136 
1 
they so came to be placed in the sea, so far from any pait ot the continents 
they are opposite to. 
« Nor do I conceive they were all thus formed at once, but rather succes¬ 
sively, some in one, some in other ages of the world, which may pi obably be 
in some measure collected from the quantity or thickness of the soil 01 mould 
upon them fit for vegetation; whence the island of Mcendion may be rationally 
concluded to have been a production of not many ages, and the Bermuda* 
also of not very many more, because of the thinness of such a soil. So also 
the island of Bctrbadoed , and some others, whose mould is yet but thin in 
respect of what it is in some others, and especially in those of greater magni¬ 
tude and in the greater continents. 
“ Hereupon possibly it may be inquired why those greater islands and con¬ 
tinents should be of greater antiquity than the smaller islands. To which I 
answer, that in the first ages of the world there were much greater maga¬ 
zines, or stores of the materials fitted for this purpose, which being first 
kindled threw up from under the sea, with which they were covered, vast 
quantities of it all at once, and thereupon those magazines became in a 
manner exhausted, yet not so totally as not to leave some smaller parcels of 
those substances so disposed, as not to be ready for inkindling together with 
those greater; besides there remained other smaller parcels of it disposed and 
placed in other parts of the globe sufficiently distant from them, not to be 
This disposition of shells in strata indicate their origin as connected with the sea. 
Other appearances, as the bones of elephants, and other large animals, prove the general deluge, 
and this instrument of destruction was exhibited, as a tremendous proof of the omnipotence of the 
Creator of all things, and of his judgments. 
When man too long the paths of vice pursu’d, 
Thy hand prepar’d the universalJlood\ 
“ Withdraw thy light, thou sun! he dark, ye skies ; 
,e And from the deep abyss ye waters rise!” 
Ihe frighted angels heard th’ Almighty Lord, 
And o’er the earth from wrathful viols pour’d 
Tempest and storms, obedient to his word. 
Mean time his Providence to Noah gave 
The guard of all that he design’d to save:_ 
Exempt from general doom the patriarch stood. 
Contemned the waves, and triumph’d o’er the flood. 
Prior. 
For the mode in which the deluge was produced, vide Note * page 111. 
