52 e/fTrMh'jZfl/BODIES. Chap. 6. 



(vvhicM is likcwife a body) vvhcrefoever it is admitted: for 

 within the whole iphcre of the irradiation of it, there is no 

 point wherein one may fet their eye, but light is found. And 

 therefore , if it were a body there would be no room for aire in 

 that place which light taketh up. And likewife, we fee that it 

 penetratcth all folid bodies, ( and particularly glafle, ) as expe- 

 rience fheweth, in wood, ftone , metals , and any other body 

 vvhatfbcver, if it be made thinne enough. 



The third argument, why light cannot be a body, is, that if 

 it were fo, it can be none other but fire, which is the fubtileftj 

 and moft rarified of all bodies whatfoever. But if u be fire, then 

 it cannot be without heat : and confequently, a man could not 

 feel cold in a funne-fhining day. The contrary of which is 

 apparent all winter long; whofe brightcft dayes oftentimes 

 prove the coldeft. And Galileus with divers others fince, did 

 nfe from the funne to gather light in a kind of frone that is 

 found in Italy ( which is therefore by them called, U caUmit*. 

 deRa luce ) and yet no heat appeared in it. A glow-worm wili 

 give light to read by, but not to warm you any whit at all. And 

 it is faid, that diamonds and carbuncles will fhine like fire in 

 the grcateft darks; yet no man ever complained of being ferved 

 by them as the fooHfti Satyrc was by killing of a burning coal. 

 On the contray fide; if one confitler how great heats may be 

 made without any light at all, how can one be pcrfwaded .that 

 light & heat ftiould be the fame thing,or indeed any whit of kin? 



The fourth motive to induce us to believe that light cannot 

 be a body , is the fudden extinction of it, when any folid body 

 cometh between the fountain of it, and the place where he fend- 

 eth his beams. What becometh of that great expanfion of light 

 that fhined all about, when a cloud interpoleth it fclf between 

 the body of the 'funne and the ftreams that come from it.? Or 

 when it leavcth our horizon to light the other world? His head 

 is no fooneroutof our fight ; but at the inftant all his beams 

 are vanished. If that which filleth fb va(r a room were a body, 

 fomething would become of it : it would at Jeaft be changed 

 to ibme other fubftance; and forne rcliques would be left of it; 

 as when afhcs remain of burned bodies : for nature admittetb 

 not the annihilation of any thing. 



And in the hit place; we may conceive that if light were a bo- 

 dy, 



