The Description of a New World, Called the Blazing-World — John Shaqi
The Description of a New World, Called the Blazing-WorldNewcastle, Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of
Science
The Description of a New World, Called the Blazing-World
Newcastle, Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of
Science fiction; Utopias -- Fiction; Voyages, Imaginary -- Early works to 1800
is, said they, Spirits being immaterial, cannot properly make a World;
for a World belongs to material, not to immaterial Creatures. If this be
so, replied the Empress, then certainly there can be no world of Lives
and Forms without Matter? No, answered the Spirits; nor a world of
Matter without Lives and Forms; for Natural Lives and Forms cannot be
immaterial, no more then Matter can be immovable. And therefore natural
lives, forms and matter, are inseparable. Then the Empress asked,
Whether the first Man did feed on the best sorts of the Fruits of the
Earth, and the Beasts on the worst? The Spirits answered, That unless
the Beasts of the field were barred out of manured fields and gardens,
they would pick and chuse the best Fruits as well as Men; and you may
plainly observe it, said they, in Squirrels and Monkies, how they are
the best Chusers of Nuts and Apples; and how Birds do pick and feed in
the most delicious fruits, and Worms on the best roots, and most savoury
herbs; by which you may see, that those Creatures live and feed better
then men do, except you will say, that artificial Cookery is better and
more wholsome then the natural. Again, the Empress asked, Whether the
first Man gave Names to all the several sorts of Fishes in the Sea, and
fresh Waters? No, answered the Spirits, for he was an Earthly, and not a
Watery Creature; and therefore could not know the several sorts of
Fishes. Why, replied the Empress, he was no more an Airy Creature then
he was a Watery one, and yet he gave Names to the several sorts of Fowls
and Birds of the Air. Fowls, answered they, are partly Airy, and partly
Earthly Creatures, not onely because they resemble Beasts and Men in
their flesh, but because their rest and dwelling places are on Earth;
for they build their Nests, lay their Eggs, and hatch their Young, not
in the Air, but on the Earth. Then she asked, Whether the first Man did
give Names to all the various sorts of Creatures that live on the Earth?
Yes, answered they, to all those that were presented to him, or he had
knowledg of, that is, to all the prime sorts; but not to every
particular: for of Mankind, said they, there were but two at first; and
as they did encrease, so did their Names. But, said the Empress, who
gave the Names to the several sorts of Fish? The posterity of Mankind,
answered they. Then she enquired, Whether there were no more kinds of
Creatures now, then at the first Creation? They answered, That there
were no more nor fewer kinds of Creatures then there are now; but there
are, without question, more particular sorts of Creatures now, then
there were then. she asked again, Whether all those Creatures that were
in Paradise, were also in Noah's Ark? They answered, That the principal
kinds had been there, but not all the particulars. Then she would fain
know, how it came, that both Spirits and Men did fall from a blessed
into so miserable a state and condition as they are now in. The Spirits
answered, By disobedience.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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