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.[147:A]
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.[148:A]
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.[151:A] 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.
FOOTNOTES:
[138:A] Voyage du Levant, vol. 2, page 336.
[147:A] See the Hist. of the Acad. 1708, page 32.
[148:A] See the Diss. de Solido intra Solidum, &c.
[151:A] See Acta erudit, Lepiss, Ann. 1691, page 100.
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.