Bis patet in præceps, tantem tendítque sub umbras,
Quantus ad æthereum cœli suspectus Olympum:
for that is a thing the proportion of Earth to Heaven cannot bear: but that wee should beleeve them there, indefinitely, where those men are, on whom God inflicted that Exemplary punnishment.
The Congregation Of Giants
Again, because those mighty men of the Earth, that lived in the time of Noah, before the floud, (which the Greeks called Heroes, and the Scripture Giants, and both say, were begotten, by copulation of the children of God, with the children of men,) were for their wicked life destroyed by the generall deluge; the place of the Damned, is therefore also sometimes marked out, by the company of those deceased Giants; as Proverbs 21.16. “The man that wandreth out of the way of understanding, shall remain in the congregation of the Giants,” and Job 26.5. “Behold the Giants groan under water, and they that dwell with them.” Here the place of the Damned, is under the water. And Isaiah 14.9. “Hell is troubled how to meet thee,” (that is, the King of Babylon) “and will displace the Giants for thee:” and here again the place of the Damned, (if the sense be literall,) is to be under water.
Lake Of Fire
Thirdly, because the Cities of Sodom, and Gomorrah, by the extraordinary wrath of God, were consumed for their wickednesse with Fire and Brimstone, and together with them the countrey about made a stinking bituminous Lake; the place of the Damned is sometimes