182 ASTRONOMICAL HISTORY. 



when you might clearly see the radiating and white light 

 of the candle in the midst of the flame of the spirits of 

 wine, which was weak, and approaching to a mere pellucid 

 medium. And in like manner there are often seen in 

 the heavens luminous belts, affording a distinctly visible 

 light of their own, vividly illuminating the darkness of 

 the night, through the substance of which, however, the 

 stars are plainly discernible. And that difference between 

 a star, and the interstellar air is not justly described by 

 the terms rare and dense, that is by the star being denser, 

 the ether rarer. For generally here among us flame is 

 a body subtler than the air, I mean more expanded, and 

 having in it less matter for the space it occupies, which 

 may probably obtain also in the heavenly bodies. It is 

 a gross mistake, if they really suppose the star to be a 

 part of a sphere in which it is fastened, as it were, by a 

 nail, and the ether a vehicle in which it is carried. For 

 either the body of the star cuts the ether, or the ether 

 itself is carried round in the same rotation. This notion, 

 then, is a mere invention, like that fabric of orbs upon 

 orbs which they describe. For if they revolve otherwise 

 than simultaneously, it is still necessary that the star cut 

 the ether. For that supposed arrangement of adjacent 

 orb, so that the concave of the outer falls in with the 

 convex of the interior orbit, yet ou account of the curve 

 of both, the one does not interfere with the other in its 

 revolutions, though differing from its own, has no founda 

 tion in fact; since the body of the ether is unbroken, just 

 as that of the air is : and yet because of the great varieties 

 found in each, their various regions are most properly dis 

 criminated for the purpose of instruction. Wherefore the 

 sixth question, according to this our explanation of it, is a 

 fit subject for inquiry. 



Then follows another question, and not an easy one, with 

 respect to the substance of the stars themselves. We first 

 inquire whether there be other globes or masses of solid 

 and impacted matter besides the earth itself? For the 

 theory is proposed without any extravagance, in our trea 

 tise De Facie in Orbe Luna, that it is not probable, that in 

 the distribution of matter, nature had bound up whatever 

 solid matter there was in the globe of the earth, since there 

 is such a host of other orbs of a sublimated and expanded 

 matter. And Gilbertus carried this theory so extra 

 vagantly far, (in which however he had several precursors, 

 or rather guides among the ancients), as to assert not only 



