, has it not been verified? Add to this that the

augmentation and diminution in the motion of the pendulum, do not agree

with the result drawn from measurement, and that, on the contrary, they

differ very little from the theory of Newton. This is surely more than is

requisite to convince us that the poles are not flattened more than a 230th

part, and that if there is any difference, it can proceed only from the

inequalities, which the water and other external causes have produced on its

surface; but these inequalities being more irregular than regular, we must

not form any hypothesis thereon, nor suppose, that the meridians are

ellipses, or any other regular curves. From whence we perceive, that if we

should successively measure many degrees of the earth in all directions, we

still should not be certain by that alone, of the exact situation of the poles,

nor whether they were depressed more or less than the 230th part.

May it not also be conjectured, that if the inclination of the axis of the earth

has changed, it can only be produced by the changes which have happened

to the surface, since all the rest of the globe is homogeneous; that

consequently this variation is too little sensible to be perceived by

astronomers, and that if the earth is not encountered with a comet, or

deranged, by any other external cause, its axis will remain perpetually

inclined as it is at present, and as it has always been?

In order not to omit any conjecture which appears reasonable, may it not be

said, that as the mountains and inequalities which are on the surface of the

earth have been formed by the flux and reflux of the sea, the mountains and

inequalities which we remark on the surface of the moon, have been

produced by a similar cause? they certainly are much higher than those of

the earth, but then her tides are also much stronger, occasioned by the earth's

being considerably larger than the moon, and consequently producing her

tides with a superior force; and this effect would be much greater if the moon

had, like the earth, a rapid rotation; but as the moon presents always the

same surface to the earth, the tides cannot operate but in proportion to the

motion arising from her libration, by which it alternatively discovers to us a

segment of its other hemisphere; this, however, must produce a kind of flux

and reflux, quite different from that of our sea, and the effects of which will

be much less considerable than if the moon had from its course a revolution

round its axis, as quick as the rotation of the terrestrial globe.

I should furnish a volume as large as that of Burnet or Whiston's, if I were to

enlarge on the ideas which arise in support of the above; by giving them a

geometrical air, in imitation of the last author, I might add considerably to

their weight; but, in my opinion, hypothesis, however probable, ought not

to be treated with such pomposity; it being a dress which borders so much

on quackery.

ARTICLE II.

FROM THE SYSTEM OF WHISTON.

This Author commences his treatise by a dissertation on the creation of the

world; he says that the account of it given by Moses in the text of Genesis

has not been rightly understood; that the translators have confined

themselves too much to the letter and superficial views, without attending

to nature, reason, and philosophy. The common notion of the world being

made in six days, he says is absolutely false, and that the description given

by Moses, is not an exact and philosophical narration of the creation and

origin of the universe, but only an historical representation of the terrestrial

globe. The earth, according to him, existed in the chaos; and, at the time

mentioned by Moses, received the form, situation and consistency necessary

to be inhabited by the human race. I shall not enter into a detail of his proofs,

nor undertake their refutation. The exposition we have just made, is

sufficient to demonstrate the difference of his opinion with public facts, its

contrariety with scripture, and consequently the insufficiency of his proofs.

On the whole, he treats this matter as a theological controvertist, rather than

as an enlightened philosopher.

Leaving these erroneous principles, he flies to ingenious suppositions,

which, although extraordinary, yet have a degree of probability to those

who, like him, incline to the enthusiasm of system. He says, that the ancient

chaos, the origin of our earth, was the atmosphere of a comet: that the annual

motion of the earth began at the time it took its new form, but that its diurnal

motion began only when the first man fell. That the ecliptic cut the tropic of

cancer, opposite to the terrestrial paradise, which was situated on the north-

west side of the frontiers of Assyria: that before the deluge, the year began

at the autumnal equinox: that the orbits of the planets, and the earth were

then perfect circles. That the deluge began the 18th of November, 2365 of the

Julian period, or 2349 years before Christ. That the solar and lunar year were

then the same, and that they exactly contained 360 days. That a comet

descending in the plane of the ecliptic towards its perihelion, passed near

the globe of the earth the same day as the deluge began: that there is a great

heat in the internal part of the terrestrial globe, which constantly diffuses

itself from the centre to the circumference; that the form of the earth is like

that of an egg, the ancient emblem of the globe; that mountains are the

lightest part of the earth, &c. He afterwards attributes all the alterations and

changes which have happened to the earth, to the universal deluge; then

blindly adopts the theory of Woodward, and indiscriminately makes use of

all the observations of that author on the present state of the globe; but

assumes originality when he speaks of its future state: according to him it

will be consumed by fire, and its destruction will be preceded by terrible

earthquakes, thunder, and frightful meteors; the Sun and Moon will have an

hideous aspect, the heavens will appear to fall, and the flames will be general

over all the earth; but when the fire shall have devoured all the impurities it

contains; when it shall be vitrified and rendered transparent as crystal, the

saints and the blessed spirits will return and take possession of it, and there

remain till the day of judgment.

These hypotheses, at the first glance, appear to be rash and extravagant

assertions; nevertheless the author has managed them with such address,

and treated them with such strength, that they cease to appear absolutely

chimerical. He supports his subjects with much science, and it is surprising

that, from a mixture of ideas so very absurd, a system could be formed with

an air of probability. It has not affected vulgar minds so much as it has

dazzled the eyes of the learned, because they are more easily deceived by

the glare of erudition, and the power of novel ideas. Mr. Whiston was a

celebrated astronomer, in the constant habit of considering the heavens,

observing the stars, and contemplating the wonderful course of nature; he

could never persuade himself that this small grain of sand, this Earth which

we inhabit, occupied more the attention of the Creator than the universe, the

vast extent of which contains millions of other Suns and Earths. He pretends,

that Moses has not given us the history of the first creation of this globe, but

only a detail of the new form that it took when the Almighty turned it from

the mass of a comet into a planet, and formed it into a proper habitation for

men. Comets are, in fact, subjected to terrible vicissitudes by reason of the

eccentricity of their orbits. Sometimes, like that in 1680, it is a thousand times

hotter there than red-hot iron; and sometimes a thousand times colder than

ice; if they are, therefore, inhabited it must be by strange creatures, of which

we can have no conception.

The planets, on the contrary, are places of rest, where the distance of the sun

not varying much, the temperature remains nearly the same, and permits

different kinds of plants and animals to grow and multiply.

In the beginning God created the world; but, observes our author, the earth

was then an uninhabitable comet, suffering alternatively the excess of heat

and cold, its liquifying and freezing by turns formed a chaos, or an abyss,

surrounded with thick darkness: "and darkness covered the face of the

deep," & tenebræ erant superfaciam abissi. This chaos was the atmosphere

of the comet, a body composed of heterogeneous matters, the centre

occupied by spherical, solid, and hot substances, of about two thousand

leagues in diameter, round which a very great surface of a thick fluid

extended, mixed with an unshapen and confused matter, like the chaos of

the ancient rudis & indigestaque moles.

This vast atmosphere contained but very few dry, solid, or terrestrial

particles, still less aqueous or aerial, but a great quantity of fluid, dense and

heavy matters, mixed, agitated and jumbled together in the greatest disorder

and confusion. Such was the earth before the six days, but on the first day of

the creation, when the eccentrical orbit of the comet had been changed, every

thing took its place, and bodies arranged themselves according to the law of

gravity, the heavy fluid descended to the lowest places, and left the upper

regions to the terrestrial, aqueous and aerial parts; those likewise descended

according to their order of gravity; first the earth, then the water, and last of

all the air. The immense volume of chaos was thus reduced to a globe of a

moderate size, in the centre of which is the solid body that still retains the

heat which the sun formerly communicated to it, when it belonged to a

comet. This heat may possibly endure six thousand years, since the comet of

1680 required fifty thousand years to cool. Around this solid and burning

matter, which occupies the centre of the earth, the dense and heavy fluid

which descended the first is to be found, and this is the fluid which forms

the great abyss on which the earth is borne, like cork on quicksilver; but as

the terrestrial parts were originally mixed with a large quantity of water, in

descending they have dragged with them a part of this water, which, not

being able to re-ascend after the earth was consolidated, formed a

concentrical bed with the heavy fluid which surrounds this hot substance,

insomuch that the great abyss is composed of two concentrical orbs, the most

internal of which is a heavy fluid, and the other water; the last of which

serves for a foundation to the earth. It is from this admirable arrangement,

produced by the atmosphere of a comet, that the Theory of the Earth, and

the explanation of all its phenomena are to depend.

When the atmosphere of the comet was once disembarrassed from all the

solid and terrestrial matters, there remained only the lighter air, through

which the rays of the sun freely passed and instantly produced light: "Let

there be light, and there was light." The columns which composed the orb of

the Earth being formed with such great precipitation is the cause of their

different densities: consequently the heaviest sunk deeper into this

subterraneous fluid than the lightest; and it is this which has produced the

vallies and mountains on the surface of the earth. These inequalities were,

before the deluge, dispersed and situated otherwise than they are at present.

Instead of the vast valley, which contains the ocean, there were many small

divided cavities on the surface of the globe, each of which contained a part

of this water; the mountains were also more divided, and did not form

chains as at present: nevertheless, the earth contained a thousand times more

people, and was a thousand times more fertile; and the life of man and other

animals were ten times longer, all which was affected by the internal heat of

the earth that proceeded from the centre, and gave birth to a great number

of plants and animals, bestowing on them a degree of vigour necessary for

them to subsist a long time, and multiply in great abundance. But this heat,

by increasing the strength of bodies, unfortunately extended to the heads of

men and animals; it augmented their passions; it deprived man of his

innocence, and the brute creation of part of their intelligence; all creatures,

excepting fish, who inhabited a colder element, felt the effects of this heat,

became criminal and merited death. It therefore came, and this universal

death happened on Wednesday the 28th of November, by a terrible deluge

of forty days and forty nights, and was caused by the tail of another comet

which encountered the earth in returning from its perihelion.

