All this however is nothing to the purpose. The expression of Seneca is not applicable; for his proposed discovery is towards the north, whereas ours is to the westwards. The coasting of Africa, as said to have been performed by the ancients, is widely different from traversing the vast ocean, as was accomplished by Columbus, and by the Spaniards after his example. If any notice is due to ancient hints, that only is worthy of observation which we find in the twenty-eighth chapter of the book of Job, in which it seems predicted that God would keep this new world concealed from the knowledge of men, until it should please his inscrutable providence to bestow its dominion to the Spaniards. No attention is due to the opinions of those who would endeavour to establish the Ophir of the Scriptures in Peru, and who even allege that it was called Peru at the time when the holy text was penned. For, neither is that name of Peru so ancient, nor does it properly belong to that great country as its universal appellation. It has been a general practice among discoverers to apply names to new found ports and lands, just as occasion offered, or accident or caprice directed; and accordingly, the Spaniards who made the first discovery of that kingdom, applied to it the name of the river they first landed at, or that of the cacique who governed the district. Besides, the similarity of words is too trivial a circumstance on which to establish a foundation for a superstructure of such importance. The best informed and most judicious historians affirm, that Ophir was in the East Indies: For, if it had been in Peru, Solomons fleet must necessarily have run past the whole of the East Indies and China, and across the immense Pacific ocean, before it could reach the western shore of the new world; which is quite impossible. Nothing can be more certain than that the fleet of Solomon went down the Red Sea; and as the ancients were not acquainted with those arts of navigation which are now used, they could not launch out into the ocean to navigate so far from land; neither could those distant regions be attained to by a land journey. Besides, we are told that they carried from Ophir peacocks and ivory, articles that are not to be found in the new world. It is therefore believed that it was the island of Taprobana, from whence all those valuable commodities were carried to Jerusalem; and the ancients may have very justly called their discovery the new world, to express its vast extent, because it contained as much land as was before known, and also because its productions differed so much from those of our parts of the earth, or the old world. This explanation agrees with the expressions of Seneca and St Jerome.

The admiral Christopher Columbus had many reasons for being of opinion that there were new lands which might be discovered. Being a great cosmographer, and well skilled in navigation, he considered that the heavens were circular, moving round the earth, which in conjunction with the sea, constitute a globe of two elements, and that all the land that was then known could not comprise the whole earth, but that a great part must have still remained undiscovered. The measure of the circumference of the earth being 360 degrees, or 6300 leagues, allowing 17 leagues to the degree, must be all inhabited, since God hath not created it to lie waste. Although many have questioned whether there were land or water about the poles, still it seemed requisite that the earth should bear the same proportion to the water towards the antarctic pole, which it was known to have at the arctic. He concluded likewise that all the five zones of the earth were inhabited, of which opinion he was the more firmly persuaded after he had sailed into 75 degrees of north latitude. He also concluded that, as the Portuguese had sailed to the southwards, the same might be done to the westwards, where in all reason land ought to be found: And having collected all the tokens that had been observed by mariners, which made for his purpose, he became perfectly satisfied that there were many lands to the westwards of Cabo Verde and the Canaries, and that it was practicable to sail over the ocean for their discovery; because, since the world is round, all its parts must necessarily be so likewise. All the earth is so fixed that it can never fail; and the sea, though shut in by the land, preserves its rotundity, without ever falling away, being preserved in its position by attraction towards the centre of gravity. By the consideration of many natural reasons, and by perceiving that not above the third part of a great circle of the sphere was discovered, being the extent eastwards from Cabo Verde to the farthest then known land of India, he concluded that there remained much room for farther discoveries by sailing to the westwards, till they should come to meet with those lands then known, the ends whereof to the eastwards had not been yet explored. In this opinion he was much confirmed by his friend Martin de Bohemia101, a Portuguese and an able cosmographer, a native of the island of Fayal.

