Buffon's Natural History, Volume I (of 10)

ARTICLE V.
EXPOSITION OF SOME OTHER SYSTEMS

It is plain that the three forementioned hypotheses have much in common with each other. They all agree in this point, that during the deluge the earth changed its form, as well externally as internally; but these speculators have not considered that the earth before the deluge was inhabited by the same species of men and animals, and must necessarily have been nearly such as it is at present. The sacred writings teach us, that before the deluge there were rivers, seas, mountains, and forests. That these rivers and mountains were, for the most part, retained in the same situations; the Tigris and Euphrates were the rivers of the ancient paradise; that the mountain of Armenia, on which the ark rested, was one of the highest mountains in the world at the deluge, as it is at present: that the same plants and animals which exist now, existed then; for we read of the serpent, of the raven, of the crow, and of the dove, which brought the olive branch into the ark. Although Tournefort asserts there are no olive trees for more than 400 miles from Mount Ararat, and passes some absurd jokes thereon⁹, it is nevertheless certain there were olives in this neighbourhood at the time of the deluge, since holy writ assures us of it in the most express terms; but it is by no means astonishing that in the space of 4000 years the olive trees should have been destroyed in those quarters, and multiplied in others; it is therefore contrary to scripture and reason, that those authors have supposed the earth was quite different from its present state before the deluge; and this contradiction between their hypothesis and the sacred text, as well as physical truths, must cause their systems to be rejected, if even they should agree with some phenomena. Burnet gives neither observations, nor any real facts, for the support of his system. Woodward has only given us an essay, in which he promised much more than he could perform: his book is a project, the execution of which has not been seen. He has made use of two general observations; the first, that the earth is every where composed of matters which formerly were in a state of fluidity, transported by the waters, and deposited in horizontal strata. The second, that there are abundance of marine productions in most parts of the bowels of the earth. To give a reason for these facts, he has recourse to the universal deluge, or rather it appears that he gives them as proofs of the deluge; but, like Burnet, he falls into evident contradictions, for it is not to be supposed with them that there were no mountains prior to the deluge, since it is expressly stated, that the waters rose fifteen cubits above the tops of the highest mountains. On the other hand, it is not said that these waters destroyed or dissolved these mountains; but, on the contrary, these mountains remained in their places, and the ark rested on that which the water first deserted. Besides how can it be imagined that, during the short duration of the deluge, the waters were able to dissolve the mountains and the whole body of the earth? Is it not an absurdity to suppose that in forty days all marble, rocks, stones, and minerals, were dissolved by water? Is it not a manifest contradiction to admit this total dissolution, and at the same time maintain that shells, bones, and marine productions were preserved entire, and resisted that which had dissolved the most solid substances? I shall not therefore hesitate to say, that Woodward, with excellent facts and observations, has formed but a poor and inconsistent system.

Whiston, who came last, greatly enriched the other two, and notwithstanding he gave a vast scope to his imagination has not fallen into contradiction; he speaks of matters not very credible, but they are neither absolutely nor evidently impossible. As we are ignorant of the centre of the earth, he thought he might suppose it was a solid matter, surrounded with a ring of heavy fluid, and afterwards with a ring of water, on which the external crust was sustained; in the latter the different parts of this crust were more or less sunk, in proportion to their relative weights, which produced mountains and inequalities on the surface of the earth. Here, however, this astronomer has committed a mechanical blunder; he did not recollect that the earth, according to this hypothesis, must be an uniform arch, and that consequently it could not be borne on the water it contains, and much less sunk therein. I do not know that there are any other physical errors; but he has made a great number of errors, both in metaphysics and theology. On the whole it cannot be denied absolutely that the earth meeting with the tail of a comet might not be inundated, especially allowing the author that the tail of a comet may contain aqueous vapours; nor can it be denied as an absolute impossibility that the tail of a comet, in returning from its perihelium, might not burn the earth, if we suppose, with Mr. Whiston, that the comet passed very near the sun; it is the same with the rest of the system. But though his ideas are not absolutely impossibilities, there is so little probability to each thing, when taken separately, that the result upon the whole taken together puts it beyond credibility.

The three systems we have spoken of are not the only works which have been composed on the theory of the earth; a Memoir of M. Bourguet appeared in 1729, printed at Amsterdam, with his "Philosophical Letters on the Formation of Salts, &c." in which he gives a specimen of the system he meditated, but which was prevented completion by the death of the author. It is but justice to admit, that no person was more industrious in making observations or collecting facts. To him we owe that great and beautiful observation, the correspondence between the angles of mountains. He presents every thing which he had collected in great order; but with all those advantages, it appears that he has succeeded no better than the rest in making a physical and reasonable history of the changes which had happened to the globe, and that he was very wide from having found the real cause of those effects which he relates. To be convinced of this we need only cast our eyes on the propositions which he deduces from the phenomena, and which ought to serve for the basis of his theory. He says, that the whole globe took its form at one time, and not successively; that its form and disposition prove that it has been in a state of fluidity; that the present state of the earth is very different from that in which it was for many ages after its first formation; that the matter of the globe was at the beginning less dense than since it altered its appearance; that the condensation of its solid parts diminished by degrees with its velocity, so that after having made a number of revolutions on its axis, and round the sun, it found itself on a sudden in a state of dissolution, which destroyed its first structure. This happened about the vernal equinox. That the sea-shells introduced themselves into the dissolved matters; that after this dissolution the earth took the form it now has, and that the fire which directly infused itself therein consumed it by degrees, and it will be one day destroyed by a terrible explosion, accompanied with a general conflagration, which will augment the atmosphere of the globe, and diminish its diameter, and that then the earth, instead of beds of sand or earth, will have only strata of calcined metal and mountains composed of amalgamas of different metals.

