University of Virginia Library

2. CHAP. II.

Having thus briefly introduced my reader to the
world, and given him some idea of its form and situation,
he will naturally be curious to know from
whence it came, and how it was created. And indeed
these are points absolutely essential to be
cleared up, in as much as if this world had not
been formed, it is more than probable, nay I may
venture to assume it as a maxim or postulate at
least, that this renowned island on which is situated
the city of New York, would never have had an
existence. The regular course of my history therefore,
requires that I should proceed to notice the
cosmogony or formation of this our globe.

And now I give my readers fair warning, that I
am about to plunge for a chapter or two, into as
complete a labyrinth as ever historian was perplexed
withal; therefore I advise them to take fast
hold of my skirts, and keep close at my heels, venturing
neither to the right hand nor to the left,
least they get bemired in a slough of unintelligible
learning, or have their brains knocked out, by some
of those hard Greek names which will be flying

about in all directions. But should any of them
be too indolent or chicken-hearted to accompany
me in this perilous undertaking, they had better
take a short cut round, and wait for me at the beginning
of some smoother chapter.

Of the creation of the world, we have a thousand
contradictory accounts; and though a very
satisfactory one is furnished us by divine revelation,
yet every philosopher feels himself in honour bound,
to furnish us with a better. As an impartial historian,
I consider it my duty to notice their several
theories, by which mankind have been so exceedingly
edified and instructed.

Thus it was the opinion of certain ancient sages,
that the earth and the whole system of the universe,
was the deity himself;[8] a doctrine most strenuously
maintained by Zenophanes and the whole tribe
of Eleatics, as also by Strato and the sect of peripatetic
or vagabondizing philosophers. Pythagoras
likewise inculcated the famous numerical system of
the monad, dyad and triad, and by means of his
sacred quaternary elucidated the formation of the
world, the arcana of nature and the principles both
of music and morals.[9] Other sages adhered to
the mathematical system of squares and triangles;

the cube, the pyramid and the sphere; the tetrahedron,
the octahedron, the icosahedron and the dodecahedron.
[10] While others advocated the great
elementary theory, which refers the construction of
our globe and all that it contains, to the combinations
of four material elements, air, earth, fire and
water; with the assistance of a fifth, an immaterial
and vivifying principle; by which I presume
the worthy theorist meant to allude to that vivifying
spirit contained in gin, brandy, and other potent liquors,
and which has such miraculous effects, not
only on the ordinary operations of nature, but likewise
on the creative brains of certain philosophers.

Nor must I omit to mention the great atomic
system taught by old Moschus before the siege of
Troy; revived by Democritus of laughing memory;
improved by Epicurus that king of good fellows,
and modernised by the fanciful Descartes. But I
decline enquiring, whether the atoms, of which the
earth is said to be composed, are eternal or recent;
whether they are animate or inanimate; whether,
agreeably to the opinion of the Atheists, they were
fortuitously aggregated, or as the Theists maintain,
were arranged by a supreme intelligence.[11] Whether
in fact the earth is an insensate clod, or whe

ther it is animated by a soul;[12] which opinion was
strenuously maintained by a host of philosophers,
at the head of whom stands the great Plato, that
temperate sage, who threw the cold water of philosophy
on the form of sexual intercourse, and inculcated
the doctrine of Platonic affection, or the
art of making love without making children.—An
exquisitely refined intercourse, but much better
adapted to the ideal inhabitants of his imaginary
island of Atlantis, than to the sturdy race, composed
of rebellious flesh and blood, who populate the little
matter of fact island which we inhabit.

Besides these systems, we have moreover the
poetical theogeny of old Hesiod, who generated the
whole Universe in the regular mode of procreation,
and the plausible opinion of others, that the earth
was hatched from the great egg of night, which
floated in chaos, and was cracked by the horns of
the celestial bull. To illustrate this last doctrine,
Bishop Burnet in his Theory of the Earth,[13] has
favoured us with an accurate drawing and description,
both of the form and texture of this mundane
egg; which is found to bear a miraculous resemblance
to that of a goose! Such of my readers as take

a proper interest in the origin of this our planet, will
be pleased to learn, that the most profound sages
of antiquity, among the Egyptians, Chaldeans,
Persians, Greeks and Latins, have alternately assisted
at the hatching of this strange bird, and that
their cacklings have been caught, and continued in
different tones and inflections, from philosopher to
philosopher, unto the present day.

But while briefly noticing long celebrated systems
of ancient sages, let me not pass over with
neglect, those of other philosophers; which though
less universal and renowned, have equal claims to
attention, and equal chance for correctness. Thus
it is recorded by the Brahmins, in the pages of their
inspired Shastah, that the angel Bistnoo transforming
himself into a great boar, plunged into the
watery abyss, and brought up the earth on his tusks.
Then issued from him a mighty tortoise, and a
mighty snake; and Bistnoo placed the snake erect
upon the back of the tortoise, and he placed the
earth upon the head of the snake.[14]

The negro philosophers of Congo affirm, that
the world was made by the hands of angels, excepting
their own country, which the Supreme Being
constructed himself, that it might be supremely
excellent. And he took great pains with the inhabitants,
and made them very black, and beautiful:

and when he had finished the first man, he was well
pleased with him, and smoothed him over the face,
and hence his nose and the nose of all his descendants
became flat.

