BOOK II.] History of Nature. 103 



CHAPTER LXIV. 

 Of the Form of the Earth. 



THE first Thing that offereth itself to be considered, is 

 her Figure, in which by a general Consent we all agree. 

 For surely we utter nothing more commonly than the round 

 Ball 1 of the Earth ; and confess that it is a Globe enclosed 

 within two Poles. But yet the Form is not that of a perfect 

 Globe, considering so great Height of Mountains, and such 

 Extent of Plains; nevertheless, if the Compass thereof might 

 be taken by Lines, the End of those Lines would meet just 

 in Circuit, and prove the Figure to be an accurate Circle. 

 And this the very Consideration of natural Reason doth 

 convince, although there were not those Causes which we 

 alleged about the Heaven. For in it the hollow Convexity 

 declineth upon itself, and on every Side resteth upon the 

 Centre thereof, which is that of the Earth. But this being 

 solid and compact, ariseth as if it swelled, and is stretched 

 without. The Heaven inclineth toward the Centre, but the 

 Earth goeth from the Centre ; whilst the World, with con- 

 tinual Volubility and turning about it, driveth the huge 

 Globe thereof into the Form of a round Ball. 



1 The Egyptian Cosmogony, as delivered by Diodorus Siculus, de- 

 scribes the earth as "rolled within itself, and turned continually;" although 

 a subsequent idea was founded on its being merely an extended surface, 

 where the earth was inclosed within a field of waters, which was again 

 encompassed with darkness and impenetrable mist. But after what 

 Pliny has said in this, and the immediately following chapters, on the 

 form of the earth, and the proofs he has given of its being a globe, it 

 seems surprising that a contrary opinion should have prevailed, even to 

 comparatively modern times; and especially among men accustomed to 

 regard every thing delivered by the ancients as unquestionably true. This 

 perversity can only be accounted for by having made a religious dogma 

 of the contrary idea, on the authority of some ill-understood passages of 

 Scripture. Wern. Club. 



