Page:Mathematical collections and translations, in two tomes - Salusbury (1661).djvu/79

 smalnesse of the body of this, in comparision to the magnitude of the other, it cannot be denied but that the will and as it were valour of this, is very great. Thus much for their congruities or resemblances. It should next follow that we discourse touching their disparity; but because Simplicius will favour us with his objections against the former, its necessary that we hear and examine them, before we proceed any farther.

And the rather, because it is to be supposed that Simplicius will not any wayes oppose the disparities, and incongruities betwixt the Earth and Moon, since that he accounts their substances extremely different.

Amongst the resemblances by you recited, in the parallel you make betwixt the Earth and Moon, I find that I can admit none confidently save onely the first, and two others; I grant the first, namely, the spherical figure; howbeit, even in this there is some kind of difference, for that I hold that of the Moon to be very smooth and even, as a looking-glasse, whereas, we find and feel this of the Earth to be extraordinary montuous and rugged; but this belonging to the inequality of superficies, it shall be anon considered, in another of those Resemblances by you alledged; I shall therefore reserve what I have to say thereof, till I come to the consideration of that. Of what you affirm next, that the Moon seemeth, as you say in your second Resemblance, opacous and obscure in its self, like the Earth; I admit not any more than the first attribute of opacity, of which the Eclipses of the Sun assure me. For were the Moon transparent, the air in the total obscuration of the Sun, would not become so duskish, as at such a time it is, but by means of the transparency of the body of the Moon, a refracted light would passe through it, as we see it doth through the thickest clouds. But as to the obscurity, I believe not that the Moon is wholly deprived of light, as the Earth; nay, that clarity which is seen in the remainder ot its Discus, over and the above the small crescent enlightened by the Sun, I repute to be its proper and natural light, and not a reflection of the Earth, which I esteem unable, by reason of its asperity (cragginesse) and obscurity, to reflect the raies of the Sun. In the third Parallel I assent unto you in one part, and dissent in another: I agree in judging the body of the Moon to be most solid and hard, like the Earth, yea much more; for if from Aristotle we receive that the Heavens are impenetrable, and the Stars the most dense parts of Heaven, it must necessarily follow, that they are most solid and most impenetrable.

What excellent matter would the Heavens afford us for to make Pallaces of, if we could procure a substance so hard and so transparent?