which the Copernicans afcribe to the COLD take thefe Ex Earth. If we fhould preffions in a philofophical, ftrict, literal fenfe. and not as vulgar Exariling from the appearance vad sen to atone 3 preffions, ariling mo of things; we shall find that very odd and unreafonable Conclufions may as well be collected from thofeScriptures, as the Sun's Motion: as that the Sun hath animal Life, Motion, and Defire, being faid to act these things it felf, to rife, to fet, yea to hafte to the place of his Rifing, or as the Hebrew hath it, to pant after, or eagerly to defire it (7). So in Pfal. 19. the elegant Pfalmift giving a poetical defcription of this noble and admirable work of GOD, the Sun, faith, GOD hath, in the Heavens, made a Tabernacle for him; as if the Sun had an House, a Refting place provided for Var(7) DNAnhelavit, inhiavit, vid. Buxtorf. Lexicon.gits michig bus him ་་་་་་ him from which he comes daily forth with with beauty and luftre, as refplendent as that of a Bridegrooms and with the fame ardency, joy, and diligence runs his Course,as a Cham pion doth his Race. And lastly hist Going forth is faid to be from the end of the Heaven, and his Circuit to reach to the ends thereof; as though the Heavens had two Extremities, or was,1 as the Ancients fancied the Earth to be, a long large Plane bounded by the Ocean, under which they imagin ned the Sun betook himself, and was thence faid Tingere fe Oceano, to dip himself into the Ocean when he Set. M N AND as in these places of Scripture the Sun is faid to Move; fo in theo other places he is faid to ftand Still and to go backward. But we fhall (1 find that very abfurd conclufions! would follow the taking thofe Texts in a strict literal sense. For in Joshua the Sun is ordered to stand still upon Gibeon, Gibeon, and the Moon in the valley of Ajalon. But it would be very abfurd to take this in a literal fenfe, and imagine thofe two great Luminaries were confined to those two places, otherwife than in appearance to the victorious Ifraelites. And if fo confiderable a part of the tranfaction be fpoken according to its appearance, why not the whole? Why might not this Station as well be an Arreft of the Earth's motion, as of that of the Heavens, if the whole Miracle was not (as fome not improbably think) effected by means of fome preternatural Refractions, or extraordinary Meteors, c. AND fo for the Recefs of the Sun, or its Shadow in Hezekiah's cafe, that which in appearance feemed to be the action of the Sun, is by divers learned men thought to have been the effect of fuch like extraordinary Refractions or Meteors, as I mentio ned і ned in the laft cafe: of if it was à real Recefs, why not of the Earth, tather than the Sun and whole Heavens ? Taus having answered the particular Texts, it doth not appear that the Scriptures oppose the Copernican Syfteme, but that thofe paffages which feem to do so, are spoken more ac cording as things appear than as really they are. For as St. Hierom faith, (8) Confuetudinis Scripturarum eft It is the custom of the Striptures, for the Hiftorian fo to relate the opinion men had of many matters, as at that time those matters were by all people taken to be. And in another place (9) There are many things in the Holy Scriptures, which are Spoken according to the opinion of the time in which they were done, and not (8) Hierom. in Matth. C. 13. accor " cording to their reality. And this is no other than what is very reafonable and suitable to the end and defign of the Holy Scriptures, which, as I have faid, is rather to inftruct men in Divine and Moral Doctrines, than Philofophical Truths. And agreeably hereto St. Auguftine anfwers this very doubt concerning the Motion of the Heavens (9). Some of the Brethren (faith he) move a Question, whether the Heavens ftand fill or are moved, because, Jay they, if they are moved, how is it a Firmament? and if they stand still, how do the Stars, which are believed to be fixt in them, revolve from East to West, the Northern Stars defcribing leffer Circles 'near the Pole? To which, faith he, I anfwer, That these things do greatly require feveral fubtile and laborious Reafons, to difcover truly whether the matter be fo, (9) Auguft. de Genesi ad Literam. L.2.6.10. b or |