The Mohawk Philosophers tell us that a pregnant
woman fell down from heaven, and that a tortoise
took her upon its back, because every place
was covered with water; and that the woman sitting
upon the tortoise paddled with her hands in
the water, and raked up the earth, whence it finally
happened that the earth became higher than the
water.[15]

Beside these and many other equally sage opinions,
we have likewise the profound conjectures of
Aboul-Hassan-Aly,[16] son of Al Khan, son of Aly,
son of Abderrahman, son of Abdallah, son of Masoud-el-Hadheli,
who is commonly called Masoudi,
and surnamed Cothbeddin, but who takes the humble
title of Laheb-ar-rasoul, which means the companion
of the ambassador of God. He has written
an universal history entitled “Mouroudge-ed-dhahrab,
or the golden meadows and the mines of precious
stones.” In this valuable work he has related
the history of the world, from the creation down to
the moment of writing; which was, under the Khaliphat
of Mothi Billah, in the month Dgioumadi-elaoual

of the 336th year of the Hegira or flight of
the Prophet. He informs us that the earth is a
huge bird, Mecca and Medina constituting the head,
Persia and India the right wing, the land of Gog
the left wing, and Africa the tail. He informs us
moreover, than an earth has existed before the present,
(which he considers as a mere chicken of 7000
years) that it has undergone divers deluges, and
that, according to the opinion of some well informed
Brahmins of his acquaintance, it will be renovated
every seventy thousandth hazarouam; each
hazarouam consisting of 12,000 years.

But I forbear to quote a host more of these ancient
and outlandish philosophers, whose deplorable
ignorance, in despite of all their erudition, compelled
them to write in languages which but few of my
readers can understand; and I shall proceed briefly
to notice a few more intelligible and fashionable
theories of their modern successors.

And first I shall mention the great Buffon, who
conjectures that this globe was originally a globe of
liquid fire, scintillated from the body of the sun,
by the percussion of a comet, as a spark is generated
by the collision of flint and steel. That at first
it was surrounded by gross vapours, which cooling
and condensing in process of time, constituted, according
to their densities, earth, water and air;
which gradually arranged themselves, according to

their respective gravities, round the burning or vitrified
mass, that formed their centre, &c.

Hutton, on the contrary, supposes that the waters
at first were universally paramount; and he terrifies
himself with the idea that the earth must be
eventually washed away, by the force of rain, rivers
and mountain torrents, untill it is confounded with
the ocean, or in other words, absolutely dissolves
into itself.—Sublime idea! far surpassing that of the
tender-hearted damsel of antiquity who wept herself
into a fountain; or the good dame of Narbonne
in France, who for a volubility of tongue unusual
in her sex, was doomed to peel five hundred thousand
and thirty-nine ropes of onions, and actually
ran out at her eyes, before half the hideous task
was accomplished.

Whiston, the same ingenious philosopher who
rivalled Ditton in his researches after the longitude,
(for which the mischief-loving Swift discharged on
their heads a stanza as fragrant as an Edinburgh
nosegay) has distinguished himself by a very admirable
theory respecting the earth. He conjectures
that it was originally a chaotic comet, which
being selected for the abode of man, was removed
from its excentric orbit, and whirled round the sun
in its present regular motion; by which change of
direction, order succeeded to confusion in the arrangement
of its component parts. The philosopher
adds, that the deluge was produced by an un

courteous salute from the watery tail of another
comet; doubtless through sheer envy of its improved
condition; thus furnishing a melancholy proof that
jealousy may prevail, even among the heavenly
bodies, and discord interrupt that celestial harmony
of the spheres, so melodiously sung by the poets.

But I pass over a variety of excellent theories,
among which are those of Burnet, and Woodward,
and Whitehurst; regretting extremely that my time
will not suffer me to give them the notice they deserve—And
shall conclude with that of the renowed
Dr. Darwin, which I have reserved to the
last for the sake of going off with a report. This
learned Theban, who is as much distinguished for
rhyme as reason, and for good natured credulity as
serious research, and who has recommended himself
wonderfully to the good graces of the ladies, by
letting them into all the gallantries, amours, debaucheries,
and other topics of scandal of the court
of Flora; has fallen upon a theory worthy of his
combustible imagination. According to his opinion,
the huge mass of chaos took a sudden occasion to
explode, like a barrel of gunpowder, and in that act
exploded the sun—which in its flight by a similar explosion
expelled the earth—which in like guise exploded
the moon—and thus by a concatenation of
explosions, the whole solar system was produced,
and set most systematically in motion![17]

By the great variety of theories here alluded to,
every one of which, if thoroughly examined, will
be found surprisingly consistent in all its parts; my
unlearned readers will perhaps be led to conclude,
that the creation of a world is not so difficult a task
as they at first imagined. I have shewn at least a
score of ingenious methods in which a world could
be constructed; and I have no doubt, that had any
of the Philo's above quoted, the use of a good
manageable comet, and the philosophical ware-house
chaos at his command, he would engage, by the aid
of philosophy to manufacture a planet as good, or
if you would take his word for it, better than this
we inhabit.

