Page:The Philosophy of Earthquakes, Natural and Religious.djvu/51

 text, because he was wroth. In imitation of the sacred writers, the heathen poets, both greek and latin, express the anger of their Jupiter by an earthquake:

The moving meteors in the free air, lightning, coruscations, fire-balls, tempests, thunders, or the dreaded comets, tho' frightful enough; yet people that do not think to any purpose, hope, as they are at a distance, to escape their effects. But when the terror comes home to us, to our feet; when the earth moves on which we stand; what heart is not moved? When our houses shake over our ears, the greatest courage is shaken.

It is true, an earthquake causes an universal dread among all sorts of people; even the philosopher immersed in speculation of second causes, quakes; as well as the pious, whose fear proceeds from solid piety: a due sense of the anger of the almighty Being.

We saw how the late earthquakes affrighted every one; but, as to the generality, it was but for a moment. When they found themselves safe, and alive; thoughtless they ran to their business, or their diversion: and this not only the first, but the second time. And I am