ESS.-lYS CIVIL AND MORAL. 



that they arc a newer or a younger people than the people of the old 

 world : and it is much mere likely, that the destruction that hath 

 heretofore been there, was not by earthquakes (as the Egyptian priest 

 told Solon, concerning the island of Atlantis, that it was swallowed 

 by an earthquake) but rather, that it was desolated by a particular 

 deluge ; for earthquakes are seldom in those parts : but, on the other 

 side,&quot; they have such pouring rivers, as the rivers of Asia, and Africa, 

 and Europe, arc but brooks to them. Their Andes likewise, or moun 

 tains arc far higher than those with us ; whereby it seems that the 

 remnants of generation of men were in such a particular deluge saved. 

 As for the observation that Machiavel hath, that the jealousy of sects 

 doth much extinguish the memory of things; traducing Gregory the 

 Great, that he did what in him lay to extinguish all heathen antiquities ; 

 I do not find that those zeals do any great effects nor last long ; as it 

 appeared in the succession of Sabinian, who did revive the former 

 antiquities. 



The vicissitude or mutations in the superior globe are no fit mat 

 ter for this present argument. It may be, Plato s great year, if the 

 world should last so long, would have some effect, not in renewing 

 the state of like individuals (for that is the fume of those, that conceive 

 the celestial bodies have more accurate influences upon these things 

 below than indeed they have), but in gross. Comets, out of the ques 

 tion, have likewise power and effect over the gross and mass of things : 

 but they are rather gazed upon, and waited upon i their journey, than 

 wisely observed in their effects ; specially in their respective effects : 

 that is what kind of comet, for magnitude, colour, version of the beams, 

 placing in the region of heaven, or lasting, produceth what kind of 

 effects. 



There is a toy, which I have heard, and I would not have it given 

 over, but waited upon a little. They say it is observed in the Low 

 Countries, I know not in what part, that every five-and-thirty years, 

 the same kind and sute of years and weathers comes about again : as 

 great frost, great wet, warm winters, summers with little heat, and the 

 like ; and they call it the prime. It is a thing I do the rather mention, 

 because computing backwards, I have found some concurrence. 



Hut to leave these points of nature, and to come to men. The 

 greatest vicissitudes of things amongst men is the vicissitude of sects 

 and religions, for those orbs rule in men s minds most. The true reli 

 gion is built upon the rock : the rest arc tossed upon the waves of 

 time. To speak therefore of the causes of new sects, and to give some 

 counsel concerning them, as far as the weakness of human judgment 

 can give stay to so great revolutions. 



When the religion formerly received is rent by discords ; and when 

 the holiness of the professors of religion is decayed and full of scandal: 

 and withal the times be stupid, ignorant, and barbarous, you may 

 doubt the springing up of a new sect ; if then also there should arise 

 any extravagant and strange spirit to make himself author thereof: all 

 which points held when Mahomet published his law. If a new sect 

 have not two properties, fear it not, for it will not spread. The one is 



