Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 3.1 Thomas Burnet
(1635-1715) (from the fifth
edition of his Sacred Theory of
the Earth (1722), in Davies,
The Earth in Decay, (1969),
Plate 1).
that this had taken place over a very short timescale. God created the
Earth and the organisms living on and in it, and so it seemed to these
commentators that the wonders of his creation deserved to be exam-
ined closely and revealed to them. By the late 1600s several accounts
of the world had appeared in print in England and in Europe which
attempted to explain the nature of the Earth and its surface features
with reference to the biblical readings. Those by Thomas Burnet
(1635-1715) (Figure
3.1
), William Whiston (1667-1752) and John
Woodward (1665-1728) were the most widely known, with Burnet's
ideas being particularly influential in some quarters and generating
considerable comment and variants on the theory. On the other hand
there were many in continental Europe who had serious doubts about
these biblical-based 'sacred theories of the Earth' and argued that it
was much older than these theories or the Bible allowed.
