Page:The Discovery of a World in the Moone, 1638.djvu/118

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of a new World.
101

The more common and generall opinion[1] is, that the spots are the thinner parts of the Moone, which are lesse able to reflect the beames that they receive from the Sunne, and this is most agreeable to reason, for if the starres are therefore brightest, because they are thicker and more solid then their orbes, then it will follow, that those parts of the Moone which have lesse light, have also lesse thickenesse. It was the providence of nature (say some) that so contrived that planet to have these spots within it, for since that is neerest to those lower bodies which are so full of deformity, 'tis requisite that it should in some measure agree with them, and as in this inferiour world the higher bodies are the most compleat, so also in the heavens perfection is ascended unto by degrees, and the Moone being the lowest, must be the least pure, and therefore Philo the Jew[2] interpre-

  1. Albert. mag. de coævis. Q. 4. Art. 21. Colleg. Con.
  2. De Somniis.
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ting