I beavens are the works of thy hands. They fhall perish, but thou remaineft, and they all shall wax old as doth a garment, and as a vesture shalt thou fold them up and they shall be changed, Pfalm cii. 25, 26. To which I fhall add the very paffage quoted against me by Mr. V. We, according to his promife, look for new heavens and a new earth, 2 Pet. c. iii. v. 13. "But this earth, say you, which has been purified by fire, will be without any human creature upon it; fo that your revolution will not bury any in the ruins of the earth." do not fee but my hypothefis may be juft, tho' there fhould not be any human creature upon it. There are already a fufficient number of animals and men buried in the earth to gratify the curiofity of the new inhabitants of the new world, if there be any. God has not revealed to us that he has not placed any inhabitants in Saturn, Jupiter, the moon, and other planets unknown to us; and the men who may be fuppofed to be upon the earth after the laft judgment, are as much men as those in the moon, at whom no divine hitherto has taken the leaft offence. I believe my hypothefis is fufficiently vindicated by what I have already alledged; but Mr. V-'s civilities claim a proper return. Tho' I am far from thinking that the first chapter of Genefis ought to be a rule in phyfical difquifitions, yet to please Mr. V I will prove from Genefis itself, that my hypothefis is entirely conformable to the facred text. ❝. If (fays Mr. V) the creation of the moon and fishes were pofterior to that of the mountains and continent, then it is not the flux and reflux, caufed by the moon, which have raised thefe mountains and buried these fishes. Now the earth was created on the third day and the moon on the fourth; therefore, &c." It has not escaped the penetration of Mr. V that God created light on the first day. He would, however, infinuate that this light, which he calls unformed and primitive, did not depend on any luminous body. But this irrefragable text fays pofitively, that light was created on this very first day, and that God divided the light from the darkness, calling the light day, and the dark darkness night; and that the evening and the morning were the first day. Now, with your leave, what is day, but the effect of a luminous body above the horizon? What is evening, but its fetting? Night, but its abfence in the oppofite hemifphere? Morning, but its rifing? "In all things where we have ideas (fays Mr. Regis, in his treatise of reafon and faith) reason is the the true competent judge. That is, when reafon clearly decides in favour of an opinion, we cannot renounce it, and embrace an oppofite one, under pretence that it is a matter of faith; for faith can have no authority against thofe clear and exprefs conclufions of reafon." The application of this principle to the matter in debate is clear and evident. And feveral interpreters of the fcripture are of opinion (according to M. de Sacy) that what produced this light, and this firft day "was a luminous body, out of whofe fubftance the fun and ftars might afterwards have been formed. And that during the three first days, this light moved in the fame manner as the fun." Now, by fuppofing within the earth's vortex, a heavenly body, whether luminous or not, it must immediately caufe a flux and reflux; and confequently my fyftem is established, without waiting till the fourth day for the moon, to begin to form the mountains and continent. I fay to begin to form the mountains and continent; for, according to my fyftem, and indeed according to reason, this formation is not the work of a fingle day, fince it is carried on even now; whence it follows, that even tho' there was not any flux and reflux on the very first day, and tho' God made the continent on the third day, and the flux by the moon commenced on the fourth, yet all this would not overthrow our fyftem. It would only follow from thence, that God having at first miraculously created a continent, wherein animals were not liable to be buried; but that fome days after leaving the moon to act as a fecond caufe, this planet began, by burying here and there fome of these newcreated animals; which Mr. V afferts was performed by the deluge fixteen hundred years after. But, Cc 3 Lays fays Mr. V why not agree in that only true caufe of it, the univerfal deluge? By a reafon which admits of no reply, as being the affertion of the fcripture itself, the waters of the deluge exceeded the highest mountains by fifteen cubits; whence it must follow, that these mountains were before the deluge. Now in the bowels of these mountains are found animals inclofed in the ftones and quarries of which they confift. This is a fact verified by numberless inftances, of which I myself have been an eye-witnefs to many. Therefore those animals, thus inclosed in the bafes of thefe mountains, muft have exifted, together with those mountains before the deluge. The deluge then is a revolution which does not account for thefe phænomena. Befides the formation of mountains, which problem is alfo folved by my fyftem, is lefs explicable by it. There is then a neceffity of having