Many other circumstances concurred to encourage Columbus in the mighty enterprize of discovery towards the west, by discoursing with those who used to sail to the westwards, particularly to the islands of the Azores. In particular, Martin Vincente assured him, that, having been on one occasion 450 leagues to the westwards of Cape St Vincent, he took up a piece of wood which was very artificially wrought, and yet was supposed not to have been fashioned with tools of iron: And, because the wind had blown many days from the west, he inferred that this piece of wood must have drifted from some land in that direction. Peter Correa, who had married the sister of Columbuses wife, likewise assured him, that he had seen another piece of wood similarly wrought, which had been drifted by the west winds upon the island of Puerto Santo; and that canes also had been floated thither, of such a size that every joint could contain a gallon of liquor. Columbus had farther heard mention made of these canes by the king of Portugal, who had some of them, which he ordered to be shewn to the admiral, who concluded that they must have been drifted from India by the west wind, more especially as there are none such in Europe. He was the more confirmed in this opinion, as Ptolemy, in the 17th chapter of the first book of his cosmography, describes such canes as being found in India. He was likewise informed by some of the inhabitants of the Azores, that when the wind continued long and violent from the west and north-west, the sea used to throw pine trees on the coasts of the isles of Gracioso and Fayal, in which no trees of that sort grew. The sea once cast two dead bodies on the coast of Flores, having very broad faces, and quite different features from those of the Christians. Two canoes were seen at another time, having several articles in them, which might have been driven out to sea by the force of the wind while passing from one island to another, and thence to the Azores. Anthony Leme, who had married in Madeira, declared that he once run a considerable way to the westwards of that island in his caravel, and fancied that he saw three islands; and many of the inhabitants of Gomera, Hierro, and the Azores, affirmed that they every year saw islands to the westwards. These were considered by Columbus as the same with those mentioned by Pliny in his Natural History, where he says, "That the sea to the northwards cuts off some pieces of woods from the land; and the roots being very large, they drift on the water like floats, and looked at a distance like islands."

In the year 1484, an inhabitant of the island of Madeira asked permission from the king of Portugal to go upon the discovery of a country, which he declared he saw every year exactly in the same position, agreeable to what had been reported by the people of the Azores. On these accounts, the ancient sea-charts laid down certain islands in these seas, which they called Antilla, and placed them about 200 leagues west from the Canaries and Azores; which the Portuguese believed to be the island of the Seven Cities, the fame of which has occasioned many to commit great folly from covetousness, by spending much money to no purpose. The story is, that this island of the Seven Cities was peopled by those who fled from the persecution of the infidels, when Spain was conquered by the Moors, in the reign of king Roderick; when seven bishops embarked with a great number of people, and arrived in that island, where they burnt their ships to prevent any one from thinking to return, and each of the bishops built a separate city for his flock. It was reported, that in the days of Prince Henry of Portugal, one of his ships was driven by a storm upon that island, where the natives carried the sailors to church, to see whether they were Christians observing the Roman ceremonies; and, finding them to be so, desired them to remain till their lord should come; but, fearing they might burn their ship and detain them, the Portuguese returned well pleased into Portugal; expecting a considerable reward from the prince. He, however, reproved them for bringing so imperfect an account, and ordered them to return; which the master and sailors dared not attempt, but left the kingdom, and were never more heard of. It is added, that these sailors, while in the island of the Seven Cities, gathered some sand for their cookroom, which turned out to be partly gold. Some adventurers from Portugal, allured by this report, went out for the purpose of prosecuting this discovery, one of whom was James de Tiene, and the pilot was James Velasquez of Palos. This man affirmed to Columbus, at the monastery of St Maria de Rabida, that they took a departure from Fyal, and sailed 150 leagues to the south-west, and at their return discovered the island of Flores, following many birds flying in that direction, which they knew were not water-fowl. He next said, that they sailed so far to the north-west, that Cape Clare of Ireland bore east of them; where they found the west wind blowing hard, yet with a smooth sea, which they believed was occasioned by the nearness of some land sheltering the sea from the violence of the wind; but that they dared not to proceed on their voyage, it being then the month of August, and they feared the approach of winter. This is said to have happened forty years before Columbus discovered the West Indies.