it [6] after
I have finished the present work. I shall now betake myself to the
history before me, after I have first mentioned what Moses says of the
creation of the world, which I find described in the sacred books after
the manner following.

BOOK I. Containing The Interval Of Three Thousand Eight Hundred And
Thirty-Three Years.

From The Creation To The Death Of Isaac.

CHAPTER 1. The Constitution Of The World And The Disposition Of The
Elements.

1. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. But when the
earth did not come into sight, but was covered with thick darkness, and
a wind moved upon its surface, God commanded that there should be light:
and when that was made, he considered the whole mass, and separated the
light and the darkness; and the name he gave to one was Night, and the
other he called Day: and he named the beginning of light, and the time
of rest, The Evening and The Morning, and this was indeed the first day.
But Moses said it was one day; the cause of which I am able to give even
now; but because I have promised to give such reasons for all things
in a treatise by itself, I shall put off its exposition till that time.
After this, on the second day, he placed the heaven over the whole
world, and separated it from the other parts, and he determined it
should stand by itself. He also placed a crystalline [firmament] round
it, and put it together in a manner agreeable to the earth, and fitted
it for giving moisture and rain, and for affording the advantage of
dews. On the third day he appointed the dry land to appear, with the sea
itself round about it; and on the very same day he made the plants and
the seeds to spring out of the earth. On the fourth day he adorned the
heaven with the sun, the moon, and the other stars, and appointed them
their motions and courses, that the vicissitudes of the seasons might
be clearly signified. And on the fifth day he produced the living
creatures, both those that swim, and those that fly; the former in
the sea, the latter in the air: he also sorted them as to society
and mixture, for procreation, and that their kinds might increase and
multiply. On the sixth day he created the four-footed beasts, and made
them male and female: on the same day he also formed man. Accordingly
Moses says, That in just six days the world, and all that is therein,
was made. And that the seventh day was a rest, and a release from the
labor of such operation