Page:A Collection of Several Philosophical Writings of Dr. Henry More.djvu/84

42 Winter, though those vicissitudes would be, yet it could not but cause very raging Diseases to have the Sun stay so long describing his little Circles near the Poles, and lying so hot upon the Inhabitants that had been in so long extremity of Darkness and Cold before.

4. It remains therefore that the postureof the Axis of the Earth be Inclining, not Co-incident, nor Perpendicular to the forenamed Plane, And verily it is not onely Inclining, but in so fit proportion, that there can be no fitter excogitated to make it to the utmost capacity as well pleasant as habitable. For though the course of the Sun be curbed within the compass of the Tropicks, and so makes those parts very hot; yet the constant gales of wind from the East (to say nothing of the nature and fit length of their nights) make the Torrid Zone not onely habitable, but pleasant.

Now this best posture which our reason would make choice of, we see really establish'd in Nature; and therefore, if we be not perverse and wilfull, we are to infer, that it was establish'd by a Principle that hath in it Knowledge and Counsel, not from a blind fortuitous jumbling of the parts of the Matter one against another, especially having found before in our selves a Knowing Spiritual Substance, that is also able to move and alter the Matter. Wherefore, I say, we should more naturally conclude, That there is some such Universal Knowing Principle, that hath power to move & direct the Matter of the Universe, then to fancy that a confused justling of the Parts thereof should contrive themselves into such a condition, as if they had in them Reason and Counsel, and could direct themselves. But this directing Principle, what could it be but God?

5. But to speak the same thing more briefly, and yet more intelligibly, to those that are onely acquainted with the Ptolemaical Hypothesis: I say, that being it might have hapned, that the annual course or the Sun should have been through the Poles of the world, and that the Axis of the Heavens might have been very troublesomely and disorderly moveable, from whence all those inconveniencies would arise which I have before mentioned, and yet they are not, but are so ordered as our own reason must approve of as best; it is natural for a man to conceive, that they are really ordered by a Principle of Reason and Counsel, that is, that they are made by an All-wise and All-powerful God.

6. I will onely adde one or two observables more, concerning the Axis of the Earth and the course of the Moon, and so I will pass to other things.

It cannot but be acknowledged, that if the Axis of the Earth were perpendicular to the Plane of the Sun's Ecliptick, that her Motion would be more easie & natural; and yet, for the conveniencies afore-mentioned, we see it is made to stand in an inclining posture: So in all likelihood it would be more easie and natural for that Hand-maid of the Earth, the Moon, to finish her monethly courses in the Æquinoctial Line; but we see, like the Sun, she crosses it, and expatiates some degrees further then the Sun himself, that her exalted light might be more comfortable to those that live very much North, in their long nights.

Wherefore I conclude. That though it were possible that the