Plate XII.
Plate XIII.
Theophrastus[V] was of Opinion, that the Hemispheres, which, by many of the Antients were imagined to be solid, was joined together here; and that this was the soldering of the two Parts into one. [W]Diodorus thought it celestial Fire, of a dense and compact Nature, seen through the Clifts or Cracks of the parting Hemisphere: But as Manilius says,
Astonishment must sure their Senses reach,
To see the World's wide Wound, and Heav'n's eternal Breach.
[V] Macrobius, lib. i. cap. 15.
Or meets Heaven here! and this while Cloud appears
The Cement of the close-wedg'd Hemispheres!