378 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book V. 



tion with refpea to that part of the Sea where the Tide rifes. It 

 is commonly faid, that it is the Moon which produces this rifmg of 

 the waters ; and, I believe, moft of our philofophers are fatisfied 

 with this folution of the phaenomenon. That the Waters do rife up- 

 on occafion of the Moon being in fuch or fuch a pofition, and 

 that, therefore, there is a certain fympathy or confent betwixt the 

 Motions of the Moon and of the Sea, is a fa£l undeniable : But the 

 queftion is. Whether the Moon be the Efficient Caufe of the E- 

 levation of the Sea, or by what other power it is produced ? To ac- 

 count for it in the way the Planetary Motion is accounted for by the 

 Newtonians, that is, by Projection and Gravitation, by hthers or 

 Subtile Fluids, or, in fhort, by other Bodies protruding or impelling 

 the Waters to rife contrary to their natural tendency towards the 

 centre of the Earth, I hold to be abfolutely impoffible. Neither do 

 I think that the hypothefis of Attraction, as above explained, if it 

 could be admitted, abfurd and inconceivable as it is, would explain 

 the Phaenomenon with the lead degree of probability : For, how 

 is it poffible to conceive that the Moon, a much lefs Body than the 

 Earth and at fo great a diftance from it, fhould operate upon the 

 Waters of the Sea fo much more powerfully than the Earth itfelf 

 does, upon the furface of which they are, as to overcome the effedt 

 of their Gravity, which we are fire exifls, and make them rife in 

 fo extraordinary a manner. Or, if we could fuppofe the Moon to 

 have fuch an efFeCl upon the Sea, Why has flie not a like effect upon 

 other Bodies upon the furface of the Earth ? — Why not upon Bodies 

 lighter than Water, fuch as the Air and Bodies floating in the Air, 

 which are lighter ftill than the Air ? — Why not upon other Waters, 

 fuch as the great lakes of America ?— Why not upon the inland feas, 

 fuch as the Mediterranean ? It being, therefore, abfolutely impoffible 

 to account for the Tides by any Adtion of Body upon Body either 

 in contact or at a diftance, one fhould think that a philofopher, who 

 had not an abhorrence of Mind, or Fneumatophobiaf as Cudworth 



calls 



