1 5 o PHYSICAL SCIENCE BK. in 



any great height in order to overflow. In order to 

 overtop what is on a level with it, it need make only 

 a slight rise. Besides, the flow of it does not pro 

 ceed from the shore where it is lower, but from mid 

 ocean where the heap in question stands. Therefore, 



6 as the tide at the equinox soon after the conjunction 

 of moon and sun rises to a height greater than at 

 any other time of year ; in like manner this one 

 that is sent out to seize upon the earth must exceed 

 in violence the highest of ordinary tides, and bear 

 a far greater volume of water ; nor does it begin 

 to ebb until it has swollen above the peaks of the 

 mountains that are its objective. Some localities 

 have at present a tide that runs up inland for a 

 hundred miles in ordinary course harmlessly. It 

 flows up to its normal limit and then ebbs again. 



7 But when the time of deluge comes, the tide, 

 freed from all restraint, will set no limit to its 

 advance. In what way? you say. Just in the 

 same way as the great conflagration is destined 

 to take place. Both will take place when God 

 has seen fit to end the old order, and bring in a 

 better. Fire and water are lords of the earth. 

 From these it took its rise, and in these it will 

 find its grave. So when a new creation of the 

 world has been resolved upon by Heaven, the sea 

 will be let loose on us from above ; or it may be 

 the raging fire, if another variety of destruction 

 is Heaven s will. 



XXIX 



SOME suppose that in the final catastrophe the earth, 

 too, will be shaken, and through clefts in the ground 

 will uncover sources of fresh rivers which will flow 