The tail of a comet is the lightest part of its atmosphere; it is a transparent

mist, a subtile vapour, which the heat of the sun exhales from the body of

the comet: this vapour composed of extremely rarefied aqueous and aerial

particles, follows the comet when it descends to its perihelion, and precedes

when it re-ascends, so that it is always situate opposite to the sun, as if it

sought to be in the shade, and avoid the too great heat of that luminary. The

column which this vapour forms is often of an immense length, and the more

a comet approaches the sun, the longer and more extended is its tail, and as

many comets descend below the annual orb of the earth, it is not surprising

that the earth is sometimes found surrounded with the vapour of this tail;

this is precisely what happened at the time of the deluge. In two hours the

tail of a comet will evacuate a quantity of water equal to what is contained

in the whole ocean. In short, this tail was what Moses calls the cataracts of

Heaven, "and the cataracts of Heaven were opened." The terrestrial globe

meeting with the tail of a comet, must, in going its course through this

vapour, appropriate to itself a part of the matter which it contains; all which,

coming within the sphere of the earth's attraction, must fall on it, and fall in

the form of rain, since this tail is partly composed of aqueous vapours. Thus

rain may come down in such abundance as to produce an universal deluge

the waters of which might easily surmount the tops of the highest

mountains. Nevertheless, our author, cautious of not going directly against

the letter of holy writ, does not say that this rain was the sole cause of the

universal deluge, but takes the water from every place he can find it. The

great abyss as we see contains a considerable quantity. The earth, at the

approach of the comet, would prove the force of its attraction; and the waters

contained in the great abyss would be agitated by so violent a kind of flux

and reflux, that the superficial crust would not resist, but split in several

places, and the internal waters be dispersed over the surface, "And the

fountains of the abyss were opened."

But what became of these waters, which the tail of the comet and great abyss

furnished so liberally? our author is not the least embarrassed thereon. As

soon as the earth, continuing its course, removed from the comet, the effects

of its attraction, the flux and reflux in the great abyss ceased of course, and

immediately the upper waters precipitated back with violence by the same

roads as they had been forced upon the surface. The great abyss absorbed all

the superfluous waters, and was of a sufficient capacity not only to receive

its own waters, but also all those which the tail of the comet had left, because

during its agitation, and the rupture of its crust, it had enlarged the space by

driving out on all sides the earth that surrounded it. It was at this time also

the figure of the earth, which till then was spherical, became elliptic. This

effect was occasioned by the centrifugal force caused by its diurnal motion,

and by the attraction of the comet, for the earth, in passing through the tail

of the comet, found itself so placed that it presented the parts of the equator

to that planet; and the power of the attraction of the comet, concurring with

the centrifugal force of the earth, caused the parts of the equator to be

elevated, and that with the more facility as the crust was broken and divided

in an infinity of places, and because the flux and reflux of the abyss drove

against the equator more violently than elsewhere.

Here then is Mr. Whiston's history of the creation; the causes of the universal

deluge; the length of the life of the first men; and the figure of the Earth; all

which seem to have cost our author little or no labour; but Noah's ark

appears to have greatly disquieted him. In the midst of so terrible a disorder

occasioned by the conjunction of the tail of a comet with the waters of the

great abyss, in the terrible moments wherein not only the elements of the

earth were confused, but when new elements still concurred to augment the

chaos, how can it be imagined that the ark floated quietly with its numerous

cargo on the top of the waves? Here our author makes great efforts to arrive

at and give a physical reason for the preservation of the ark, but which has

always appeared to me insufficient, poorly imagined, and but little

orthodoxical: I will not here relate it, but only observe how hard it is for a

man who has explained objects so great and wonderful, without having

recourse to a supernatural power, to be stopt by one particular circumstance;

our author, however, chose rather to risk drowning with the ark, than to

attribute to the immediate bounty of the Almighty the preservation of this

precious vessel.

I shall only make one remark on this system, of which I have made a faithful

abridgement: which is, whenever we are rash enough to attempt to explain

theological truths by physical reasons, or interpret purely by human views,

the divine text of holy writ, or that we endeavour to reason on the will of the

Most High, and on the execution of his decrees, we consequently shall

involve ourselves in the darkness and chaos of obscurity and confusion, like

the author of this system, which, in defiance of its absurdities, has been

received with great applause. He neither doubts the truth of the deluge, nor

the authenticity of the sacred writ; but as he was less employed with it than

with physic and astronomy, he has taken passages of the scripture for

physical facts, and the results of astronomical observations; and has so

strangely blended the divine knowledge with human science as to give birth

to the most extraordinary system that possibly ever was or will be conceived.

ARTICLE III.

FROM THE SYSTEM OF BURNET.

This author is the first who has treated this subject generally and in a

systematical matter. He was possessed of much understanding, and was a

person well acquainted with the belles lettres. His work acquired great

reputation, and was criticised by many of the learned, among the rest by Mr.

Keil, who has geometrically demonstrated the errors of Mr. Burnet, in a

treatise called "Examination of the Theory of the Earth." Mr. Keil also refuted

Whiston's system; but he treats the last author very different from the first,

and seems even to be of his opinion in several cases, and looks upon the tail

of a comet to be a very probable cause for the deluge. But, to return to Burnet,

his book is elegantly written; he knew how to paint noble images and

magnificent scenes. His plan is great, but the execution is deficient for want

of proper materials: his reasoning is good, but his proofs are weak; yet his

confidence in his writings is so great, that he frequently causes his readers

to pass over his errors.

He begins by telling us, that before the deluge the earth had a very different

form from that which it has at present; it was at first, he says, a fluid mass,

compounded of matters of all kinds, and all sorts of figures, the heaviest

descended towards the centre, and formed a hard and solid body; round

which the waters collected, and the air, and all the liquors lighter than water,

surmounted them. Between the orb of air and that of water, was an orb of

oily matter, but as the air was still very impure, and contained a great

quantity of small particles of terrestrial matter, they by degrees descended

on the coat of oil, and formed a terrestrial orb blended with earth and oil;

and this was the first habitable earth, and the first abode of man. This was

an excellent soil, light, and calculated to yield to the tenderness of the first

germs. The surface of the terrestrial globe was at first equal, uniform,

without mountains, without seas, and without inequalities; but it remained

only about sixteen centuries in this state, for the heat of the sun by degrees

drying the crust, split it at first on the surface, soon after these cracks

penetrated farther and increased so considerably by time, that at length they

entirely opened the crust; in an instant the whole earth fell into pieces in the

abyss of water it surrounded; and this was the cause of the deluge.

But all these masses of earth, by falling into the abyss, dragged along with

them a great quantity of air; these struck against each other, divided, and

accumulated so irregularly, that great cavities filled with air were left

between them. The waters by degrees opened these cavities, and in

proportion as they filled them, the surface of the earth discovered itself in

the highest parts; at length water alone remained in the lowest parts; that is

to say, the vast vallies which contain the sea. Thus our ocean is a part of the

ancient abyss, the rest is entered into the internal cavities with which the

ocean communicates. The islands and sea rocks are the small fragments, and

continents are the great masses of the old crust. As the rupture and the fall

of this crust are made of a sudden, and with confusion, it was not surprising

to find eminences, depths, plains, and inequalities of all kinds on the surface

of the earth.

ARTICLE IV.

FROM THE SYSTEM OF WOODWARD.

It may be said of this author, that he attempted to raise an immense

monument on a less solid base than the moving sand, and to construct a

world with dust; for he pretends, that at the time of the deluge a total

dissolution of the earth was made. The first idea which presents, after having

gone through his book, is, that this dissolution was made by the waters of

the great abyss. He asserts, that the abyss where the water was included

opened all at once at the command of God, and dispersed over the surface

an enormous quantity of water necessary to cover the tops of the highest

mountains, and that God suspended the cause of cohesion which reduced

all solid bodies into dust, &c. He did not consider that by these suppositions

he added other miracles to that of the universal deluge, or at least physical

impossibilities, which agree neither with the letter of the holy writ, nor with

the mathematical principles of natural philosophy. But as this author has the

merit of having collected many important observations, and as he was better

acquainted with the materials of which the globe is composed than those

who preceded him, his system, although badly conceived, and worse

digested, has nevertheless dazzled many people, who, seduced by the truth

of some particular circumstances, put confidence in his general conclusions;

we shall, therefore, give a short view of his theory, in which, by doing justice

to the author's merit, and the exactness of his observations, we shall put the

reader in a state of judging of the insufficiency of his system, and of the

falsity of some of his remarks. Mr. Woodward speaks of having discovered

by his sight that all matters which compose the English earth, from the

surface to the deepest places which had been dug, were disposed by beds of

strata, and that in a great number of these there were shells and other marine

productions; he afterwards adds, that by his correspondents and friends he

was assured, that in other countries the earth is composed of the same

materials, and that shells are found there, not only in the plains but on the

highest mountains, in the deepest quarries, and in an infinity of different

places. He perceived their strata to be horizontal and disposed one over the

other, as matters are which are transported by the waters, and deposited in

form of sediment. These general remarks, which are true, are followed by

particular observations, by which he evidently shews, that fossils found

incorporated in the strata are real shells and marine productions, not

minerals and singular bodies, the sport of nature, &c.

To these observations, though partly made before him, which he has

collected and proved, he adds others less exact. He asserts, that all matters

of different strata are placed one on the other in the order of their specific

gravity.

This general assertion is not true, for we daily see rocks placed above clay,

sand, coal, and bitumen, and which certainly are specifically heavier than

either of these latter materials. If, in fact, we found throughout the earth that

the first strata was bitumen, then chalk, then marl, clay, sand, stone, marble,

and at last metals, so that the composition of the earth exactly followed the

law of gravity, there would be an appearance that they might have been

precipitated at the same time, which our author asserts with confidence, in

spite of the evidence to the contrary; for, without being a naturalist, we need

only have our eye-sight to be convinced that heavy strata are often found

above lighter, and that consequently these sediments were not precipitated

all at one time, but have been brought and deposited successively by the

water. As this is the foundation of his system, and is manifestly false, we

shall follow it no farther than to show how far an erroneous principle may

produce false combinations and erroneous conclusions.

