The history and philosophy of earthquakes from the remotest to the present times: collected from the best writers on the subject. With a particular account of the phaenomena of the great one of November 1st 1755, in various parts of the globe / By a Member of the Royal Academy of Berlin [i.e. John Bevis].

Date:
1757
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The history and philosophy of earthquakes from the remotest to the present times: collected from the best writers on the subject. With a particular account of the phaenomena of the great one of November 1st 1755, in various parts of the globe / By a Member of the Royal Academy of Berlin [i.e. John Bevis]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    liv’d thefe accidents from the rarefied ftream of waters heated by fome neighbouring fires: and feme, as Epicurus of old, (among the reft of the opinions colledted by Senecau) and, as Andreas C<zf- alpinus w fhews, feveral of the Peripatetic fchool alfo aferibed thefe horrible accidents to the igni¬ tion of certain inflammable exhalations. IV. And this has been the favourite hypothefis of the moft celebrated modern philofophers, Gaf~ fendus, Kircher, Schottus, Varenius, Des Cartes, Du Hamel„ HonGratus Faber, &c. Though it fhould be noted, that this laft imagines that waters extremely rarefied by heat, may fometimes force a way through their proper boundaries, and that included vapours may, under the like circum- ftances adf in the fame manner, and fo be fome¬ times alfo produdlive of earthquakes. Thefe learned men do fuppofe that there are many vaft cavities under ground which have a communica¬ tion with one another by intermediate canals, fome of which abound with waters, others with vapours and exhalations ariflng from inflammable fub- ftances, as bitumen, nitre, fulphur, &c. and alfo metals and minerals, congefted together, at all times difpofed for inflammation, and on fome oc^- caflons in an adfual ftate of accenflon : All which dodtrine is confonant both to reafon and experi¬ ence, as will be prefently proved at large. Now whether fuch combuftible exhalations as thefe hap¬ pen to be kindled up by any fubterraneous fpark, or from fome adtive flame gliding thro’ a narrow |ifture from without, or in confequence of the fer- * Cap, 20. w Lib. iii. cpissft. peripatet. 9. mentation