WHAT IS, IS NOT. 109 



admit the existence of peoples not descended from Adam, 

 since it would have been impossible for him to traverse the 

 ocean lying between Asia and the Antipodes ! 



Some authorities denied the Antipodes on the ground 

 taken by certain classic writers, that the regions of the 

 opposite hemisphere were uninhabitable under the tropics, 

 on account of the extreme heat, and near the Poles, on 

 account of the extreme cold. Others cited Epicurus, affirm- 

 ing that the earth was inhabitable and roofed with a celestial 

 vault only in our western hemisphere, the other half being 

 an inaccessible chaos. Others pretended that no traveller 

 could reach the east by way of the west, because the 

 earth, being pear-shaped, he would encounter on his road 

 an insurmountable tuberosity, undoubtedly the tail or stalk 

 of the pear ! Finally, there were some who dwelt upon the 

 magnitude 'of the earth, whose circuit would occupy a voyage 

 of upwards of three years. 



It was to this objection, as the most serious, that Columbus 

 principally addressed his reply. And he replied by discover- 

 ing the New World. But had not this daring genius been 

 supported in his projects by the Spanish sovereigns, Fer- 

 dinand and Isabella, he would have been handed over to 

 the Inquisition, and condemned as a heretic. It was then 

 so dangerous to believe in the Antipodes, that a Bishop 

 of Salzburg was deposed from his episcopal throne, and 

 deprived of his ecclesiastical dignity, by the Pope Zacharias, 

 for having countenanced the heresy. 