All the matters, says our author, which compose the earth, from the summits

of the highest mountains, to the greatest depths of mines, are disposed by

strata, according to their specific weights; therefore he concludes the whole

has been dissolved and precipitated at one time. But in what manner, and at

what time was it dissolved? In water, replies he, and at the time of the

deluge. But there is not a sufficient quantity of water on the globe for this to

be effected, since there is more land than water, and the bottom of the sea

itself is earth. This he admits, but says, there is more water than is requisite

at the centre of the earth, that it was only necessary for it to ascend, and

possess a power of dissolving every substance but shells, afterwards to find

the means for this water to re-enter the abyss, and to make all this agree with

the history of the deluge. This then is the system, of which the author does

not entertain the least doubt; for when it is opposed to him that water cannot

dissolve marble, stone, and metals, especially in forty days, the duration of

the deluge, he answers simply, that nevertheless it did happen so. When he

is asked, what the virtue of this water of the abyss was, to dissolve all the

earth, and at the same time preserve the shells? he says, that he never

pretended that this water was a dissolvent; but that it is clear, by facts, that

the earth has been dissolved and the shells preserved. When he was

evidently shown that if he had no reason to give, or facts to support, for these

phenomena, his system was useless, he said, we have only to imagine that,

during the deluge, the force of gravity and the coherency of matter ceased

on a sudden, and by this supposition the dissolution of the old world would

be explained in a very easy and satisfactory manner. But, it was said to him,

if the power which holds the parts of matter united was suspended, why

were not the shells dissolved as well as all the rest? Here he makes a

discourse on the organization of shells and bones of animals, by which he

pretends to prove that their texture being fibrous, and different from that of

minerals, their power of cohesion was different also; after all, we have, says

he, only to suppose that the power of gravity and cohesion did not entirely

cease, but that it was only diminished sufficient to disunite all the parts of

minerals, and not those of animals. To all this we cannot be prevented from

discovering, that our author's philosophy was not equal to his talents for

observation; and I do not think it necessary seriously to refute opinions

which have no foundation, especially when they have been imagined against

the rules of probability, and drawn from consequences contrary to

mechanical laws.

ARTICLE V.

EXPOSITION OF SOME OTHER SYSTEMS.

It is plain that the three forementioned hypotheses have much in common

with each other. They all agree in this point, that during the deluge the earth

changed its form, as well externally as internally; but these speculators have

not considered that the earth before the deluge was inhabited by the same

species of men and animals, and must necessarily have been nearly such as

it is at present. The sacred writings teach us, that before the deluge there

were rivers, seas, mountains, and forests. That these rivers and mountains

were, for the most part, retained in the same situations; the Tigris and

Euphrates were the rivers of the ancient paradise; that the mountain of

Armenia, on which the ark rested, was one of the highest mountains in the

world at the deluge, as it is at present: that the same plants and animals

which exist now, existed then; for we read of the serpent, of the raven, of the

crow, and of the dove, which brought the olive branch into the ark. Although

Tournefort asserts there are no olive trees for more than 400 miles from

Mount Ararat, and passes some absurd jokes thereon, it is nevertheless

certain there were olives in this neighbourhood at the time of the deluge,

since holy writ assures us of it in the most express terms; but it is by no

means astonishing that in the space of 4000 years the olive trees should have

been destroyed in those quarters, and multiplied in others; it is therefore

contrary to scripture and reason, that those authors have supposed the earth

was quite different from its present state before the deluge; and this

contradiction between their hypothesis and the sacred text, as well as

physical truths, must cause their systems to be rejected, if even they should

agree with some phenomena. Burnet gives neither observations, nor any real

facts, for the support of his system. Woodward has only given us an essay,

in which he promised much more than he could perform: his book is a

project, the execution of which has not been seen. He has made use of two

general observations; the first, that the earth is every where composed of

matters which formerly were in a state of fluidity, transported by the waters,

and deposited in horizontal strata. The second, that there are abundance of

marine productions in most parts of the bowels of the earth. To give a reason

for these facts, he has recourse to the universal deluge, or rather it appears

that he gives them as proofs of the deluge; but, like Burnet, he falls into

evident contradictions, for it is not to be supposed with them that there were

no mountains prior to the deluge, since it is expressly stated, that the waters

rose fifteen cubits above the tops of the highest mountains. On the other

hand, it is not said that these waters destroyed or dissolved these mountains;

but, on the contrary, these mountains remained in their places, and the ark

rested on that which the water first deserted. Besides how can it be imagined

that, during the short duration of the deluge, the waters were able to dissolve

the mountains and the whole body of the earth? Is it not an absurdity to

suppose that in forty days all marble, rocks, stones, and minerals, were

dissolved by water? Is it not a manifest contradiction to admit this total

dissolution, and at the same time maintain that shells, bones, and marine

productions were preserved entire, and resisted that which had dissolved

the most solid substances? I shall not therefore hesitate to say, that

Woodward, with excellent facts and observations, has formed but a poor and

inconsistent system.

Whiston, who came last, greatly enriched the other two, and

notwithstanding he gave a vast scope to his imagination has not fallen into

contradiction; he speaks of matters not very credible, but they are neither

absolutely nor evidently impossible. As we are ignorant of the centre of the

earth, he thought he might suppose it was a solid matter, surrounded with

a ring of heavy fluid, and afterwards with a ring of water, on which the

external crust was sustained; in the latter the different parts of this crust were

more or less sunk, in proportion to their relative weights, which produced

mountains and inequalities on the surface of the earth. Here, however, this

astronomer has committed a mechanical blunder; he did not recollect that

the earth, according to this hypothesis, must be an uniform arch, and that

consequently it could not be borne on the water it contains, and much less

sunk therein. I do not know that there are any other physical errors; but he

has made a great number of errors, both in metaphysics and theology. On

the whole it cannot be denied absolutely that the earth meeting with the tail

of a comet might not be inundated, especially allowing the author that the

tail of a comet may contain aqueous vapours; nor can it be denied as an

absolute impossibility that the tail of a comet, in returning from its

perihelium, might not burn the earth, if we suppose, with Mr. Whiston, that

the comet passed very near the sun; it is the same with the rest of the system.

Butthough his ideas are not absolutely impossibilities, there is so little

probability to each thing, when taken separately, that the result upon the

whole taken together puts it beyond credibility.

The three systems we have spoken of are not the only works which have

been composed on the theory of the earth; a Memoir of M. Bourguet

appeared in 1729, printed at Amsterdam, with his "Philosophical Letters on

the Formation of Salts, &c." in which he gives a specimen of the system he

meditated, but which was prevented completion by the death of the author.

It is but justice to admit, that no person was more industrious in making

observations or collecting facts. To him we owe that great and beautiful

observation, the correspondence between the angles of mountains. He

presents every thing which he had collected in great order; but with all those

advantages, it appears that he has succeeded no better than the rest in

making a physical and reasonable history of the changes which had

happened to the globe, and that he was very wide from having found the

real cause of those effects which he relates. To be convinced of this we need

only cast our eyes on the propositions which he deduces from the

phenomena, and which ought to serve for the basis of his theory. He says,

that the whole globe took its form at one time, and not successively; that its

form and disposition prove that it has been in a state of fluidity; that the

present state of the earth is very different from that in which it was for many

ages after its first formation; that the matter of the globe was at the beginning

less dense than since it altered its appearance; that the condensation of its

solid parts diminished by degrees with its velocity, so that after having made

a number of revolutions on its axis, and round the sun, it found itself on a

sudden in a state of dissolution, which destroyed its first structure. This

happened about the vernal equinox. That the sea-shells introduced

themselves into the dissolved matters; that after this dissolution the earth

took the form it now has, and that the fire which directly infused itself

therein consumed it by degrees, and it will be one day destroyed by a terrible

explosion, accompanied with a general conflagration, which will augment

the atmosphere of the globe, and diminish its diameter, and that then the

earth, instead of beds of sand or earth, will have only strata of calcined metal

and mountains composed of amalgamas of different metals.

This is sufficient to shew the system M. Bourguet meditated; to divine in this

manner the past, and predict the future, nearly as others have predicted,

does not appear to me to be an effort of judgment: this author had more

erudition than sound and general views: he appears to be deficient in that

capaciousness of ideas necessary to follow the extent of the subject, and

enable him to comprehend the chain of causes and effects.

In the acts of Leipsic, the famous Leibnitz published a scheme of quite a

different system, under the title of Protogaea. The earth, according to

Bourguet and others, must end by fire; according to Leibnitz it began by it,

and has suffered many more changes and revolutions than is imagined. The

greatest part of the terrestrial matter was surrounded by violent flames at

the time when Moses says light was divided from darkness. The planets, as

well as the earth, were fixed stars, luminous of themselves. After having

burnt a long time, he pretends that they were extinguished for want of

combustible matter, and are become opaque bodies. The fire, by melting the

matter, produced a vitrified crust, and the basis of all the matter which

composes the globe is glass, of which sand and gravel are only fragments.

The other kinds of earth are formed from a mixture of this sand, with fixed

salts and water, and when the crust cooled, the humid particles, which were

raised in form of vapours, refel, and formed the sea. They at first covered the

whole surface, and even surmounted the highest mountains. According to

this author, the shells, and other wrecks of the sea, which are every where to

be found, positively prove that the sea has covered the whole earth; and the

great quantity of fixed salts, sand, and other melted and calcined matters,

which are included in the bowels of the earth, prove that the conflagration

had been general, and that it preceded the existence of the sea. Although

these thoughts are void of proofs, they are capital. The ideas have

connection, the hypotheses are not impossible, and the consequences that

may be drawn therefrom are not contradictory: but the grand defect of this

theory is, that it is not applicable to the present state of the earth; it is the past

which it explains, and this past is so far back, and has left us so few remains,

that we may say what we please of it, and the probability will be in

proportion as a man has talents to elucidate what he asserts. To affirm as

Whiston has done, that the earth was originally a comet, or, with Leibnitz,

that it has been a sun, is saying things equally possible or impossible, and to

which it would be ridiculous to apply the rules of probability. To say that

the sea formerly covered all the earth, that it surrounded the whole globe,

and that it is for this reason shells are every where found, is not paying

attention to a very essential point, the unity of the time of the creation; for if

that was so, it must necessarily be admitted, that shell-fish, and other

inhabitants of the sea, of which we find the remains in the internal part of

the earth, existed long before man, and all terrestrial animals. Now,

independent of the testimony of holy writ, is it not reasonable to think, that

all animals and vegetables are nearly as ancient as each other?

