A discourse of the terrestrial paradise aiming at a more probable discovery of the true situation of that happy place of our first parents habitation / by Marmaduke Carver ...

TO The most Reverend Father in God, GILBERT, Lord Arch-bishop of CANTER∣BURY, his Grace, Primate of all Eng∣land and Metropolitan; and one of His MAJESTIES most Ho∣nourable Privy Council.

MAY it please Your Grace to vouchsafe the Patrociny of Your great and worthy Name to this mean and un∣polished Discourse, framed many years agoe upon a private occasion, and for private satisfaction onely; but passing into the hands of divers eminently fa∣mous for their Piety, Learning, and Sta∣tion in this Church, was by them ad∣judged not unuseful to communicate to the Publick, as relating (though more remotely) to a Concern of the whole Ca∣tholick Church, (I adde, the Jewish Sy∣nagogue

also) in vindicating the truth of Moses's Description of the Terrestrial Paradise from the Blasphemies of Heathe∣nish Infidels, (Celsus, Porphyry, Julian the Apostate, &c.) and the more Heathenish Christians of these later times, the Anti∣scripturists, who springing (as the Spartae from the teeth of the Serpent, so these) from a prodigious mixture of Phari∣saism and Sadducism, epidemically raging in these last years, (under various disguises) have arrived at length to that height of superlative Insolence, as (among other their Blasphemies) to propound the History of Paradise to scorn and de∣rision, as a mere Utopia, or Fiction of a place that never was, to the manifest and designed undermining of the Authority and Veracity of the Holy Text: the con∣servation of which (next under his Sa∣cred Majesty, the great Defender of the Faith) being by the Divine Providence intrusted to Your Grace, (whom he hath

extraordinarily furnished with all ex∣cellent Gifts for the Government of so eminent a portion of his Catholick Church as this is of which he hath made Your Grace Overseer) I was encouraged, and soon after emboldned, (by the expe∣rience of Your generally-known and un∣parallel'd Clemency, Candor, and Con∣descension, not to have been expected by one so inconsiderable and a stranger) to advance to this presumption, to crave Your Grace's Patronage for what may herein be observed conducing to the Vin∣dication thereof: Not altogether doub∣ting (considering the Cause wherein I am ingaged) but that he who out of the mouths of Babes and Sucklings perfecteth strength to still the enemy and avenger, may so level this pebble taken out of the bag of a poor Shepherd, as, if not to pierce the brow, yet to stop the mouth of that Goliah that blasphemeth the Hoast of the living God. For the many mistakes, errours and imper∣fections

which every-where will betray the weakness of the Author, as I humbly crave Your Grace's and the Churche's pardon and pity, as being not onely easie for me to fall into, but (considering the great disadvantages I labour under) mo∣rally impossible for me to avoid; so for the blame of them I am content (after much reluctance to the publishing of them) to charge my self with it, being not unwilling to sacrifice my own credit to save (though but in this one particu∣lar) the Credit of the Holy Scriptures. Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Great Shepherd of the Sheep, and Arch-bishop of our Souls, long preserve Your Grace, to the great good of his Church; and, having served Your Generation by the will of God, vouchsafe You that Crown of Glory that fa∣deth not away, reserved at his appearing for all that faithfully serve him: Which is the daily Praier of

Your Grace's humbly and af∣fectionately devoted Servant, M. C.