The First Proposition, by way of Preface.

That the strangeness of this opinion is no sufficient reason why it should be rejected, because other certain truths have been formerly esteemed ridiculous, and great absurdities entertained by common consent.

There is an earnestness and hungering after novelty which still adheres to all our natures, and it is part of that primitive image—that wide extent and infinite capacity—at first created in the heart of man. For this, since its depravation in Adam,