M. Scheutzer, in a Dissertation, addressed to the Academy of Sciences in

1728, attributes, like Woodward, the change, or rather the second formation

of the globe, to the universal deluge; to explain that of mountains, he says,

that after the deluge, God chusing to return the waters into subterraneous

reservoirs, broke and displaced with his all-powerful hand a number of

beds, before horizontal, and raised them above the surface of the globe,

which was originally level. The whole Dissertation is composed to imply this

opinion. As it was requisite these eminences should be of a solid consistence,

M. Scheutzer remarks, that God only drew them from places where there

were many stones; from hence, says he, it proceeds that those countries, like

Switzerland, which are very stony, are also mountainous; and on the

contrary, those, as Holland, Flanders, Hungary and Poland, have only sand

or clay, even to a very great depth, and are almost entirely without

mountains.

This author, more than any other, is desirous of blending Physic with

Theology, and though he has given some good observations, the

systematical part of his works is still weaker than those who preceded him.

On this subject he has even made declamations and ridiculous witticisms, as

may be seen in his Visciam quærelæ, &c. without speaking of his large work

in many folio volumes, Physica Sacra, a puerile work, which appears to be

composed less for the instruction of men than for the amusement of children.

Steno, and some others, have attributed the cause of the inequalities of the

earth to particular inundations, earthquakes, &c. but the effects of these

secondary causes have been only able to produce some slight changes. We

admit of these causes after the first cause, the motion of the flux and reflux,

and of the sea from east to west. Neither Steno, nor the rest, have given

theory, nor even any general facts on this matter.

Ray pretends that all mountains have been produced by earthquakes, and

he has composed a treatise to prove it; we shall shew under the article of

Volcanos what little foundation his opinion is built upon.

We cannot dispense with observing that Burnet, Woodward, Whiston, and

most of these other authors, have committed an error which deserves to be

cleared up; which is, to have looked upon the deluge as possible by the

action of natural causes, whereas scripture presents it to us as produced by

the immediate will of God; there is no natural cause which can produce on

the whole surface of the earth, the quantity of water required to cover the

highest mountains; and if even we could imagine a cause proportionate to

this effect, it would still be impossible to find another cause capable of

causing the water to disappear: allowing Whiston, that these waters

proceeded from the tail of a comet, we deny that any could proceed from the

great abyss, or that they all returned into it, since the great abyss, according

to him, being surrounded on every side by the crust, or terrestrial orb, it is

impossible that the attraction of the comet could cause any motion to the

fluids it contained; much less, as he says, a violent flux and reflux; hence

there could not be issued from, nor entered into, the great abyss, a single

drop of water; and unless it is supposed that the waters which fell from the

comet have been destroyed by a miracle, they would still be on the surface

of the earth, covering the summits of the highest mountains. Nothing better

characterises a miracle, than the impossibility of explaining the effect of it by

natural causes. Our authors have made vain efforts to give a reason for the

deluge; their physical efforts, and the secondary causes, which they made

use of, prove the truth of the fact as reported in the scriptures, and

demonstrate that it could only have been performed by the first cause, the

will of the Almighty.

Besides, it is certain that it was neither at one time, nor by the effect of the

deluge, that the sea left dry these continents we inhabit: for it is certain by

the testimony of holy writ, that the terrestrial paradise was in Asia, and that

Asia was inhabited before the deluge; consequently the sea, at that time, did

not cover this considerable part of the globe. The earth, before the deluge,

was nearly as it is at present, and this enormous quantity of water, which

divine justice caused to fall on the earth to punish guilty men, in fact,

brought death on every creature; but it produced no change on the surface

of the earth, it did not even destroy plants which grew upon it, since the

dove brought an olive branch to the ark in her beak.

Why, therefore, imagine, as many of our naturalists have done, that this

water totally changed the surface of the globe even to a depth of two

thousand feet? Why do they desire it to be the deluge which has brought the

shells on the earth which we meet with at 7 or 800 feet depth in rocks and

marble? Why say, that the hills and mountains were formed at that time?

And how can we figure to ourselves, that it is possible for these waters to

have brought masses and banks of shells 100 miles long? I see not how they

can persist in this opinion, at least, without admitting a double miracle in the

deluge; the first, for the augmentation of the waters; and the second, for the

transportation of the shells; but as there is only the first which is related in

the Bible, I do not see it necessary to make the second an article of our creed.

On the other hand, if the waters of the deluge had retired all at once, they

would have carried so great a quantity of mud and other impurities, that the

Earth would not have been capable of culture till many ages after this

inundation; as is known, by the deluge which happened in Greece, where

the overflowed country was totally forsaken, and could not receive any

cultivation for more than three centuries. We ought also to look on the

universal deluge as a supernatural means of which the Almighty made use

for the chastisement of mankind, and not as an effect of a natural cause. The

universal deluge is a miracle both in its cause and effects; we see clearly by

the scripture that it was designed for the destruction of men and animals,

and that it did not in any mode change the earth, since after the retreat of the

waters, the mountains, and even the trees, were in their places, and the

surface of the earth was proper to receive culture and produce vines and

fruits. How could all the race of fish, which did not enter the ark, be

preserved, if the earth had been dissolved in the water, or only if the waters

had been sufficiently agitated to transport shells from India to Europe, &c.?

Nevertheless, this supposition, that it was the deluge which transported the

shells of the sea into every climate, is the opinion, or rather the superstition,

of naturalists. Woodward, Scheutzer, and some more, call these petrified

shells the remains of the deluge; they look on them as the medals and

monuments which God has left us of this terrible event, in order that it never

should be effaced from the human race. In short, they have adopted this

hypothesis with so much enthusiasm, that they appear only desirous to

reconcile holy scripture with their opinion; and instead of making use of

their observations, and deriving light therefrom, they envelope themselves

in the clouds of a physical theology, the obscurity of which is derogatory to

the simplicity and dignity of religion, and only leaves the absurd to perceive

a ridiculous mixture of human ideas and divine truths. To pretend to explain

the universal Deluge, and its physical causes; to attempt to teach what

passed in the time of that great revolution; to divine what were the effects of

it; to add facts to those of Holy Writ, to draw consequences from such facts,

is only a presumptuous attempt to measure the power of the Most High. The

natural wonders which his benevolent hand performs in an uniform and

regular manner, are incomprehensible; and by the strongest reason, these

wonderful operations and miracles ought to hold us in awful wonder, and

in silent adoration.

But they will say, the universal Deluge being a certain fact, is it not permitted

to reason on its consequences? It may be so; but it is requisite that you should

begin by allowing that the Deluge could not be performed by physical

causes; you ought to consider it is an immediate effect of the will of the

Almighty; you ought to confine yourselves to know only what the Holy Writ

teaches, and particularly not to blend bad philosophy with the purity of

divine truth. These precautions, which the respect we owe to the Almighty

exacts, being taken, what remains for examination on the subject of the

Deluge? Does the Scripture say mountains were formed by the Deluge? No,

it says the contrary. Is it said that the agitation of the waters was so great as

to raise up shells from the bottom of the sea, and transport them all over the

earth? No; the ark floated quietly on the surface of the waters. Is it said, that

the earth suffered a total dissolution? None at all: the recital of the sacred

historian is simple and true, that of these naturalists complex and fabulous.

ARTICLE VI.

GEOGRAPHY.

The surface of the Earth, like that of Jupiter, is not divided by bands

alternative and parallel to the equator; on the contrary, it is divided from one

pole to the other, by two bands of earth, and two of sea; the first and principal

is the ancient continent, the greatest length of which is found to be in a line,

beginning on the east point of the northern part of Tartary, and extending

from thence to the land which borders on the gulph of Linchidolkin, where

the Muscovites fish for whales; from thence to Tobolski, from Tobolski to the

Caspian sea, from the Caspian sea to Mecca, and from Mecca to the western

part of the country inhabited by the Galli, in Africa; afterwards to

Monoemuci or Monomotapa, and at last to the Cape of Good Hope; this line,

which is the greatest length of the old continent, is about 3600 leagues, Paris

measure; it is only interrupted by the Caspian and Red seas, the breadths of

which are not very considerable, and we must not pay any regard to these

interruptions, when it is considered, the surface of the globe is divided only

in four parts.

This greatest length is found by measuring the old continent diagonally; for

if measured according to the meridians, we shall find that there are only 2500

leagues from the northernmost Cape of Lapland to the Cape of Good Hope;

and that the Baltic and Mediterranean cause a much greater interruption

than is met with in the other way. With respect to all the other distances that

might be measured in the old continent under the same meridian, we shall

find them to be much smaller than this; having, for example, only 1800

leagues from the most southern point of the island of Ceylon to the

northernmost coast of Nova Zembla. Likewise, if we measure the continent

parallel to the equator, we find that the greatest uninterrupted length is

found from Trefna, on the western coast of Africa, to Ninpo, on the eastern

coast of China, and that it is about 2800 leagues. Another course may be

measured from the point of Brittany near Brest, extending to the Chinese

Tartary; about 2300 leagues. From Bergen, in Norway, to the coast of

Kamschatka, is no more than 1800 leagues. All these lines have much less

length than the first, therefore the greatest extent of the old continent, is, in

fact, from the eastern point of Tartary to the Cape of Good Hope, that is

about 3600 leagues.

There is so great an equality of surface on each side of this line, which is also

the longest, that there is every probability to suppose it really divides the

contents of the ancient continent; for in measuring on one side is found

2,471,092-3/4 square leagues, and on the other 2,469,687.

Agreeable to this, the old continent consists of about 4,940,780 square

leagues, which is nearly one-fifth of the whole surface of the globe, and has

an inclination towards the equator of about 30 degrees.

The greatest length of the new continent may be taken in a line from the

mouth of the river Plata to the lake of Assiniboils. From the former it passes

to the lake Caracara; from thence to Mataguais, Pocona, Zongo, Mariana,

Morua, St. Fe, and Carthagena; it then proceeds through the gulph of

Mexico, Jamaica, and Cuba, passes along the peninsula of Florida, through

Apolache, Chicachas, and from thence to St. Louis, Fort le Suer, and ends on

the borders of lake Assiniboils; the whole extent of which is still unknown.

