_Terra accepto solis lumine clarescit, tantummodo, non relucet._
"The earth is by the Sunne-beames made bright, but not able to
enlighten any thing so farre."
And his reason is, because this being of a thicke and grosse matter, the
light is terminated in its superficies, and cannot penetrate into the
substance; whereas the moone doth therefore seeme so bright to us,
because it receives the beames within it selfe. But the weaknesse of
this assertion, may bee easily manifest by a common experience, for
polished steele (whose opacity will not give any admittance to the
rayes) reflects a stronger heate then glasse, and so consequently a
greater light.
3. 'Tis the generall consent of Philosophers, that the reflection of the
Sunne-beames from the earth doth not reach much above halfe a mile high,
where they terminate the first region, so that to affirme they might
ascend to the moone, were to say, there were but one region of aier,
which contradicts the proved and received opinion.
Unto this it may be answered:
That it is indeed the common consent, that the reflexion of the
Sunne-beames reach onely to the second region, but yet some there are,
and those too Philosophers of good note, who thought otherwise. Thus
_Plotinus_ is cited by _Caelius_,[1]
_Si concipias te in sublimi quopiam mundi loco, unde oculis
subjiciatur terrae moles aquis circumfusa, & solis syderumque radiis
illustrata, non aliam profecto visam iri probabile est, quam qualis
modo visatur lunaris globi species._
"If you did conceive your selfe to bee in some such high place,
where you might discerne the whole Globe of the earth and water,
when it was enlightned by the Sunnes rayes, 'tis probable it would
then appeare to you in the same shape as the moone doth now unto us."