44 PHYSICAL SCIENCE 



XVII 



1 Go now and laugh at the philosophers for discussing 

 the nature of the mirror and inquiring why our face 

 is reflected in it, and is turned toward us too. What 

 did nature mean by giving us real bodies and then 

 ordaining that phantoms of them also should be 

 visible ? What was her purpose in providing 

 material of the sort capable of receiving and return- 



2 ing images ? Not, I trow, that we men might 

 use a looking-glass to pluck out the straggling 

 hairs of our beard and polish up our face. 

 Nature has never at any point merely provided 

 resources for luxury. First of all, her motive was 

 to show us the sun with his glare dulled, since 

 our eyes are too weak to gaze at him direct, and 

 without something to reflect him we should be 



3 wholly ignorant of his shape. No doubt one may 

 study him as he rises and as he sets. But we should 

 know nothing of his true figure as he shines in 

 fierce noonday brightness, without his softening 

 ruddy glow, unless an image of him could be 

 mirrored in some liquid where he shines less 

 directly and is more easy to observe. In the second 

 place, we should be unable to see or investigate 

 the conjunction of two heavenly bodies, by which 

 the daylight is wont to be interrupted, unless we 

 could examine the reflections of sun and moon 

 in basins on the ground with comparative freedom. 



4 In the third place, mirrors were discovered in order 

 that man might come to know himself. 



Many benefits have ensued ; first, the knowledge 

 of self, after that, devices to secure specific results. 

 The comely man was taught to shun conduct that 