This line, which is interrupted only by the Mexican gulph (which must be

looked upon as a mediterranean sea) may be about 2500 leagues long, and

divides the new continent into nearly two equal parts, the left of which

contains about 1,069,286-5/6 leagues square, and that on the right about

1,070,926-1/12; this line, which forms the middle of the band of the new

continent, is inclined to the equator about 30 degrees, but in an opposite

direction, for that of the old continent extends from the north-east to the

south-west, and that of the new continent from the north-west to the south-

east. All those lands together of the old and new continent, make about

7,080,993 leagues square, which is not near the third of the whole surface,

which contains 25 millions of square leagues.

It must be remarked, that these two lines, which divide the continents into

two equal parts, both terminate at the same degree of southern and northern

latitude, and that the two continents make opposite projections, which

exactly face each other; to wit, the coasts of Africa, from the Canary islands

to the coasts of Guinea, and those of America from Guiana to the mouth of

Rio Janeiro.

It appears, therefore, that the most ancient land of the globe, is on the two

sides of these lines, at the distance of from 2 to 250 leagues on each side. By

following this idea, which is founded on the observations before related, we

shall find in the old continent that the most ancient lands of Africa are those

which extend from the Cape of Good Hope to the Red Sea, as far as Egypt,

about 500 leagues broad, and that, consequently, all the western coasts of

Africa, from Guinea to the straits of Gibraltar, are the newest lands. So

likewise we shall discover that in Asia, if we follow the line on the same

breadth, the most ancient lands are Arabia Felix and Deserta, Persia,

Georgia, Turcomania, part of Tartary, Circassia, part of Muscovy, &c. that

consequently Europe, and perhaps also China, and the eastern part of

Tartary, are more modern. In the new continent we shall find the Terra

Magellanica, the eastern part of Brasil, the country of the Amazons, Guiana,

and Canada, to be the new lands, in comparison with Peru, Terra Firma, the

islands in the gulph of Mexico, Florida, the Mississippi, and Mexico.

To these observations we may add two very remarkable facts, the old and

new continent are almost opposite each other; the old is more extensive to

the north of the equator than the south; the new is more to the south than

the north. The centre of the old continent is in the 16th or 18th degree of north

latitude, and the centre of the new is in the 16th or 18th degree south latitude,

so that they seem to be made to counterbalance each other. There is also a

singular connexion between the two continents, although it appears to be

more accidental than those which I have spoken of, which is, that if the two

continents were divided into two parts, all four would be surrounded by the

sea, if it were not for the two small isthmuses, Suez and Panama.

This is the most general idea which an attentive inspection of the globe

furnishes us with, on the division of the earth. We shall abstain from forming

hypotheses thereon, and hazarding reasonings which might lead into false

conclusions; but no one as yet having considered the division of the globe

under this point of view, I shall submit a few remarks. It is very singular that

the line which forms the greatest length of the terrestrial continents divides

them also into two equal parts; it is no less so that these two lines commence

and end at the same degrees of latitude, and are both alike inclined to the

equator. These relations may belong to some general conclusions, but of

which we are ignorant. The inequalities in the figure of the two continents

we shall hereafter examine more fully: it is sufficient here to observe, that

the most ancient countries are the nearest to these lines, and are the highest;

that the more modern lands are the farthest, and also the lowest. Thus in

America, the country of the Amazons, Guiana and Canada will be the most

modern parts; by casting our eyes on the map of this country we see the

waters on every side, and that they are divided by numberless lakes and

rivers, which also indicates that these lands are of a late formation; while on

the other hand Peru and Mexico are high mountains, and situate at no great

distance from the line that divides the continent, which are circumstances

that seem to prove their antiquity. Africa is very mountainous, and that part

of the world is also very ancient. There are only Egypt, Barbary, and the

western coasts of Africa, as far as Senegal, in this part of the globe, which

can be looked upon as modern countries. Asia is an old land, and perhaps

the most ancient of all, particularly Arabia, Persia, and Tartary; but the

inequalities of this vast part of the globe, as well as those of Europe, we will

consider in a separate article. It might be said in general, that Europe is a

new country, and such position would be supported both by the universal

traditions relative to the emigrations of different people, and the origin of

arts and sciences. It is not long since it was filled with morasses, and covered

with forests, whereas in the land anciently inhabited, there are but few

woods, little water, no morasses, much land, and a number of mountains,

whose summits are dry and barren; for men destroy the woods, drain the

waters, confine rivers, dry up morasses, and in time give a different

appearance to the face of the earth, from that, of uninhabited or newly-

peopled countries.

The ancients were acquainted with but a small part of the globe. All America,

the Magellanic, and a great part of the interior of Africa, was entirely

unknown to them. They knew not that the torrid zone was inhabited,

although they had navigated around Africa, for it is 2200 years since Neco,

king of Egypt, gave vessels to the Phenicians, who sailed along the Red Sea,

coasted round Africa, doubled the Cape of Good Hope, and having

employed two years in this voyage, the third year they entered the straits of

Gibraltar. The ancients were unacquainted with the property of the

loadstone, if turned towards the poles, although they knew that it attracted

iron. They were ignorant of the general cause of the flux and reflux of the

sea, nor were they certain the ocean surrounded the globe; some indeed

suspected it might be so, but with so little foundation, that no one dared to

say, or even conjecture, it was possible to make a voyage round the world.

Magellan was the first who attempted it in the year 1519, and accomplished

the great voyage in 1124 days. Sir Francis Drake was the second in 1577, and

he performed it in 1056 days; afterwards Thomas Cavendish made this great

voyage in 777 days, in the year 1586. These celebrated navigators were the

first who demonstrated physically the sphericity and the extent of the earth's

circumference; for the ancients had no conception of the extent of this

circumference, although they had travelled a great deal. The trade winds, so

useful in long voyages, were also unknown to them; therefore we must not

be surprised at the little progress they made in geography. Notwithstanding

the knowledge we have acquired by the aid of mathematical sciences, and

the discovery of navigators, many things remain still unsettled, and vast

countries undiscovered. Almost all the land on the side of the Atlantic pole

is unknown to us; we only know that there is some, and that it is separated

from all the other continents by the ocean. Much land also remains to be

discovered on the side of the Arctic pole, and it is to be regretted that for

more than a century the ardour of discovering new countries is extremely

abated. European governments seem to prefer, and possibly with reason,

increasing the value of those countries we are acquainted with to the glory

of conquering new ones.

Nevertheless, the discovery of the southern continent would be a great object

of curiosity, and might be useful. We have discovered only some few of its

coasts; those navigators who have attempted this discovery, have always

been stopt by the ice. The thick fogs, which are in those latitudes, is another

obstacle; yet, in defiance of these inconveniencies, it is probable that by

sailing from the Cape of Good Hope at different seasons, we might at last

discover a part of these lands, which hitherto make a separate world.

There is another method, which possibly might succeed better. The ice and

fogs having hitherto prevented the discovery, might it not be attempted by

the Pacific Sea; sailing from Baldivia, or any other port on the coast of Chili,

and traversing this sea under the 50th degree south latitude? There is not the

least appearance that this navigation is perilous, and it is probable would be

attended with the discovery of new countries; for what remains for us to

know on the coast of the southern pole, is so considerable, that we may

estimate it at a fourth part of the globe, and of course may contain a

continent, as large as Europe, Asia, and Africa, all together.

As we are not at all acquainted with this part of the globe, we cannot justly

know the proportion between the surface of the earth and that of the sea;

only as much as may be judged by inspection of what is known, there is more

sea than land.

If we would have an idea of the enormous quantity of water which the sea

contains, we must suppose a medium depth, and by computing it only at

200 fathom, or the sixth part of a league, we shall find that there is sufficient

to cover the whole globe to the height of 600 feet of water, and if we would

reduce this water into one mass, it would form a globe of more than 60 miles

diameter.

Navigators pretend, that the latitudes near the south pole are much colder

than those of the north, but there is no appearance that this opinion is

founded on truth, and probably has been adopted, because ice is found in

latitudes where it is scarcely ever seen in the southern seas; but that may

proceed from some particular cause. We find no ice in April on this side 67

and 68 degrees northern latitude: and the savages of Arcadia and Canada

say, when it is not all melted in that month, it is a sign the rest of the year

will be cold and rainy. In 1725 there may be said to have been no summer, it

rained almost continually; and the ice of the northern sea was not only not

melted in April in the 67th degree, but even it was found the 15th of June

towards the 41st and 42d degree.

A great quantity of floating ice appears in the northern sea, especially at

some distance from land. It comes from the Tartarian sea into that of Nova

Zembla, and other parts of the Frozen Ocean. I have been assured by people

of credit, that an English Captain, named Monson, instead of seeking a

passage between the northern land to go to China, directed his course strait

to the pole, and had approached it within two degrees; that in this course he

had found an open sea, without any ice, which proves that the ice is formed

near land, and never in open sea; for if we should suppose, against all

probability, that it might be cold enough at the pole to freeze over the surface

of the sea, it is still not conceivable how these enormous floating mountains

of ice could be formed, if they did not find a fixed point against land, from

whence afterwards they were loosened by the heat of the sun. The two

vessels which the East India Company sent, in 1739, to discover land in the

South Seas, found ice in the latitude of 47 and 48 degrees, but this ice was

not far from shore, that being in sight although they were unable to land.

