Page:Mathematical collections and translations, in two tomes - Salusbury (1661).djvu/363

 Starry Orb: "And indeed in my opinion this Authour very pertinently questioneth and asketh: To what end, and for whose sake are such huge machines made? Were they produced for the Earth, for an inconsiderable point? And why so remote? To the end they might seem so very small, and might have no influence at all upon the Earth? To what purpose is such a needlesse monstrous * immensity between them and Saturn? All those assertions fall to the ground that are not upheld by probable reasons."

I conceive by the questions which this person asketh, that one may collect, that in case the Heavens, the Stars, and the quantity of their distances and magnitudes which he hath hitherto held, be let alone, (although he never certainly fancied to himself any conceivable magnitude thereof) he perfectly discerns and comprehends the benefits that flow from thence to the Earth, which is no longer an inconsiderable thing; nor are they any longer so remote as to appeare so very small, but big enough to be able to operate on the Earth; and that the distance between them and Saturn is very well proportioned, and that he, for all these things, hath very probable reasons; of which I would gladly have heard some one: but being that in these few words he confounds and contradicts himself, it maketh me think that he is very poor and ill furnished with those probable reasons, and that those which he calls reasons, are rather fallacies, or dreams of an over-weening fancy. For I ask of him, whether these Celestial bodies truly operate on the Earth, and whether for the working of those effects they were produced of such and such magnitudes, and disposed at such and such distances, or else whether they have nothing at all to do with Terrene mattets. If they have nothing to do with the Earth; it is a great folly for us that are Earth-born, to offer to make our selves arbitrators of their magnitudes, and regulators of their local dispositions, seeing that we are altogether ignorant of their whole businesse and concerns; but if he shall say that they do operate, and that they are directed to this end, he doth affirm the same thing which a little before he denied, and praiseth that which even now he condemned, in that he said, that the Celestial bodies situate so far remote as that they appear very small, cannot have any influence at all upon the Earth. But, good Sir, in the Starry Sphere pre-established at its present distance, and which you did acknowledg to be in your judgment, well proportioned to have an influence upon these Terrene bodies, many stars appear very small, and an hundred times as many more are wholly invisible unto us (which is an appearing yet lesse than very small) therefore it is necessary that (contradicting your self) you do