showing the
size of our antediluvian ancestors, giving the height of Adam as 123
feet 9 inches and that of Eve as 118 feet 9 inches and 9 lines.(156)

(156) See Cuvier, Recherches sur les Ossements fossiles, fourth edition,
vol. ii, p. 56; also Geoffrey St.-Hilaire, cited by Berger de Xivery,
Traditions Teratologiques, p. 190.

But the most brilliant service rendered to the theological theory came
from another quarter for, in 1726, Scheuchzer, having discovered a large
fossil lizard, exhibited it to the world as the "human witness of the
Deluge":(157) this great discovery was hailed everywhere with joy,
for it seemed to prove not only that human beings were drowned at the
Deluge, but that "there were giants in those days." Cheered by the
applause thus gained, he determined to make the theological position
impregnable. Mixing together various texts of Scripture with notions
derived from the philosophy of Descartes and the speculations of
Whiston, he developed the theory that "the fountains of the great deep"
were broken up by the direct physical action of the hand of God, which,
being literally applied to the axis of the earth, suddenly stopped the
earth's rotation, broke up "the fountains of the great deep," spilled
the water therein contained, and produced the Deluge. But his service
to sacred science did not end here, for he prepared an edition of the
Bible, in which magnificent engravings in great number illustrated his
view and enforced it upon all readers. Of these engravings no less than
thirty-four were devoted to the Deluge alone.(158)

(157) Homo diluvii testis.

(158) See Zoeckler, vol. ii, p. 172; also Scheuchzer, Physica Sacra,
Augustae Vindel et Ulmae, 1732. For the ancient belief regarding
giants, see Leopoldi, Saggio. For accounts of the views of Mazaurier and
Scheuchzer, see Cuvier; also Buchner, Man in Past, Present, and Future,
English translation, pp. 235, 236. For Increase Mather's views, see
Philosophical Transactions, vol. xxiv, p. 85. As to similar fossils
sent from New York to the Royal Society as remains of giants, see Weld,
History of the Royal Society, vol. i, p. 421. For Father Torrubia and
his Gigantologia Espanola, see D'Archiac, Introduction a l'Etude de
la Paleontologie Stratigraphique, Paris, 1864, p. 201. For admirable
summaries, see Lyell, Principles of Geology, London, 1867; D'Archiac,
Geologie et Paleontologie, Paris, 1866; Pictet, Traite de Paleontologie,