This must have been separated from the adjoining lands of the south pole,

and it may be conjectured that they follow the course of some great rivers,

which water the unknown land, the same as the Oby, Jenisca, and other great

floods, which fall into the North Seas, carry with them the ice, which, during

the greatest part of the year, stops up the straits of Waigat, and renders the

Tartarian sea unnavigable by this course; whereas beyond Nova Zembla,

and nearer the poles, where there are few rivers, and but little land, ice is not

so frequently met with, and the sea is more navigable; so that if they would

still attempt the voyage to China and Japan by the North Seas, we should

possibly, to keep clear from the land and ice, shape our course to the pole,

and seek the open seas, where certainly there is but little or no ice; for it is

known that salt water can, without freezing, become colder than fresh water

when frozen, and consequently the excessive cold of the pole may possibly

render the sea colder than the ice, without the surface being frozen: so much

the more as at 80 or 82 degrees, the surface of the sea, although mixed with

much snow and fresh water, is only frozen near the shore. By collecting the

testimonies of travellers, on the passage from Europe to China, it appears

that one does exist by the north sea; and the reason it has been so often

attempted in vain is, because they have always feared to go sufficiently far

from land, and approach the pole.

Captain William Barents, who, as well as others, run aground in his voyage,

yet did not doubt but there was a passage, and that if he had gone farther

from shore, he should have found an open sea free from ice. The Russian

navigators, sent by the Czar to survey the north seas, relate that Nova

Zembla is not an island, but belonging to the continent of Tartary, and that

to the north of it is a free and open sea. A Dutch navigator asserts, that the

sea throws up whales on the coasts of Corea and Japan, which have English

and Dutch harpoons on their backs. Another Dutchman has pretended to

have been at the pole, and asserts it is as warm there as it is at Amsterdam

in the middle of the summer. An Englishman, named Golding, who made

more than thirty voyages to Greenland, related to King Charles II. that two

Dutch vessels with which he had sailed, having found no whales on the coast

of the island of Edges, resolved to proceed farther north, and that upon their

return at the expiration of fifteen days, they told him that they had been as

far as 89 degrees latitude (within one degree of the pole), and that they found

no ice there, but an open deep sea like that of the Bay of Biscay, and that they

shewed him the journals of the two vessels, as a proof of what they affirmed.

In short, it is related in the Philosophical Transactions that two navigators,

who had undertaken the discovery of this passage, shaped a course 300

leagues to the east of Nova Zembla, but that the East India Company, who

thought it their interest this passage should not be discovered, hindered

them from returning. But the Dutch East India Company thought, on the

contrary, that it was their interest to find this passage; having attempted it

in vain on the side of Europe, they sought it by that of Japan, and they would

probably have succeeded, if the Emperor of Japan had not forbidden all

strangers from navigating on the side of the land of Jesso. This passage,

therefore, cannot be found but by sailing to the pole, beyond Spitzbergen, or

by keeping the open sea between Nova Zembla and Spitzbergen under the

79th degree of latitude. We need not fear to find it frozen even under the

pole itself, for reasons we have alledged; in fact, there is no example of the

sea being frozen at a considerable distance from the shore; the only example

of a sea being frozen entirely over, is that of the Black Sea, which is narrow,

contains but little salt, and receives a number of rivers from the northern

countries, and which bring ice with them: and if we may credit historians, it

was frozen in the time of the Emperor Copronymus, thirty cubits deep,

without reckoning twenty cubits of snow above the ice. This appears to be

exaggerated, but it is certain that it freezes almost every winter; whereas the

open seas, a thousand leagues nearer the pole, do not freeze at all: this can

only proceed from the saltness, and the little ice which they receive, in

comparison with that transported into the Black Sea.

This ice, which is looked upon as a barrier that opposes the navigation near

the poles, and the discovery of the southern continent, proves only that there

are large rivers adjacent to the places where it is met with; and indicates also

there are vast continents from whence these rivers flow; nor ought we to be

discouraged at the sight of these obstacles; for if we consider, we shall easily

perceive, this ice must be confined to some particular places; that it is almost

impossible that it should occupy the whole circle which encompasses, as we

suppose, the southern continent, and therefore we should probably succeed

if we were to direct our course towards some other point of this circle. The

description which Dampier and some others have given of New Holland,

leads us to suspect that this part of the globe is perhaps a part of the southern

lands, and is a country less ancient than the rest of this unknown continent.

New Holland is a low country, without water or mountains, but thinly

inhabited, and the natives without industry; all this concurs to make us think

that they are in this continent nearly what the savages of Amaconia or

Paraguais are in America. We have found polished men, empires, and kings,

at Peru and Mexico, which are the highest, and consequently the most

ancient countries of America. Savages, on the contrary, are found in the

lowest and most modern countries; therefore we may presume that we

should also find men united by the bands of society in the upper countries,

from whence these great rivers, which bring this prodigious ice to the sea,

derive their sources.

The interior parts of Africa are unknown to us, almost as much as they were

to the ancients: they had, like us, made the tour of that vast peninsula, but

they have left us neither charts, nor descriptions of the coasts. Pliny informs

us, that the tour of Africa was made in the time of Alexander the Great, that

the wrecks of some Spanish vessels had been discovered in the Arabian sea,

and that Hanno, a Carthaginian general, had made a voyage from Gades to

the Arabian sea, and that he had written a relation of it. Besides that, he says

Cornelius Nepos tells us that in his time one Eudoxus, persecuted by the

king Lathurus, was obliged to fly from his country; that departing from the

Arabian gulph, he arrived at Gades, and that before this time they traded

from Spain to Ethiopia by sea. Notwithstanding these testimonies of the

ancients, we are persuaded that they never doubled the Cape of Good Hope,

and the course which the Portuguese took the first to go to the East-Indies,

was looked upon as a new discovery; it will not perhaps, therefore, be

deemed amiss to give the belief of the 9th century on this subject.

"In our time an entire new discovery has been made, which was wholly

unknown to those who lived before us. No one thought, or even suspected,

that the sea, which extends from India to China, had a communication with

the Syrian sea. We have found, according to what I have learnt, in the sea

Roum, or Mediterranean, the wreck of an Arabian vessel, shattered to pieces

by the tempest, some of which were carried by the wind and waves to the

Cozar sea, and from thence to the Mediterranean, and was at length thrown

on the coast of Syria. This proves that the sea surrounds China and Cila, the

extremity of Turqueston and the country of the Cozars; that it afterwards

flows by the strait till it has washed the coast of Syria. The proof is drawn

from the construction of the vessel; for no other vessels but those of Siraf are

built without nails, which, as was the wreck we speak of, are joined together

in a particular manner, as if they were sewed. Those, of all the vessels of the

Mediterranean and of the coast of Syria, are nailed and not joined in this

manner."

To this the translator of this ancient relation adds.—

"Abuziel remarks, as a new and very extraordinary thing, that a vessel was

carried from the Indian sea, and cast on the coasts of Syria. To find a passage

into the Mediterranean, he supposes there is a great extent above China,

which has a communication with the Cozar sea, that is, with Muscovia. The

sea which is below Cape Current, was entirely unknown to the Arabs, by

reason of the extreme danger of the navigation, and from the continent being

inhabited by such a barbarous people, that it was not easy to subject them,

nor even to civilize them by commerce. From the Cape of Good Hope to

Soffala, the Portuguese found no established settlement of Moors, like those

in all the maritime towns as far as China, which was the farthest place known

to geographers; but they could not tell whether the Chinese sea, by the

extremity of Africa, had a communication with the sea of Barbary, and they

contented themselves with describing it as far as the coast of Zing, or

Caffraria. This is the reason why we cannot doubt but that the first discovery

of the passage of this sea, by the Cape of Good Hope, was made by the

Europeans, under the conduct of Vasco de Gama, or at least some years

before he doubled the Cape, if it is true there are marine charts of an older

date, where the Cape is called by the name of Frontiera du Africa. Antonio

Galvin testifies, from the relation of Francisco de Sousa Tavares, that, in 1528,

the Infant Don Ferdinand shewed him such a chart, which he found in the

monastery of Acoboca, dated 120 years before, copied perhaps from that said

to be in the treasury of St. Mark, at Venice, which also marks the point of

Africa, according to the testimony of Ramusio, &c."

The ignorance of those ages, on the subject of the navigation around Africa,

will appear perhaps less singular than the silence of the editor of this ancient

relation on the subject of the passages of Herodotus, Pliny, &c. which we

have quoted, and which proves the ancients had made the tour of Africa.

Be it as it may, the African coasts are now well known; but whatever

attempts have been made to penetrate into the inner parts of the country, we

have not been able to attain sufficient knowledge of it to give exact relations.

It might, nevertheless, be of great advantage, if we were, by Senegal, or some

other river, to get farther up the country and establish settlements, as we

should find, according to all appearances, a country as rich in precious mines

as Peru or the Brazils. It is perfectly known that the African rivers abound

with gold, and as this country is very mountainous, and situated under the

equator, it is not to be doubted but it contains, as well as America, mines of

heavy metals, and of the most compact and hard stones.

The vast extent of north and east Tartary has only been discovered in these

latter times. If the Muscovite maps are just, we are at present acquainted

with the coasts of all this part of Asia; and it appears that from the point of

eastern Tartary to North America, it is not more than four or five hundred

leagues: it has even been pretended that this tract was much shorter, for in

the Amsterdam Gazette, of the 24th of January, 1747, it is said, under the

article of Petersburgh, that Mr. Stalleravoit had discovered one of these

American islands beyond Kamschatca, and demonstrated that we might go

thither from Russia by a shorter tract. The Jesuits, and other missionaries,

have also pretended to have discovered savages in Tartary, whom they had

catechised in America, which should in fact suppose that passage to be still

shorter. This author even pretends, that the two continents of the old and

new world join by the north, and says, that the last navigations of the

Japanese afford room to judge, that the tract of which we have spoken is only

a bay, above which we may pass by land from Asia to America. But this

requires confirmation, for hitherto it has been thought that the continent of

the north pole is separated from the other continents, as well as that of the

south pole.

Astronomy and Navigation are carried to so high a pitch of perfection, that

it may reasonably be expected we shall soon have an exact knowledge of the

whole surface of the globe. The ancients knew only a small part of it, because

they had not the mariner's compass. Some people have pretended that the

Arabs invented the compass, and used it a long time before we did, to trade

on the Indian sea, as far as China; but this opinion has always appeared

destitute of all probability; for there is no word in the Arab, Turkish, or

Persian languages, which signifies the compass; they make use of the Italian

word Bossola; they do not even at present know how to make a compass,

nor give the magnetical quality to the needle, but purchase them from the

Europeans. Father Maritini says, that the Chinese have been acquainted with

the compass for upwards of 3000 years; but if that was the case, how comes

it that they have made so little use of it? Why did they, in their voyages to

Cochinchina, take a course much longer than was necessary? And why did

they always confine themselves to the same voyages, the greatest of which

were to Java and Sumatra? And why did not they discover, before the

Europeans, an infinity of fertile islands, bordering on their own country, if

they had possessed the art of navigating in the open seas? For a few years

after the discovery of this wonderful property of the loadstone, the

Portuguese doubled the Cape of Good Hope, traversed the African and

Indian seas, and Christopher Columbus made his voyage to America.

