[ 
. 1 
much claims to correctness, and entitles i 
to the reflections and investigation of sci¬ 
entific inquiry. 
AU theories of the earth, as to ils fcu:e,: 
properties, or motions, aro, or should he 
founded upon the laws of matter. The 
laws of matter are not framed, like the laws 
of slates and nations, by theonzmg me j 
thev are gathered from the effects of matter 
by observing its opperations. With regar 
toth e figure of the earth, Symmes there), 
, assumes it as true, that it is compose 0 
spheres, more or less in&umh ar, which a roj 
~ - -fic' h j -.-r-r^wa.rnr-nnr r-%T...^l -nt.Tr-ndX.C'rVrgaT-SCA .SlA^n 
all concave convex globular, and concen¬ 
tric with each other. 
Wo 
«•» In 
universe, with all its suns and fixed stares,;: 
with their systems revolving around them . 
in their present form, is it more dificult to 
conceive them spoken into shapes and forms^ 
concentric with each other, by the Almighty j 
fiat which created all things as they were ere- ^ 
ated, than that each should be composed ofj 
solid matter ? Or, if we suppose, as was, 
the opinion of the ancients, that unbound-! 
ed space, before time and the world began,I 
was filled with molocula or particles of mat¬ 
ter imperceptibly small, but in a chaotic 
state, without form., and that matter in this 
unformed stale, had those general laws which 
now govern it impressed upon it in this ^ 
state of chaos, and obedient to those general 
laws, particles began to be attracted by, and 
adhere to each other, according to 
the quantity and distance, and to as¬ 
sume regular forms, and take up regular 
I courses, and perlorm regular revolutions, 
around certain centres, preserving that strict 
uniformity and similarity throughout the 
whole, which is due to the same general 
laws, until all the matter that was “void and 
without form,’ 1 (or as the original Hebrew 
has it, void and hall zv) had become attach- 
' ed to some of those seen and unseen orbs 
which move in the universe, we can as easly 
admit that each is composed of spheres con- 
