In the _Archaeologiae_ he
professed to reconcile a former work of his on the origins of the world
with the account given in Genesis. The quotation is from chapter VII. of
book I., "De Hebraeis, eorumque Cabala," and may be translated thus: "I
easily believe that the invisible natures in the universe are more in
number than the visible. But who shall tell us all the kinds of them?
the ranks and relationships, the peculiar qualities and gifts of each?
what they do? where they dwell? Man's wit has ever been circling about
the knowledge of these things, but has never attained to it. Yet in the
meanwhile I will not deny that it is profitable to contemplate from time
to time in the mind, as in a picture, the idea of a larger and better
world; lest the mind, becoming wonted to the little things of everyday
life, grow narrow and settle down altogether to mean businesses. At the
same time, however, we must watch for the truth, and observe method, so
as to distinguish the certain from the uncertain, day from night."
Instead of this motto the first edition had an Argument prefixed, as
follows:
"How a Ship having passed the Line was driven by storms to the cold
Country towards the South Pole; and how from thence she made her course
to the tropical Latitude of the Great Pacific Ocean; and of the strange
things that befell; and in what manner the Ancyent Marinere came back
to his own Country."
This was somewhat enlarged in the second edition (1800), and dropped
thereafter.
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