This is sufficient to shew the system M. Bourguet meditated; to divine in this manner the past, and predict the future, nearly as others have predicted, does not appear to me to be an effort of judgment: this author had more erudition than sound and general views: he appears to be deficient in that capaciousness of ideas necessary to follow the extent of the subject, and enable him to comprehend the chain of causes and effects.

In the acts of Leipsic, the famous Leibnitz published a scheme of quite a different system, under the title of Protogaea. The earth, according to Bourguet and others, must end by fire; according to Leibnitz it began by it, and has suffered many more changes and revolutions than is imagined. The greatest part of the terrestrial matter was surrounded by violent flames at the time when Moses says light was divided from darkness. The planets, as well as the earth, were fixed stars, luminous of themselves. After having burnt a long time, he pretends that they were extinguished for want of combustible matter, and are become opaque bodies. The fire, by melting the matter, produced a vitrified crust, and the basis of all the matter which composes the globe is glass, of which sand and gravel are only fragments. The other kinds of earth are formed from a mixture of this sand, with fixed salts and water, and when the crust cooled, the humid particles, which were raised in form of vapours, refel, and formed the sea. They at first covered the whole surface, and even surmounted the highest mountains. According to this author, the shells, and other wrecks of the sea, which are every where to be found, positively prove that the sea has covered the whole earth; and the great quantity of fixed salts, sand, and other melted and calcined matters, which are included in the bowels of the earth, prove that the conflagration had been general, and that it preceded the existence of the sea. Although these thoughts are void of proofs, they are capital. The ideas have connection, the hypotheses are not impossible, and the consequences that may be drawn therefrom are not contradictory: but the grand defect of this theory is, that it is not applicable to the present state of the earth; it is the past which it explains, and this past is so far back, and has left us so few remains, that we may say what we please of it, and the probability will be in proportion as a man has talents to elucidate what he asserts. To affirm as Whiston has done, that the earth was originally a comet, or, with Leibnitz, that it has been a sun, is saying things equally possible or impossible, and to which it would be ridiculous to apply the rules of probability. To say that the sea formerly covered all the earth, that it surrounded the whole globe, and that it is for this reason shells are every where found, is not paying attention to a very essential point, the unity of the time of the creation; for if that was so, it must necessarily be admitted, that shell-fish, and other inhabitants of the sea, of which we find the remains in the internal part of the earth, existed long before man, and all terrestrial animals. Now, independent of the testimony of holy writ, is it not reasonable to think, that all animals and vegetables are nearly as ancient as each other?

M. Scheutzer, in a Dissertation, addressed to the Academy of Sciences in 1728, attributes, like Woodward, the change, or rather the second formation of the globe, to the universal deluge; to explain that of mountains, he says, that after the deluge, God chusing to return the waters into subterraneous reservoirs, broke and displaced with his all-powerful hand a number of beds, before horizontal, and raised them above the surface of the globe, which was originally level. The whole Dissertation is composed to imply this opinion. As it was requisite these eminences should be of a solid consistence, M. Scheutzer remarks, that God only drew them from places where there were many stones; from hence, says he, it proceeds that those countries, like Switzerland, which are very stony, are also mountainous; and on the contrary, those, as Holland, Flanders, Hungary and Poland, have only sand or clay, even to a very great depth, and are almost entirely without mountains.¹⁰

This author, more than any other, is desirous of blending Physic with Theology, and though he has given some good observations, the systematical part of his works is still weaker than those who preceded him. On this subject he has even made declamations and ridiculous witticisms, as may be seen in his Visciam quærelæ, &c. without speaking of his large work in many folio volumes, Physica Sacra, a puerile work, which appears to be composed less for the instruction of men than for the amusement of children.

Steno, and some others, have attributed the cause of the inequalities of the earth to particular inundations, earthquakes, &c. but the effects of these secondary causes have been only able to produce some slight changes. We admit of these causes after the first cause, the motion of the flux and reflux, and of the sea from east to west. Neither Steno, nor the rest, have given theory, nor even any general facts on this matter.¹¹

Ray pretends that all mountains have been produced by earthquakes, and he has composed a treatise to prove it; we shall shew under the article of Volcanos what little foundation his opinion is built upon.