By a little consideration, it was easy to divine there were immense spaces

towards the west; for, by comparing the known part of the globe, as for

example, the distance of Spain to China, and attending to the revolution of

the Earth and Heavens, it was easy to see that there remained a much greater

extent towards the west to be discovered, than what they were acquainted

with towards the east. It, therefore, was not from the defect of astronomical

knowledge that the ancients did not find the new world, but only for want

of the compass. The passages of Plato and Aristotle, where they speak of

countries far distant from the Pillars of Hercules, seem to indicate that some

navigators had been driven by tempest as far as America, from whence they

returned with much difficulty; and it may be conjectured, that if even the

ancients had been persuaded of the existence of this continent, they would

not have even thought it possible to strike out the road, having no guide nor

any knowledge of the compass.

I own, that it is not impossible to traverse the high seas without a compass,

and that very resolute people might have undertaken to seek after the new

world by conducting themselves simply by the stars. The Astrolabe being

known to the ancients, it might strike them they could leave France or Spain,

and sail to the west, by keeping the polar star always to the right, and by

frequent soundings might have kept nearly in the same latitude; without

doubt the Carthaginians, of whom Aristotle makes mention, found the

means of returning from these remote countries by keeping the polar star to

the left; but it must be allowed that a like voyage would be looked upon as

a rash enterprize, and that consequently we must not be astonished that the

ancients had not even conceived the project.

Previous to Christopher Columbus's expedition, the Azores, the Canaries,

and Madeira were discovered. It was remarked, that when the west winds

lasted a long time, the sea brought pieces of foreign wood on the coast of

these islands, canes of unknown species, and even dead bodies, which by

many marks were discovered to be neither European nor African. Columbus

himself remarked, that on the side of the west certain winds blew only a few

days, and which he was persuaded were land winds; but although he had

all these advantages over the ancients, and the knowledge of the compass,

the difficulties still to conquer were so great, that there was only the success

he met with which could justify the enterprise. Suppose, for a moment, that

the continent of the new world had been 1000 or 1500 miles farther than it in

fact is, a thing with Columbus could neither know nor foresee, he would not

have arrived there, and perhaps this great country might still have remained

unknown. This conjecture is so much the better founded, as Columbus,

although the most able navigator of his time, was seized with fear and

astonishment in his second voyage to the new world; for as in his first, he

only found some islands, he directed his course more to the south to discover

a continent, and was stopt by currents, the considerable extent and direction

of which always opposed his course, and obliged him to direct his search to

the west; he imagined that what had hindered him from advancing on the

southern side was not currents, but that the sea flowed by raising itself

towards the heavens, and that perhaps both one and the other touched on

the southern side. True it is, that in great enterprises the least unfortunate

circumstance may turn a man's brain, and abate his courage.

ARTICLE VII.

ON THE PRODUCTION OF THE STRATA, OR BEDS OF EARTH.

We have shewn, in the first article, that by virtue of the mutual attraction

between the parts of matter, and of the centrifugal force, which results from

its diurnal rotation, the earth has necessarily taken the form of a spheroid,

the diameters of which differ about a 230th part, and that it could only

proceed from the changes on the surface, caused by the motion of the air and

water, that this difference could become greater, as is pretended to be the

case from the measures taken under the equator, and within the polar circle.

This figure of the earth, which so well agrees with hydrostatical laws, and

with our theory, supposes the globe to have been in a state of liquefaction

when it assumed its form, and we have proved that the motions of projection

and rotation were imprinted at the same time by a like impulsion. We shall

the more easily believe that the earth has been in a state of liquefaction

produced by fire, when we consider the nature of the matters which the

globe incloses, the greatest part of which are vitrified or vitrifiable; especially

when we reflect on the impossibility there is that the earth should ever have

been in a state of fluidity, produced by the waters; since there is infinitely

more earth than water, and that water has not the power of dissolving stone,

sand, and other matters of which the earth is composed.

It is plain then that the earth took its figure at the time when it was liquefied

by fire: by pursuing our hypothesis it appears, that when the sun quitted it,

the earth had no other form than that of a torrent of melted and inflamed

vapour matter; that this torrent collected itself by the mutual attraction of its

parts, and became a globe, to which the rotative motion gave the figure of a

spheroid; and when the earth was cooled, the vapours, which were first

extended like the tails of comets, by degrees condensed and fell upon the

surface, depositing, at the same time, a slimy substance mixed with

sulphurous and saline matters, a part of which, by the motion of the waters,

was swept into the perpendicular cracks, where it produced metals, while

the rest remained on the surface, and produced that reddish earth which

forms the first strata; and which, according to different places, is more or less

blended with animal and vegetable particles, so reduced that the

organization is no longer perceptible.

Therefore, in the first state of the earth, the globe was internally composed

of vitrified matter, as I believe it is at present, above which were placed those

bodies the fire had most divided, as sand, which are only fragments of glass;

and above these, pumice stones and the scoria of the vitrified matter, which

formed the various clays; the whole was covered with water 5 or 600 feet

deep, produced by the condensation of the vapours, when the globe began

to cool. This water every where deposited a muddy bed, mixed with waters

which sublime and exhale by the fire; and the air was formed of the most

subtile vapours, which, by their lightness, disengaged themselves from the

waters, and surmounted them.

Such was the state of the globe when the action of the tides, the winds, and

the heat of the sun, began to change the surface of the earth. The diurnal

motion, and the flux and reflux, at first raised the waters under the southern

climate, which carried with them mud, clay, and sand, and by raising the

parts of the equator, they by degrees perhaps lowered those of the poles

about two leagues, as we before mentioned; for the waters soon reduced into

powder the pumice stones and other spongeous parts of the vitrified matter

that were at the surface, they hollowed some places, and raised others, which

in course of time became continents, and produced all the inequalities, and

which are more considerable towards the equator than the poles; for the

highest mountains are between the tropics and the middle of the temperate

zones, and the lowest are from the polar circle to the poles; between the

tropics are the Cordeliers, and almost all the mountains of Mexico and Brazil,

the great and little Atlas, the Moon, &c. Beside the land which is between the

tropics, from the superior number of islands found in those parts, is the most

unequal of all the globe, as evidently is the sea.

However independent my theory may be of that hypothesis of what passed

at the time of the first state of the globe, I refer to it in this article, in order to

shew the connection and possibility of the system which I endeavoured to

maintain in the first article. It must only be remarked, that my theory does

not stray far from it, as I take the earth in a state nearly similar to what it

appears at present, and as I do not make use of any of the suppositions which

are used on reasoning on the past state of the terrestrial globe. But as I here

present a new idea on the subject of the sediment deposited by the water,

which, in my opinion, has perforated the upper bed of earth, it appears to

me also necessary to give the reason on which I found this opinion.

The vapours which rise in the air produce rain, dew, aerial fires, thunder,

and other meteors. These vapours are therefore blended with aqueous,

aerial, sulphurous and terrestrial particles, &c. and it is the solid and earthy

particles which form the mud or slime we are now speaking of. When rain

water is suffered to rest, a sediment is formed at bottom; and having

collected a quantity, if it is suffered to stand and corrupt, it produces a kind

of mud which falls to the bottom of the vessel. Dew produces much more of

this mud than rain water, which is greasy, unctuous, and of a reddish colour.

The first strata of the earth is composed of this mud, mixed with perished

vegetable or animal parts, or rather stony and sandy particles. We may

remark that almost all land proper for cultivation is reddish, and more or

less mixed with these different matters; the particles of sand or stone found

there are of two kinds, the one coarse and heavy, the other fine and

sometimes impalpable. The largest comes from the lower strata loosened in

cultivating the earth, or rather the upper mould, by penetrating into the

lower, which is of sand and other divided matters, and forms those earths

we call fat and fertile. The finer sort proceeds from the air, and falls with dew

and rain, and mixes intimately with the soil. This is properly the residue of

the powder, which the wind continually raises from the surface of the earth,

and which falls again after having imbibed the humidity of the air. When the

earth predominates, and the stony and sandy parts are but few, the earth is

then reddish and fertile: if it is mixed with a considerable quantity of

perished animal or vegetable substances, it is blackish, and often more fertile

than the first; but if the mould is only in a small quantity, as well as the

animal or vegetable parts, the earth is white and sterile, and when the sandy,

stony, or cretaceous parts which compose these sterile lands, are mixed with

a sufficient quantity of perished animal or vegetable substances, they form

the black and lighter earths, but have little fertility; so that according to the

different combinations of these three different matters, the land is more or

less fecund and differently coloured.

To fix some ideas relative to these stratas; let us take, for example, the earth

of Marly-la-ville, where the pits are very deep: it is a high country, but flat

and fertile, and its strata lie arranged horizontally. I had samples brought

me of all these strata which M. Dalibard, an able botanist, versed in different

sciences, had dug under his inspection; and after having proved the matters

of which they consisted in aquafortis, I formed the following table of them.

The state of the different beds of earth, found at Marly-la-ville, to the depth

of 100 feet.

I have before said that I tried all these matters in aquafortis, because where

the inspection and comparison of matters with others that we are acquainted

with is not sufficient to permit us to denominate and range them in the class

which they belong, there is no means more ready, nor perhaps more sure,

than to try by aquafortis the terrestrial or lapidific matter: those which acid

spirits dissolve immediately with heat and ebullition, are generally

calcinable, and those on which they make no impression are vitrifiable.

