Chapter VII

IN WHAT FORM AND ORDER THE WORLD WAS COMPOSED.

Parmenides believes that there are small coronets alternately twisted one within another, some made up of a thin, others of a condensed matter; and there are others between them mixed mutually together of light and of darkness, and about them all there is a solid substance, which like a firm wall surrounds these coronets. Leucippus and Democritus wrap the world round about, as with a garment and membrane. Epicurus says that that which bounds some worlds is thin, and that which limits others is gross and condensed; and of these worlds some are in motion, others are fixed. Plato, that fire takes the first place in the world, the second the ether, after that the air, under that the water; the last place the earth possesseth: sometimes he puts the ether and the fire in the same place. Aristotle gives the first place to the ether, as that which is impassible, it being a kind of fifth body; after which he placeth those that are passible, fire, air, and water, and last of all the earth. To those bodies that are accounted celestial he assigns a motion that is circular, but to those that are seated under them, if they be light bodies, an ascending, if heavy, a descending motion. Empedocles, that the places of the elements are not always fixed and determined, but they all succeed one another in their respective stations.

CHAPTER VIII.

WHAT IS THE CAUSE OF THE WORLD’S INCLINATION.

Diogenes and Anaxagoras affirm that, after the world was composed and the earth had produced living creatures, the world out of its own propensity made an inclination towards the south. Perhaps this may be attributed to a wise Providence (they say), that thereby some parts of the world may be habitable, others uninhabitable, according as the various climates are affected with a rigorous cold, or a scorching heat, or a just temperament of cold and heat. Empedocles, that the air yielding to the impetuous force of the solar rays, the pole received an inclination; whereby the northern parts were exalted and the southern depressed, by which means the whole world received its inclination.

CHAPTER IX.

OF THAT THING WHICH IS BEYOND THE WORLD, AND WHETHER IT BE A VACUUM OR NOT.

Pythagoras and his followers say that beyond the world there is a vacuum, into which and out of which the world hath its respiration. The Stoics, that there is a vacuum into which the infinite world by a conflagration shall be dissolved. Posidonius, not an infinite vacuum, but as much as suffices for the dissolution of the world; and this he asserts in his first book concerning the Vacuum. Aristotle affirms, that there is no vacuum. Plato concludes that neither within nor without the world there is any vacuum.

CHAPTER X.

WHAT PARTS OF THE WORLD ARE ON THE RIGHT HAND, AND WHAT PARTS ARE ON THE LEFT.

Pythagoras, Plato, and Aristotle say that the eastern parts of the world, from whence motion commences, are of the right, those of the western are of the left-hand of the world. Empedocles, that those that are of the right-hand are towards the summer solstice, those of the left towards the winter solstice.

CHAPTER XI.

OF HEAVEN, WHAT IS ITS NATURE AND ESSENCE.

Anaximenes declares that the circumference of heaven is the limit of the earth’s revolution. Empedocles, that the heaven is a solid substance, and hath the form and hardness of crystal, it being composed of the air compacted by fire, and that in both hemispheres it invests the elements of air and fire. Aristotle, that it is formed by the fifth body, and by the mixture of extreme heat and cold.

CHAPTER XII.

INTO HOW MANY CIRCLES IS THE HEAVEN DISTINGUISHED; OR, OF THE DIVISION OF HEAVEN.

Thales, Pythagoras, and the followers of Pythagoras do distribute the universal globe of heaven into five circles which they denominate zones; one of which is called the arctic circle, which is always conspicuous to us, another is the summer tropic, another is the equinoctial, another is the winter tropic, another is the antarctic circle, which is always invisible. The circle called the zodiac is placed under the three that are in the midst, and lies obliquely, gently touching them all. Likewise, they are all cut in right angles by the meridian, which runs from pole to pole. It is supposed that Pythagoras made the first discovery of the obliquity of the zodiac, but one Oenopides of Chios challenges to himself the invention of it.