And here I cannot help noticing the kindness
of Providence, in creating comets for the great relief
of bewildered philosophers. By their assistance
more sudden evolutions and transitions are affected
in the system of nature, than are wrought in a pantomimic
exhibition, by the wonder-working sword
of Harlequin. Should one of our modern sages,
in his theoretical flights among the stars, ever find
himself lost in the clouds, and in danger of tumbling
into the abyss of nonsense and absurdity, he has but
to seize a comet by the beard, mount astride of its
tail, and away he gallops in triumph, like an enchanter
on his hyppogriff, or a Connecticut witch on
her broomstick, “to sweep the cobwebs out of the
sky.”

It is an old and vulgar saying, about a “beggar
on horse back,” which I would not for the world
have applied to our most reverend philosophers;
but I must confess, that some of them, when they
are mounted on one of these fiery steeds, are as
wild in their curvettings as was Phæton of yore,
when he aspired to manage the chariot of Phœbus.
One drives his comet at full speed against the sun,
and knocks the world out of him with the mighty
concussion; another more moderate, makes his
comet a kind of beast of burden, carrying the sun
a regular supply of food and faggots—a third, of
more combustible disposition, threatens to throw
his comet, like a bombshell into the world, and
blow it up like a powder magazine; while a fourth,
with no great delicacy to this respectable planet,
and its inhabitants, insinuates that some day or
other, his comet—my modest pen blushes while I
write it—shall absolutely turn tail upon our world
and deluge it with water!—Surely as I have already
observed, comets were bountifully provided by
Providence for the benefit of philosophers, to assist
them in manufacturing theories.

When a man once doffs the straight waistcoat
of common sense, and trusts merely to his imagination,
it is astonishing how rapidly he gets forward.
Plodding souls, like myself, who jog along on the
two legs nature has given them, are sadly put to it
to clamber over the rocks and hills, to toil through

the mud and mire, and to remove the continual obstructions,
that abound in the path of science. But
your adventurous philosopher launches his theory
like a balloon, and having inflated it with the smoke
and vapours of his own heated imagination, mounts
it in triumph, and soars away to his congenial regions
in the moon. Every age has furnished its
quota of these adventurers in the realms of fancy,
who voyage among the clouds for a season and are
stared at and admired, until some envious rival assails
their air blown pageant, shatters its crazy
texture, lets out the smoke, and tumbles the adventurer
and his theory into the mud. Thus one
race of philosophers demolish the works of their
predecessors, and elevate more splendid fantasies in
their stead, which in their turn are demolished and
replaced by the air castles of a succeeding generation.
Such are the grave eccentricities of genius, and the
mighty soap bubbles, with which the grown up
children of science amuse themselves—while the
honest vulgar, stand gazing in stupid admiration,
and dignify these fantastic vagaries with the name
of wisdom!—surely old Socrates was right in his
opinion that philosophers are but a soberer sort of
madmen, busying themselves in things which are
totally incomprehensible, or which, if they could
be comprehended, would be found not worth the
trouble of discovery.

And now, having adduced several of the most
important theories that occur to my recollection,
I leave my readers at full liberty to choose among
them. They are all the serious speculations of
learned men—all differ essentially from each
other—and all have the same title to belief. For
my part, (as I hate an embarrassment of choice)
until the learned have come to an agreement among
themselves, I shall content myself with the account
handed us down by the good old Moses; in which
I do but follow the example of our ingenious neighbours
of Connecticut; who at their first settlement
proclaimed, that the colony should be governed by
the laws of God—until they had time to make better.

One thing however appears certain—from the
unanimous authority of the before quoted philosophers,
supported by the evidence of our own senses,
(which, though very apt to deceive us, may be
cautiously admitted as additional testimony) it appears
I say, and I make the assertion deliberately,
without fear of contradiction, that this globe really
was created, and that it is composed of land and
water. It further appears that it is curiously divided
and parcelled out into continents and islands, among
which I boldly declare the renowned Island of
New York, will be found, by any one who seeks
for it in its proper place.

Thus it will be perceived, that like an experienced
historian I confine myself to such points as are
absolutely essential to my subject—building up my
work, after the manner of the able architect who
erected our theatre; beginning with the foundation,
then the body, then the roof, and at last perching
our snug little island like the little cupola on the
top. Having dropt upon this simile by chance I
shall make a moment's further use of it, to illustrate
the correctness of my plan. Had not the foundation,
the body, and the roof of the theatre first
been built, the cupola could not have had existence
as a cupola—it might have been a centry-box—or
a watchman's box—or it might have been placed in
the rear of the Manager's house and have formed—
a temple;—but it could never have been considered a
cupola. As therefore the building of the theatre
was necessary to the existence of the cupola, as a
cupola—so the formation of the globe and its internal
construction, were first necessary to the existence
of this island, as an island—and thus the necessity
and importance of this part of my history, which
in a manner is no part of my history, is logically
proved.