By this enumeration we perceive, that the soil of Marly-la-ville was formerly

the bottom of the sea, which has been raised above 75 feet, since we find

shells at that depth below the surface. Those shells have been transported by

the motion of the water, at the same time as the sand in which they are met

with, and the whole of the upper strata, even to the first, have been

transported after the same manner by the motion of the water, and deposited

in form of a sediment; which we cannot doubt, as well by reason of their

horizontal position, as of the different beds of sand mixed with shells and

marl, the last of which are only the fragments of the shells. The last stratum

itself has been formed almost entirely by the mould we have spoken of,

mixed with a small part of the marl which was at the surface.

I have chosen this example, as the most disadvantageous to my theory,

because it at first appears very difficult to conceive that the dust of the air,

rain and dew, could produce strata of free earth thirteen feet thick; but it

ought to be observed, that it is very rare to find, especially in high lands, so

considerable a thickness of cultivateable earth; it is generally about three or

four feet, and often not more than one. In plains surrounded with hills, this

thickness of good earth is the greatest, because the rain loosens the earth of

the hills, and carries it into the vallies; but without supposing any thing of

that kind, I find that the last strata formed by the waters are thick beds of

marl. It is natural to imagine that the upper stratum had, at the beginning, a

still greater thickness, besides the thirteen feet of marl, when the sea quitted

the land and left it naked. This marl, exposed to the air, melted with the rain;

the action of the air and heat of the sun produced flaws, and reduced it into

powder on the surface; the sea would not quit this land precipitately, but

sometimes cover it, either by the alternative motion of the tides, or by the

extraordinary elevation of the waters in foul weather, when it mixed with

this bed of marl, mud, clay, and other matters. When the land was raised

above the waters, plants would begin to grow, and it was then that the dust

in the rain or dew by degrees added to its substance and gave it a reddish

colour; this thickness and fertility was soon augmented by culture; by

digging and dividing its surface, and thus giving to the dust, in the dew or

rain, the facility of more deeply penetrating it, which at last produced that

bed of free earth thirteen feet thick.

I shall not here examine whether the reddish colour of vegetable earth

proceeds from the iron which is contained in the earths that are deposited

by the rains and dews, but being of importance, shall take notice of it when

we come to treat of minerals; it is sufficient to have explained our conception

of the formation of the superficial strata of the earth, and by other examples

we shall prove, that the formation of the interior strata, can only be the work

of the waters.

The surface of the globe, says Woodward, this external stratum on which

men and animals walk, which serves as a magazine for the formation of

vegetables and animals, is, for the greatest part, composed of vegetable or

animal matter, and is in continual motion and variation. All animals and

vegetables which have existed from the creation of the world, have

successively extracted from this stratum the matter which composes it, and

have, after their deaths, restored to it this borrowed matter: it remains there

always ready to be retaken, and to serve for the formation of other bodies of

the same species successively, for the matter which composes one body is

proper and natural to form another body of the same kind. In uninhabited

countries, where the woods are never cut, where animals do not brouze on

the plants, this stratum of vegetable earth increases considerably. In all

woods, even in those which are sometimes cut, there is a bed of mould, of

six or eight inches thick, formed entirely by the leaves, small branches, and

barks which have perished. I have often observed on the ancient Roman

way, which crosses Burgundy in a long extent of soil, that there is formed a

bed of black earth more than a foot thick upon the stones, which nourishes

very high trees; and this stratum could be composed only of a black mould

formed by the leaves, bark, and perished wood. As vegetables inhale for

their nutriment much more from the air and water than the earth, it happens

that when they perish, they return to the earth more than they have taken

from it. Besides, forests collect the rain water, and by stopping the vapours

increase their moisture; so in a wood which is preserved a long time, the

stratum of earth which serves for vegetation increases considerably. But

animals restoring less to the earth than they take from it, and men making

enormous consumption of wood and plants for fire, and other uses, it

follows that the vegetable soil of inhabited countries must diminish, and

become, in time, like the soil of Arabia Petrea, and other eastern provinces,

which, in fact, are the most ancient inhabited countries, where only sand and

salt are now to be met with; for the fixed salts of plants and animals remain,

whereas all the other parts volatilise, and are transported by the air.

Let us now examine the position and formation of the interior strata: the

earth, says Woodward, appears in places that have been dug, composed of

strata placed one on the other, as so many sediments which necessarily fell

to the bottom of the water; the deepest strata are generally the thickest, and

those above the thinnest, and so gradually lessening to the surface. We find

sea shells, teeth, and bones of fish in these different beds, and not only in

those that are soft, as chalk and clay, but even in those of hard stone, marble,

&c. These marine productions are incorporated with the stone, and when

separated from them, leave the impressions of the shells with the greatest

exactness. "I have been most clearly and positively assured," says this author,

"that in France, Flanders, Holland, Spain, Italy, Germany, Denmark,

Norway, and Sweden, stone, and other terrestrial substances are disposed in

strata, precisely the same as they are in England; that these strata are divided

by parallel fissures; that there are inclosed within stones and other terrestrial

and compact substances, a great quantity of shells and other productions of

the sea, disposed in the same manner as in this island. I am also informed

that these strata are found the same in Barbary, Egypt, Guinea, and in other

parts of Africa; in Arabia, Syria, Persia, Malabar, China, and the rest of the

provinces of Asia; in Jamaica, Barbadoes, Virginia, New-England, Brazil,

and other parts of America."

This author does not say how he learnt, or by whom he was told, that the

strata of Peru contained shells; yet as in general his observations are exact, I

do not doubt but he was well informed; and am persuaded that shells may

be found in the earth of Peru, as well as elsewhere. This remark is made from

a doubt having been formed some time since on the subject, and which I

shall hereafter consider.

In a trench made at Amsterdam, to the depth of 230 feet, the strata were

found as follows: 7 feet of vegetable earth, 9 of turf, 9 of soft clay, 8 of sand,

4 of earth, 10 of clay, 4 of earth, 10 of sand, then 2 feet of clay, 4 of white sand,

5 of dry earth, 1 of soft earth, 14 of sand, 8 of argil, mixed with earth; 4 of

sand, mixed with shells; then clay 102 feet thick, and at last 31 feet of sand,

at which depth they ceased digging.

It is very singular to dig so deep without meeting with water: and this

circumstance is remarkable in many particulars. 1. It shews, that the water

of the sea does not communicate with the interior part of the earth, by means

of filtration. 2. That shells are found at the depth of 100 feet below the

surface, and that consequently the soil of Holland has been raised 100 feet

by the sediment of the sea. 3. We may draw an induction, that this strata of

thick clay of 102 feet, and the bed of sand below it, in which they dug to 31

feet, and whose entire thickness is unknown, are perhaps not very far distant

from the first strata of the original earth, such as it was before the motion of

the water had changed its surface. We have said in the first article, that if we

desired to find the ancient earth, we should dig in the northern countries,

rather than towards the south; in plains rather than in mountainous regions.

The circumstances in this instance, appear to be nearly so, only it is to be

wished they had continued the digging to a greater depth, and that the

author had informed us, whether there were not shells and other marine

productions, in the last bed of clay, and in that of sand below it. The

experiment confirms what we have already said; and the more we dig, the

greater thickness we shall find the strata.

The earth is composed of parallel and horizontal beds, not only in plains, but

hills and mountains are in general composed after the same manner: it may

be said, that the strata in hills and mountains are more apparent there than

in the plains, because the plains are generally covered with a very

considerable quantity of sand and earth, which the water has brought from

the higher grounds, and therefore, to find the ancient strata, must dig deeper

in the plains than in the mountains.

I have often observed, that when a mountain is level at its summit, the strata

which compose it are also level; but if the summit is not placed horizontally,

the strata inclines also in the same direction. I have heard that, in general,

the beds of quarries inclined a little to the east; but having myself observed

all the chains of rocks which offered, I discovered this opinion to be

erroneous, and that the strata inclines to the same side as the hill, whether it

be east, west, north, or south. When we dig stone and marble from the

quarry, we take great care to separate them according to their natural

position, and we cannot even get them of a large size, if we cut them in any

other direction. Where they are made use of for good masonry, the workmen

are particular in placing them as they stood in the quarry, for if they were

placed in any other direction, they would split, and would not resist the

weight with which they are loaded. This perfectly confirms that stones, are

found in parallel and horizontal strata, which have been successively heaped

one on the other, and that these strata composed masses where resistance is

greater in that direction than in any other.

Every strata, whether horizontal or inclined, has an equal thickness

throughout its whole extent. In the quarries about Paris the bed of good

stone is not thick, scarcely more than 18 or 20 feet: in those of Burgundy the

stone is much thicker. It is the same with marble; the black and white marble

have a thicker bed than the coloured; and I know beds of very hard stone,

which the farmers in Burgundy make use of to cover their houses, that are

not above an inch thick. The different strata vary much in thickness, but each

bed preserves the same thickness throughout its extent. The thickness of

strata is so greatly varied, that it is found from less than a line to 1, 10, 20, 30,

or 100 feet thick. The ancient and modern quarries, which are horizontally

dug, the perpendicular and other divisions of mines, prove that there are

extensive strata in all directions. "It is thoroughly proved," says the historian

of the academy, "that all stones have formerly been a soft paste, and as there

are quarries almost in every part, the surface of the earth has therefore

consisted, in all these places, of mud and slime, at least to certain depths. The

shells found in most quarries prove that this mud was an earth diluted by

the water of the sea, and consequently that the sea covered all these places;

and it could not cover them without also covering all that was level with or

lower than it: and it is plain that it could not cover every place where there

were quarries, without covering the whole face of the terrestrial globe. We

do not here consider the mountains which the sea must also at one time have

covered, since quarries and shells are often found in them.

"The sea," continues he, "therefore, covered the whole earth, and from thence

it proceeds that all the beds of stone in the plains are horizontal and parallel;

fish must have also been the most ancient inhabitants of the globe, as there

was no sustenance for either birds or terrestrial animals." But how did the

sea retire into these vast basins which it at present occupies? What presents

itself the most natural to the mind is, that the earth, at least at a certain depth,

was not entirely solid, but intermixed with some great vacuums, whose

vaults were supported for a time, but at length, sunk in suddenly: then the

waters must have fallen into these vacancies, filled them, and left naked a

part of the earth's surface, which became an agreeable abode to terrestrial