So also says a more ancient philosopher than Shakspeare:—

The modern philosophers have been fertile in their theories; some consider the shock as produced by central fires, some by subterraneous waters breaking into the hollow places in the earth; some by the fortuitous concurrence of discordant mineral substances; some by electrical actions in the bowels of the earth; some think the shock is produced by a combination of these and such like causes. Probably a more satisfactory view of the subject may be attained by the advance of geological science. Gibbon thinks there is no science which can fathom the cause, and exhorts the philosophers to the exercise of modesty, although he gives intimations in favour of some of the causes which have been mentioned. It is now generally considered that the crust of the earth has not yet been entirely cooled and settled, and that the earth itself is still in a forming state, but that the violent phenomena are gradually diminishing. In New England, however, the agitations have not been violent, and it is not known that any lives have been destroyed by them, or that they have occasioned any material damage. The agitations and outbreaks of the passions of men in riots and insurrections, are far more to be feared than the throes and upheavings of “the old beldame earth.”

Forasmuch as I have had special occasion several times in this history to mention divers earthquakes that have been in New England, they being great and terrible works of God, and are usually ominous to some strokes and visitations of his hand unto places and people where they are; and sometimes the Lord in the very acting of his power in them, hath declared his severity to the children of men, to their great overthrow and confusion; I thought it necessary, before I pass on, a little to point at some few particulars, to work and induce us to a profitable remembrance of them; it being very considerable that is said by a useful author, in taking notice of the wisdom of God, in preparing the earth to be a fit habitation for man to dwell in, addeth withal, that as if man were not always worthy to tread upon so solid a foundation, we see it ofttimes quake and shake, and rock and rend itself, as if it showed that he which made it, threatened by this trembling the impiety of the world, and the ruin of those that dwell on the earth.

In order unto that which I have nominated in this behalf and more principally intend, let us take notice, that writers have rendered the cause of earthquakes to be, that when it happeneth that air and windy spirits and exhalations are shut up in the caverns of the earth, or have such passage as is too narrow for them, they then striving to break their prisons, shake the earth, and make it tremble. They speak likewise of the several kinds of them: As:—

First, When the whole force of the wind driveth to one place, there being no contrary motion to let or hinder it; many hills and buildings have been rushed down by this kind of earthquake, especially when the wind causing it was strong; for if it be a feeble wind, it only looseneth or unfasteneth foundations, if less feeble, then, without further harm, the earth only shakes, like one sick of an ague.

Secondly, The second is a swelling of the earth; the which, when the wind is broken out of its prison, the earth returns to its place again.

Thirdly, A third kind is, a gaping, rending or cleaving of the earth one part from another, so that sometimes whole towns, cities, rocks, hills, rivers, and some parts of the sea have been swallowed up, and never seen more.

Fourthly, A fourth kind is, shaking, that causeth sinking, and is far different from the former; for now the earth splitteth not, but sinketh; this being in such places, where, though the surface of the ground be solid, yet it hath but a salt foundation, which being moistened by water driven through it by the force of the shaking exhalation, is turned into water also.⁴

Fifthly, A fifth kind of earthquake is contrary to the former; for, as before the ground sinks down, so now it is cast up, like as in the second kind already mentioned, only this is the difference, that now it returneth