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Hundreds of Years as have fince paft: how they could lye fo long exposed to the Air, Weather, and other Injuries, without vaft Numbers of them, and efpecialy the finer and tenderer Species, being, long e'er' this, perish'd and rotten: fome of them quite deftroy'd and vanish'd, and the reft fo damag'd, many of them, and alter'd by Time, as not to appear the Things they then were, and fo create a Doubt amongst fome of us whether they are realy Shells or not.

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This was a Scruple that never enter'd into their Heads. The Shells, being then fair, found, and free from Decay, were fo exactly like those they faw lying upon their Shores, that they never made any Queftion but that they were the Exuvia of Shell-fish and that they once belonged all to the Sea. But the Difficulty was how they came thither: and by what Means they could ever arrive to Places oftentimes fo remote from the Ocean.

The Ages that went before knew well enough how these Marine Bodies were brought thither. But fuch

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were

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were the Anxieties and Diftreffes of the then again infant World: fo inceffant their Employs about Provifion for Food, Rayment, and the like, that (even after Letters were difcover'd) there was little Leifure to committ any thing to Writing: and, for want thereof, the Memory of this extraordinary Accident was in great Measure worn out and loft. true there was a general and loud Rumour amongst them of a mighty Deluge of Water that had drown'd all Mankind, except only a very few Perfons. But there had alfo happen'd very terrible Inundations of later Date, and which were nearer to the Times when these Authors lived. Such was that which overflow'd Attica in the Days of Ogyges: and that which drowned Theffaly in Deucalion's Time. Thefe made cruel Havock and Devastation amongst them their own native Country, Greece, was the Theatre whereon thefe Tragedies were acted, and their Progenitors had feen and felt their Fury. And thefe happening nearer Home, and their Effects being fresh, and in all Mens Mouths, they made

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fo fenfible and lafting Impreffions upon their Minds, that the old great Deluge was eclipfed by that Means, its Tradition mightily obfcured, and the Circumstances of it fo interwoven and confounded with those of these late Deluges, that 'twas e'en dwindled into Nothing, and almost bury'd in the Relations of those Inundations.

In their Inquiries therefore into this Matter, fcarcely a Man of them thought, or fo much as dream'd of the Univerfal Deluge. They concluded indeed unanimoufly that the Sea had been there, wherever they met with any of thefe Shells: and that it had left them behind. And fo far they were in the right this was an Inference rational and natural enough. But when they began to reafon about the Means how the Sea got thither, and away back again, there they were perfectly in the Dark. And, both Tradition and Philofophy failing them, they had recourfe to Shifts, and to the best Conjectures they could think of; concluding that it was either forced forth, as in particular Inundations, fuch as thofe lately menF 3 tion'd:

tion'd or that thofe Parts, where they found the Shells, had been formerly in the Poffeffion of the Sea, and the Place of its natural Refidence, which it had fince quitted and deferted.

Upon this they began to feek out by what Means, moft probably, the Sea might have been difpoffefs'd of thofe Parts, and constrained to move into other Quarters. And, if 'twas an Island where they found the Shells, they ftraitways concluded that the whole Island lay originaly at the Bottom of the Sea: and that 'twas either hoifted up by fome Vapour from beneath or that the Water of the Sea, which formerly cover'd it, was in Time exhaled, and dryed up by the Sun, the Land thereby laid bare, and thefe Shells brought to Light. But if 'twas in any Part of the Continent where they found the Shells, they concluded that the Sea had been extruded and driven off by the Mud that was continualy brought down by the Rivers of thofe Parts.

That I may not be over-tedious here, I will only add, that I fhall

clearly

clearly fhew, from plain Passages of their own Writings, yet extant, that 'twas meerly the finding thefe SeaShells at Land that occafioned this Stir, and raised all this Duft amongst the Ancients and upon which principaly they grounded their Belief of the Viciffitudes and Changes of Sea and Land, wherewith their Writings are fo filled. But how little Reafon they had for it and how far those have been over-feen who have followed them herein, hath been intimated already, and will appear farther from the following Part of this Effay, to the Account of which I now haften,

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