254 COSMOS. 



and the sea-girt heights above Cumae (called Phlegra, or the 

 burned field) lie upon the shaggy breast of the monster." 



Thus Typhon (the raging Enceladus) was, in the popular 

 fancy of the Greeks, the mythical symbol of the unknown 

 cause of volcanic phenomena lying deep in the interior of 

 the earth. By the position and the space which he occupied 

 were indicated the limitation and the co-operation of partic- 

 ular volcanic systems. In the fanciful geological picture of 

 the interior of the earth, in the great contemplation of the 

 universe which Plato establishes in the Phasdo (p. 112-114), 

 this co-operation is still more boldly extended to all volcanic 

 systems. The lava streams derive their materials from the 

 Pyriphlegethon, which, " after it has repeatedly rolled around 

 beneath the earth," pours itself into Tartarus. Plato says 

 expressly that the fire-vomiting mountains, wherever such 

 occur upon the earth, blow upward small portions from the 

 Pyriphlegethon (" ovrog d' earlv 6v enovoiid^ovot UvptcpXe- 

 yedovra, ov teal ol pvaKsg dnoandaixara dvacpvaojoiv, ottt} 

 dv Tvx^Oi rrjg y^c")* This expression (p. 113 B.) of the 

 expulsion with violence refers, to a certain extent, to the 

 moving force of the previously -inclosed wind, then sud- 

 denly breaking through, upon which the Stagirite after- 

 ward, in the Meteorology, founded his entire theory of vul- 

 canicity. 



According to these ancient views, the linear arrangement 

 of volcanoes is more distinctly characterized in the consider- 

 ation of the entire body of the earth than their grouping 

 around a central volcano. The serial arrangement is most 



stadia from each other, are still shown, which are called the wind- 

 bags ; above them lie rough hills, which are probably piled up by the 

 red-hot masses blown up." He had already stated (lib. i., p. 57) "that 

 between the Cyclades (Thera and Therasia) flames of fire burst forth 

 from the sea for four days together, so^hat the whole sea boiled and 

 burned; and an island composed of calcined masses was gradually 

 raised as if by a lever." All these well-described phenomena are 

 ascribed to the compressed wind, acting like elastic vapors. Ancient 

 physical science troubled itself but little "about the peculiar essentials 

 of material bodies ; it was dynamic, and depended on the measure of 

 the moving force. We find the opinion that the increasing heat of 

 the planet with the depth is the cause of volcanoes and earthquakes, 

 first expressed toward the close of the third century by a Christian 

 bishop in Africa under Diocletian (Cosmos, vol. v., p. 188). The Pyri- 

 phlegethon of Plato, as a stream of fire circulating in the interior of the 

 earth, nourishes all lava-giving volcanoes, as we have already men- 

 tioned in the text. In the earliest presentiments of humanity, in a 

 narrow circle of ideas, lie the germs of that which we now think we 

 may explain under the form of other symbols. 