We cannot dispense with observing that Burnet, Woodward, Whiston, and most of these other authors, have committed an error which deserves to be cleared up; which is, to have looked upon the deluge as possible by the action of natural causes, whereas scripture presents it to us as produced by the immediate will of God; there is no natural cause which can produce on the whole surface of the earth, the quantity of water required to cover the highest mountains; and if even we could imagine a cause proportionate to this effect, it would still be impossible to find another cause capable of causing the water to disappear: allowing Whiston, that these waters proceeded from the tail of a comet, we deny that any could proceed from the great abyss, or that they all returned into it, since the great abyss, according to him, being surrounded on every side by the crust, or terrestrial orb, it is impossible that the attraction of the comet could cause any motion to the fluids it contained; much less, as he says, a violent flux and reflux; hence there could not be issued from, nor entered into, the great abyss, a single drop of water; and unless it is supposed that the waters which fell from the comet have been destroyed by a miracle, they would still be on the surface of the earth, covering the summits of the highest mountains. Nothing better characterises a miracle, than the impossibility of explaining the effect of it by natural causes. Our authors have made vain efforts to give a reason for the deluge; their physical efforts, and the secondary causes, which they made use of, prove the truth of the fact as reported in the scriptures, and demonstrate that it could only have been performed by the first cause, the will of the Almighty.

Besides, it is certain that it was neither at one time, nor by the effect of the deluge, that the sea left dry these continents we inhabit: for it is certain by the testimony of holy writ, that the terrestrial paradise was in Asia, and that Asia was inhabited before the deluge; consequently the sea, at that time, did not cover this considerable part of the globe. The earth, before the deluge, was nearly as it is at present, and this enormous quantity of water, which divine justice caused to fall on the earth to punish guilty men, in fact, brought death on every creature; but it produced no change on the surface of the earth, it did not even destroy plants which grew upon it, since the dove brought an olive branch to the ark in her beak.

Why, therefore, imagine, as many of our naturalists have done, that this water totally changed the surface of the globe even to a depth of two thousand feet? Why do they desire it to be the deluge which has brought the shells on the earth which we meet with at 7 or 800 feet depth in rocks and marble? Why say, that the hills and mountains were formed at that time? And how can we figure to ourselves, that it is possible for these waters to have brought masses and banks of shells 100 miles long? I see not how they can persist in this opinion, at least, without admitting a double miracle in the deluge; the first, for the augmentation of the waters; and the second, for the transportation of the shells; but as there is only the first which is related in the Bible, I do not see it necessary to make the second an article of our creed.

On the other hand, if the waters of the deluge had retired all at once, they would have carried so great a quantity of mud and other impurities, that the Earth would not have been capable of culture till many ages after this inundation; as is known, by the deluge which happened in Greece, where the overflowed country was totally forsaken, and could not receive any cultivation for more than three centuries.¹² We ought also to look on the universal deluge as a supernatural means of which the Almighty made use for the chastisement of mankind, and not as an effect of a natural cause. The universal deluge is a miracle both in its cause and effects; we see clearly by the scripture that it was designed for the destruction of men and animals, and that it did not in any mode change the earth, since after the retreat of the waters, the mountains, and even the trees, were in their places, and the surface of the earth was proper to receive culture and produce vines and fruits. How could all the race of fish, which did not enter the ark, be preserved, if the earth had been dissolved in the water, or only if the waters had been sufficiently agitated to transport shells from India to Europe, &c.?

Nevertheless, this supposition, that it was the deluge which transported the shells of the sea into every climate, is the opinion, or rather the superstition, of naturalists. Woodward, Scheutzer, and some more, call these petrified shells the remains of the deluge; they look on them as the medals and monuments which God has left us of this terrible event, in order that it never should be effaced from the human race. In short, they have adopted this hypothesis with so much enthusiasm, that they appear only desirous to reconcile holy scripture with their opinion; and instead of making use of their observations, and deriving light therefrom, they envelope themselves in the clouds of a physical theology, the obscurity of which is derogatory to the simplicity and dignity of religion, and only leaves the absurd to perceive a ridiculous mixture of human ideas and divine truths. To pretend to explain the universal Deluge, and its physical causes; to attempt to teach what passed in the time of that great revolution; to divine what were the effects of it; to add facts to those of Holy Writ, to draw consequences from such facts, is only a presumptuous attempt to measure the power of the Most High. The natural wonders which his benevolent hand performs in an uniform and regular manner, are incomprehensible; and by the strongest reason, these wonderful operations and miracles ought to hold us in awful wonder, and in silent adoration.

But they will say, the universal Deluge being a certain fact, is it not permitted to reason on its consequences? It may be so; but it is requisite that you should begin by allowing that the Deluge could not be performed by physical causes; you ought to consider it is an immediate effect of the will of the Almighty; you ought to confine yourselves to know only what the Holy Writ teaches, and particularly not to blend bad philosophy with the purity of divine truth. These precautions, which the respect we owe to the Almighty exacts, being taken, what remains for examination on the subject of the Deluge? Does the Scripture say mountains were formed by the Deluge? No, it says the contrary. Is it said that the agitation of the waters was so great as to raise up shells from the bottom of the sea, and transport them all over the earth? No; the ark floated quietly on the surface of the waters. Is it said, that the earth suffered a total dissolution? None at all: the recital of the sacred historian is simple and true, that of these naturalists complex and fabulous.