therein no feeling of her wings, or any sensible resistance of air to mount herself by. SECT. VIII. Of their opinion that seat paradise under the equinoctial: and of the pleasant habitation under those climates. THOSE which come nearer unto reason find paradise under the equinoctial line, as Tertullian, Bonaventure, and Durandus; judging, that thereunder might be found most pleasure, and the greatest fertility of soil: but against it Thomas Aquinas objecteth the distemperate heat, which he supposeth to be in all places so directly under the sun; but this is non causa pro causa; for although paradise could not be under the line, because Eden is far from it, in which paradise was; and because there is no part of Euphrates, Tigris, or Ganges under it, (Ganges being one of the four rivers, as they suppose,) yet this conceit of distemper (being but an old opinion) is found to be very untrue, though for the conjecture not to be condemned, considering the age when those fathers wrote, grounded chiefly on this: that whereas it appeared, that every country, as it lay by degrees nearer the tropic, and so toward the equinoctial, did so much the more exceed in heat; it was therefore a reasonable conjecture, that those countries which were situated directly under it, were of a distemper uninhabitable: but it seemeth that Tertullian conceived better, and so did Avicenne, for they both thought them habitable enough: and though (perchance) in those days it might be thought a fantastical opinion, (as all are which go against the vulgar;) yet we now find, that if there be any place upon the earth of that nature, beauty, and delight, that paradise had, the same must be found within that supposed uninhabitable burnt zone, or within the tropics, and nearest to the line itself. For hereof experience hath informed reason, and time hath made those things apparent which were hidden, and could not by any contemplation be discovered. Indeed it hath so pleased God to provide for all living creatures, wherewith he hath filled the world, that such inconveniences which we contemplate afar off, are found by trial and the witness of men's travels to be so qualified, as there is no portion of the earth made in vain, or as a fruitless lump to fashion out the rest. For God himself, saith Isaiah, that formed the earth and made it; he that prepared it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited. Now we find that these hottest regions of the world seated under the equinoctial line, or near it, are so refreshed with a daily gale of easterly wind, (which the Spaniards call the brize,) that doth evermore blow strongest in the heat of the day, as the downright beams of the sun cannot so much master it, that there is any inconvenience or distemperate heat found thereby. Secondly, the nights are so cold, fresh, and equal, by reason of the entire interposition of the earth, as (for those places which myself have seen, near the line and under it) I know no other part of the world of better, or equal temper; only there are some tracts, which by accident of high mountains are barred from this air and fresh wind, and some few sandy parts without trees, which are not therefore so well inhabited as the rest; and such difference of soils we find also in all other parts of the world. But (for the greatest part) those regions have so many goodly rivers, fountains, and little brooks, abundance of high cedars, and other stately trees casting shade, so many sorts of delicate fruits, ever bearing, and at all times beautified with blossom and fruit, both green and ripe, as it may of all other parts be best compared to the paradise of Eden: the boughs and branches are never unclothed and left naked; their sap creepeth not under ground into the root, fearing the injury of the frost; neither doth Pomona at any times despise her withered husband Vertumnus, in his winterquarters and old age. Therefore are these countries called terræ vitiosæ, "vicious countries:" for nature being liberal to all without labour, necessity imposing no industry or travel, idleness bringeth forth no other fruits than vain • Isai. xlv. 18. thoughts and licentious pleasures. So that to conclude this part, Tertullian and those of his opinion were not deceived in the nature of the place: but opinion, and followed a worse. Aquinas, who misliked this the schoolmen were gross in this particular. SECT. IX. Of the change of the names of places: and that besides that Eden in Calesyria, there is a country in Babylon, once of this name, as is proved out of Isaiah xxxvii. and Ezek. xxvii. THESE opinions answered, and the region of Eden not found in any of those imaginary worlds, nor under torrida zona; it followeth that now we discover and find out the seat thereof, for in it was paradise by God planted. The difficulty of which search resteth chiefly in this, that as all nations have often changed names with their masters; so are most of these places, by Moses remembered, forgotten by those names of all historians and geographers, as well ancient as modern. Besides, we find that the Assyrians, Babylonians, Medes, and Persians (Cyrus only and few others excepted) sought to extinguish the Hebrews. The Grecians hated both their nation and their religion; and the Romans despised once to remember them in any of their stories. And as those three monarchies succeeded each other, so did they transform the names of all those principal places and cities in the east: and after them, the Turk hath sought (what he could) to extinguish in all things the ancient memory of those people, which he hath subjected and enthralled. Now besides those notable marks, Euphrates and Tigris, the better to find the way which leadeth to the country of Eden, we are to take for guides these two considerations, to wit, that it lay eastward from Canaan and Judea; and that it was of all others the most beautiful and fertile. First then in respect of situation, the next country to Judea eastward was Arabia Petræa; but in this region was Moses himself when he wrote: and the next unto it eastward also was Arabia the Desert, both which, in respect of the infertility, could not be Eden, neither have any of the Arabians any such rivers, as are expressed to run out of it: so as it followeth of necessity, that Eden must be eastward, and beyond both Arabia Petræa and Deserta. But because Eden is by Moses named by itself, and by the fertility and the rivers only described, we must seek it in other scriptures, and where it is by the additions of the neighbour nations better described. In the prophet Isaiah I find it coupled and accompanied with other adjacent countries, in these words spoken in the person of Senacherib by Rabsakeh. PHave the gods of the nations delivered them which my fathers have destroyed, as Gosan, and Haran, and Reseph, and the children of Eden, which were at Telassar? and in Ezekiel, where he prophesieth against the Tyrians: 9 They of Haran, and Canneh, and Eden, the merchants of Sheba, Ashur, and Chilmad, were thy merchants, &c. r But to avoid confusion, we must understand that there were two Edens, one of which the prophet Amos remembereth, where he divideth Syria into three provinces, whereof the first he maketh Syria Damascene, or Decapolitan: the second part is that valley called Avenis, otherwise Convallis, or the tract of Chamath, where Assyria is joined to Arabia the Desert, and where $Ptolemy placeth the city of Averia: and the third is known by the name of Domus Edenis, or Colesyria, otherwise Vallis Cava, or the hollow valley, because the mountains of Libanus and Antilibanus take all the length of it on both sides, and border it for coile in Greek is cava in Latin. But this is not that Eden which we seek: neither doth this province lie east from Canaan, but north, and so joineth unto it as it could not be unknown to the Hebrews. Yet, because there is a little city therein called paradise, the Jews believed this Colesyria to be the same which Moses describeth. For the same cause doth Hopkins in his Treatise of Paradise reprehend Beroaldus, in that he confoundeth this Eden with the other p Isa. xxxvii. 12. 9 Ezek. xxvii. 23. r Amos i. 1. • Strabo. Eden of paradise: though, to give Beroaldus his right, I conceive that he led the way to Hopkins, and to all other later writers, saving that he failed in distinguishing these two regions, both called Eden: and that he altogether misunderstood two of the four rivers, to wit, Pison and Gehon, as shall appear hereafter. Now, to find out Eden, which, as Moses teacheth us, lay eastward from the deserts, where he wrote after he had passed the Red sea; we must consider where those other countries are found, which the prophet Isaiah and Ezekiel joineth with it. For, saith Isaiah, Gosan, Haran, and Reseph, and the children of Eden which were at Telassar. Also Ezekiel joineth Haran with Eden, who, together with those of Sheba, Ashur and Chilmad, were the merchants that traded with the city of Tyre, which was then, saith Ezekiel, the mart of the people for many isles. And it hath ever been the custom, that the Persians conveyed their merchandise to Babylon, and to those cities upon Euphrates and Tigris, and from thence transported them into Syria, now Soria, and to the port of the Mediterranean sea: as in ancient times to the city of Tyre, afterwards to Tripoly, and now to Aleppo, from whence they embark them at the port of Alexandretta, in the bay of Issicus, now Laiazzo. Ezekiel, in the description of the magnificence of Tyre, and of the exceeding trade that it had with all the nations of the east, as the only mart-town of that part of the world, reciteth both the people with whom they had commerce, and also what commodities every country yielded: and having counted the several people and countries, he addeth the particular trade which each of them exercised. They were thy merchants, saith the prophet, in all sorts of things, in raiments of blue silk, and of broidered works, fine linen, coral, and pearl: and afterwards speaking of the merchants of Sheba and Raamah, and in what kinds they traded, he hath these words; The merchants of Sheba and Raamah were thy merchants, they occupied in thy fairs, with the chief of all spices, and with all u |