recourfe to my hypothefis, in order to elucidate all these phænomena; unless the univerfal deluge itself be accounted one of thofe periodical revolutions of the earth, propofed in my fyftem, and in which the mounds of the vaft abyfs of waters hidden under the earth were broken, as the fcripture and commentators inform us was the cafe at the time of the deluge: For God, at the formation of the world most certainly forefaw the ingratitude and depravation of mankind, and therefore might have ordered this natural catastrophe as the inftrument of his juft vengeance. If it be replied, that, granting my fuppofition, the period of that revolution being only fixteen hundred years, there must have been more inftances of it in fucceeding ages: I anfwer, that this period might have inequalities, from caufes unknown to us. For instance, the new created earth might have been easier to perforate, and thence the period of its duration fhortned. Befides, the great Creator might have executed his vengeance, independently of this revolution, either by natural causes, which are entirely a his difpofal, or by an exprefs miracle, as he did in all thofe miraculous events related in the facred books. There Therefore our phyfical conjectures do not in the leaft tend to invalidate the truth of thefe events; because God could perform them, independently of the course of nature: But on the contrary they tend to corroborate our belief of, or affent to them, by exhibiting an order in nature, together with a multiplicity of means established in it by the Creator to execute his pleasure, and be the inftruments of his juftice. An anonymous Letter to Mr. Le Cat concerning his Syftem; together with Mr. Le Cat's Anfwer. SIR, I take the liberty to lay before you two difficulties. First, you abruptly introduce the flux and reflux, without any preliminary or explication, inftructive or explicative of your ideas, tho' highly requifite for the reader's understanding the question. The effects you attribute to this flux and reflux appear to me exceffive; and as it is not univerfal, what muft we think of those places, where there is not, nor ever was, any flux or reflux, tho' there are certainly mountains in all places? Secondly, in what part, and how, could terreftrial animals be found in our globe, when it was foft, and entirely covered with water, fo as to retain the bones and fkeletons of them when the waters were ebbed away, and the flux and reflux, by the immenfe force which you attribute to it, had formed these soft maffes into mountains? Mr. Le Cat's. Anfwer. I had prevented your objections, Sir, in my memoir upon the formationof mountains and foffile fhells, which is preceded by a differtation on the flux and reflux, the principal machine of this effay; but to infert all these particulars in an extract is impoffible. And this I believe was the only reafon whey they were omitted. You are pleafed to make two objections; the firft that the flux and reflux, which I make the efficient caufe Cc 4 cause of mountains, is not univerfal, tho' there are mountains every where. Confider, Sir, that if the flux and reflux be not univerfal at prefent, it is because there are feas furrounded like lakes, and thefe circumfcribing lands deftroy the flux and reflux; but in the condition which I fuppofe the earth, at firft entirely covered with water, and afterwards having very little continent, there could be no obftruction to the flux and reflux, and confequently its effect was univerfal. Your fecond objection is taken from the above fuppofition, of an earth entirely covered with water. Such an earth, fay you, is not fufceptible of animals, how then could their fkeletons be inclofed in the bowels of mountains which were formed at that time? I am very far, Sir, from faying in my memoir, that the first mountains which were formed, and the first land which became expofed, contained the fkeletons of animals. This has no relation to our fyftem. It will not be in the leaft weakened, tho' fome mountains, or fome countries fhould be found deftitute of thefe animal foffils. It is fufficient that after a part of the earth had been clear'd from water, and inhabited, the fame action of the flux and reflux continued its operation, as it was neceffary it fhould, in order to produce the gradual appearance of the earth, for let us not imagine that this was the work of a day, or of an age, or even of many ages. Now during the firft effects of this mechanism, all thefe new babitations, fay I, in my memoir, were not very fixed or folid. "Those islands scarce deserve the name of land. They might rather be compared to thofe floating iflands mentioned by travellers, or to fuch as fucceffively appear and difappear. Such a fluctuating land did not afford a more certain fettlement than the quick-fands in the fea. Very great and wonderful revolutions must have happened in this new world, by the action of the flux and reflux, which was then univerfal. It is very probable that it has feveral times diffolved, confounded, thrown into ruins, and formed again the firft defigns of the several parts of the univerfe. How many deluges then hap pened! |