St. Augustine, Of the citie of God vvith the learned comments of Io. Lod. Viues. Englished by I.H.

Whether there bee any inhabitants of the earth, called the Antipodes. CHAP. 9.

BVt whereas they fable of a (a) people that inhabite that land where the sunne riseth, when it setteth with vs, and goe with (b) their feete towards ours, it is incredible. They haue no authority for it, but onely (c) coniecture that such a thing may bee, because the earth hangeth within the orbes of heauen, and each (e) part of the world is aboue and below alike, and thence they ga∣ther that the other hemysphere cannot want inhabitants. Now they consider not that although that it bee globous as ours is, yet it may bee all couered with Sea: and if it bee bare, yet it followeth not, that it is inhabited, seeing that the Scripture (that prooueth all that it saith to be true, by the true euents that 〈◊〉〈◊〉 presageth) neuer maketh mention of any such thing. And it were too absurd to say, that men might sayle ouer that huge Ocean, and goe inhabite there: that the progenie of the first man might people that part also. But let vs goe and seeke amongst those seauentie two nations and their languages, whether •…•…ee can finde that Citty of GOD which remained a continuall pilgrim on 〈◊〉〈◊〉 vntill the deluge, and is shewed to perseuere amongst the sonnes of 〈◊〉〈◊〉 after their blessing, chiefly in Sem, Noahs eldest sonne, for Iaphets blessing 〈◊〉〈◊〉 to dwell in the tents of his brother.

L. VIVES.

PEople (a) that.] All Cosmographers diuide the heauen, and consequently the earth into fiue * 1.1 Zones, the vtmost whereof lying vnder the Poles, and farre from the Heauens motion and the Sunnes heate are insufferably cold: the mid-most, being in the most violent motion of Hea∣uen, and heate of the Sunne, is intolerably hot: the two being interposed betweene both ex∣treames, are habitable: one temperate Zone lying towards the North and the other towards the South: the inhabitants of both, are called Autichthones. Now Cleomedes bids vs diuide those two Zones into foure equall parts: those that dwell in the parts that lye in the same Zone, are called Periaeci, circumferentiall inhabitants, those that dwell in diuers, or in an vnequall dis∣tance from the Poles, and equall from the equinoctiall, are called Antoeci, or opposites: they that dwell in equall distances from both, are called Antipodes. The Periaeci, differ in their day and night, but not in seasons of the yeare; the Antoeci iust contrary: the Antipodes in both. It was an old opinion which Tully, Mela, and other chiefe men followed, that neuer * 1.2 man had any knowledge of the South. Tully puts the great ocean betweene it and vs, which no man euer passed: Macrobius discourseth at large herevpon. I do but glance at this for feare of clogging my reader. This was a great perswasion to Augustine to follow Lactantius, and deny the Antipodes, for the learned men saw well, that grant men no passage ouer that great sea vnto the temperate Southerne Clymate, (as Tully and other great authors vtterly denied them) and then they that dwell there could not possibly be of Adams stocke: so that he had rather deny them habitation there, then contend in argument against so many learned op∣posits: But it is most sure once, that Antipodes there are, and that we haue found away vnto them, not onely in old times, but euen by late sea maisters: for of old, diuers flying into the Persian gulfe for feare of Augustus, sayled by the coast of Ethiopia and the Atlantike sea vnto Hercules pillers. And in the prime of Carthages height, some sayled from thence through Hercules his straytes, into the red sea of Arabia, and then were not the Bayes of Per∣sia, India, the Easterne sea, Taproban, and the Iles thereabouts all found out by the power of Alexanders nauy? and those you shall find Antipodes to vs, if you marke the posture of the Globe diligently, for they haue the same eleuation of their South pole, and bee in the same distance from the occidentall point, that some of the countries in our climat haue, of our North poynt. (b) Their feete.] As Tully saith in Scipios dreame. (c) Coniecture.] For the temperature of the Southerne Zone is iust like to ours. (d) Each part.] The world is round, and Heauen is euery where a like aboue it.

Notes

• * 1.1

  The Anti∣podes.
• * 1.2

  Derep. li. 6.