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Show 3G RA'Y.-WOODWARD. I l Causes employed at the creation, in separating been t 1e seconc . h t . t 1 t and in gatherlllO' t e wa ei s O· the land fJ·om t le wa ers, . . I:) I 1 . 1 I:I mentwns hke Hooke, t 1e eart 1- gether mto one pace. e ' d .e f 1646 h. h had violently shaken the An es 10r some quake o ' w lC • h . I d f 1 S and made many alteratwns t erem. n hundrc s o eague ' d 1 . . cause for the general deluge, he preferre a c lange nss1gnmg a ' . . · f . h . tl earth's centre of gravity to the mtroductwn o cat t - mqu a klee s. So rne u nlrnown cause he said, mig:ht have forced the ~ ' v • • subterranean waters outwards, as was, perhaps, mdiCated by " the brcakinO' up of the fountains of the great deep." Ray was o~e of the first of our writers who enlarged upon the effects of running water upon the Jan~, and of the .encroach-t Of the sea upon the shores. So Important dtd he con ... men · 1 · d' sider the agency of these causes, that he.saw m t 1e~ an I.n 1- cation of the tendency of our system to Its final d1ssolut1~n; and he wondered why the earth did not proceed more rap1dly towards a O'eneral submersion beneath the sea, when so much matter wasb carried down by rivers, or undermined in the seacliffs. ~ ... e perceive clearly from his writings, that ~he gradual decline of our system, and its future consummatwn by fire, was held to be as necessary an article of faith by the orthodox, as was the recent origin of our planet. His Discourses, like those of Hooke, are highly interesting, as attesting the familiar association in the minds of philosophers, in the age of Newton, of questions in physics and divinity. Ray gave an unequivocal proof of the sincerity of his mind, by sacrificing his preferment in the church, rather than take an oath against the Covenanters, which he could not reconcile with his conscience. His reputation, moreover, in the scientific world placed him high above the temptation of courting popularity, by pandering to the physico-theological taste of his age. It is, therefore, curious to meet with so many citations from the Christian fathers and prophets in his essays on physical science-to find him in one page proceeding by the strict rules of induction, to explain the former changes of the globe, and in the next gravely entertaining the question, whether the sun and stars, and the whole heavens shall be annihilated, together with the earth, at the era of the grand conflagration. · Among the contemporaries of Hooke and Ray, Woodward, a professor of medicine, had acquired the most extensive infor· BURNET. 37 mation respecting the geological structure of the crust of the earth. He had examined many parts of the British strata with minute attention ; and his systematic collection of specimens, bequeathed to the University of Cambridge, and still preset·ved there as arranged by him, shews how far he had advanced in ascertaining the order of superposition. From the great number of facts collected hy him we might have expected his theoretical views to be more sound and enlarged than those of his contemporaries; but in his anxiety to accommodate all observed phenomena to the scriptural account of the Creation and Deluge, he arrived at most erroneous results. He conceived " the whole terrestrial globe to have been taken to pieces and dissolved at the flood, and the strata to have settled down from this promiscuous mass as any earthy sediment from a fluid 'Y<-." In corroboration of these views, he insisted upon the fact, that " marine bodies are lodged in the strata according to the order of their gravity, the heavier shells in stone, the lighter in chalk, and so of the rest t." Ray immediately exposed the unfounded nature of this assertion, remarking truly, that fossil bodies " are often mingled, heavy with light, in the same stratum;", and he even went so far as to say, that Woodward " must have invented the phenomena for the sake of confirming his bold and strange hypothesis :j:"-a strong expression from the pen of a contemporary. At the same time Burnet published his '' Theory of the Earth ~·" The title is most characteristic of the age,-" The Sacred Theory of the Earth, containing an Account of the Original of the Earth, and of all the general Changes which it hath already undergone, or is to undergo, till the Consummation of all Things." Even Milton had scarcely ventured in his poem to indulge his imagination so freely in painting scenes of the Creation and Deluge, Paradise and Chaos, as this writer, who set forth pretensions to profound philosophy. He explained why the primeval earth enjoyed a perpetual spring before the flood ! shewed how the crust of the globe was fissured by "the sun's rays," so that it burst, and thus the dilu- * Essay towards a Natural History of the Earth, 1695. Preface. t Ibid. Preface. t Consequences of tho Deluge, p. 165. § :First published in Latin, between the years 1 GSO and 1 G!JO, |