by Solon from an old priest in Egypt. It cannot now be determined that there was any other foundation than the imagination for the belief that there existed another continent beyond the Pillars of Hercules, but certain it is that as the idea that the earth was spherical in form became more and more firmly fixed in the minds of men, the opinion rapidly gained ground that the Eastern continents were but comparatively a small portion of the land of the world.

The growth of this belief constitutes an interesting study. Both the shape and the size of the globe were unknown in ancient times. The earth was at first supposed to be a stationary plain, but at as early a date as the seventh century before Christ, Anaximander of Miletus, held that it was of cylindrical form.

Four centuries later, Eratosthenes, the learned librarian of Alexandria, the founder of geodesy, who first raised geography to the rank of a science, considered the globe an immovable sphere, and constructed maps on mathematical principles, using for the first time, parallels of longitude and latitude. Ptolemy, the Alexandrian astronomer, in the second century after Christ, re-asserted the spherical form of the earth, using the good reasons that were afterwards presented by Copernicus (1543). They had been proved true by the circumnavigation of the globe by Magalhaens, in 1519.

Eratosthenes calculated that the earth was 252,000 "stadia" in circumference, but the unit of his measure is lost; and Pliny estimated this at 31,500 Roman miles, or a little over 28,000 English miles. In the ninth century, during the caliphate of Almamoun, the Arabian astronomers fixed the circumference of

THE TERRESTRIAL PARADISE.

3

the earth at about 24,000 miles. Sir John Mandeville, the English traveller, placed it at 20,425 miles, "in roundness and circuit above and beneath," but Columbus thought it considerably less, and believed that the shores of Asia were proportionally nearer to the Azores. The ancient estimates were too great, and the later measures too small, but the mistakes of Columbus exerted an important influence upon history, for had he known the actual distance from Europe to Asia, measured westward, he would never have ventured to try to cross the vast distance in his insignificant vessels.

One of the most marked utterances of the ancients regarding the fabled land to the westward, is that of Seneca, a translation of which by archbishop Whately, is given at the head of this chapter. This philosopher, a native of Cordova in Spain, and teacher of the Emperor Nero, died in the year 65. His lines crystallize the thoughts that had long been current, perhaps giving them a more prophetic tone than any other than a philosopher and a poet would have used.

Readers of Dante are familiar with the belief that the Terrestrial Paradise existed on the other side of the globe, at the antipodes of Jerusalem - a point by the way, in the Pacific Ocean, near Tahiti. The desire to know where Paradise had been was one of the most firmly fixed in the mediæval mind. It was discussed in the fourth century with rapturous eloquence, by St. Basil and St. Ambrose, in their works on Paradise. They represented that there pure and eternal pleasures were furnished to every sense, the air was always balmy, the skies serene, and the inhabi tants enjoyed perpetual youth and bliss without a cere

by Solon from an old priest in Egypt. It cannot now be determined that there was any other foundation than the imagination for the belief that there existed another continent beyond the Pillars of Hercules, but certain it is that as the idea that the earth was spherical in form became more and more firmly fixed in the minds of men, the opinion rapidly gained ground that the Eastern continents were but comparatively a small portion of the land of the world.

The growth of this belief constitutes an interesting study. Both the shape and the size of the globe were unknown in ancient times. The earth was at first supposed to be a stationary plain, but at as early a date as the seventh century before Christ, Anaximander of Miletus, held that it was of cylindrical form.

Four centuries later, Eratosthenes, the learned librarian of Alexandria, the founder of geodesy, who first raised geography to the rank of a science, considered the globe an immovable sphere, and constructed maps on mathematical principles, using for the first time, parallels of longitude and latitude. Ptolemy, the Alexandrian astronomer, in the second century after Christ, re-asserted the spherical form of the earth, using the good reasons that were afterwards presented by Copernicus (1543). They had been proved true by the circumnavigation of the globe by Magalhaens, in 1519.

Eratosthenes calculated that the earth was 252,000 "stadia" in circumference, but the unit of his measure is lost; and Pliny estimated this at 31,500 Roman miles, or a little over 28,000 English miles. In the ninth century, during the caliphate of Almamoun, the Arabian astronomers fixed the circumference of

THE TERRESTRIAL PARADISE.

3

the earth at about 24,000 miles. Sir John Mandeville, the English traveller, placed it at 20,425 miles, "in roundness and circuit above and beneath," but Columbus thought it considerably less, and believed that the shores of Asia were proportionally nearer to the Azores. The ancient estimates were too great, and the later measures too small, but the mistakes of Columbus exerted an important influence upon history, for had he known the actual distance from Europe to Asia, measured westward, he would never have ventured to try to cross the vast distance in his insignificant vessels.

One of the most marked utterances of the ancients regarding the fabled land to the westward, is that of Seneca, a translation of which by archbishop Whately, is given at the head of this chapter. This philosopher, a native of Cordova in Spain, and teacher of the Emperor Nero, died in the year 65. His lines crystallize the thoughts that had long been current, perhaps giving them a more prophetic tone than any other than a philosopher and a poet would have used.

Readers of Dante are familiar with the belief that the Terrestrial Paradise existed on the other side of the globe, at the antipodes of Jerusalem a point by the way, in the Pacific Ocean, near Tahiti. The desire to know where Paradise had been was one of the most firmly fixed in the medieval mind. It was discussed in the fourth century with rapturous eloquence, by St. Basil and St. Ambrose, in their works on Paradise. They represented that there pure and eternal pleasures were furnished to every sense, the air was always balmy, the skies serene, and the inhabitants enjoyed perpetual youth and bliss without a care.

In the century before the discovery of our continent, Sir John Mandeville had come home from the East (1356) with particular descriptions of the region. about the Terrestrial Paradise. He described the noise, the roughness of the country, the fierceness of the beasts, and the other obstacles put in the way of adventurous travellers who would penetrate the abode of our first parents. The same traveller had told his wondering countrymen the marvellous tale of the wealth and grandeur of the Grand Khan, of the province of Cathay and the city of Cambalu.*

Marco Polo, a few years earlier had gone farther, and had described the magnificence of the island of Cipango (Japan), which he said lay fifteen hundred miles to the eastward of China.

Besides, the imagination had firmly fixed in men's minds a belief in the existence of lands of fabulous

wealth to the westward of Europe. On the maps of

the time of Columbus, we find the island of St. Brandan laid down at a distance of some six hundred miles beyond the Canary Islands, and the Island of

* Mandeville said that experience and understanding prove that a ship might sail "all round the earth, above and beneath," but that the globe is so great that it would not be apt to return to the place from which it set out, "unless by chance, or by the grace of God." He showed that when it is day in England, it is night on the other side of the earth, and assured "simple and unlearned men" that they need have no fear of falling off towards the heavens, thereby confuting the ridicule that Lactantius, in the fourth century, sought to cast upon the doctrine of antipodes, when he said: "Is there any one so foolish as to believe that there are antipodes with their feet opposite to ours; people who walk with their heels upward and their heads hanging down? That there is a part of the world in which all things are topsyturvy: where the trees grow with their branches downward, and where it rains, hails and snows upward?"