162 THE GREEK ASTRONOMY. 



and to the south. For some stars are seen in 

 Egypt or at Cyprus, but are not seen in the 

 countries to the north of these ; and the stars that 

 in the north are visible while they make a com- 

 plete circuit, there undergo a setting. So that 

 from this it is manifest, not only that the form of 

 the earth is round, but also that it is a part of 

 not a very large sphere : for otherwise the dif- 

 ference would not be so obvious to persons making 

 so small a change of place. Wherefore we may 

 judge that those persons who connect the region 

 in the neighbourhood of the pillars of Hercules 

 with that towards India, and mho assert that in 

 this way the sea is ONE, do not assert things very 

 improbable. They confirm this conjecture more- 

 over by the elephants, which are said to be of 

 the same species (761/0?) towards each extreme ; as 

 if this circumstance was a consequence of the con- 

 junction of the extremes. The mathematicians, 

 who try to calculate the measure of the circum- 

 ference, make it amount to 400,000 stadia ; whence 

 we collect that the earth is not only spherical, but 

 is not large compared with the magnitude of the 

 other stars." 



When this notion was once suggested, it was 

 defended and confirmed by such arguments as we 

 find in later writers: for instance 51 , that the ten- 

 dency of all things was to fall to the place of heavy 

 bodies, and that this place being the center of the 



51 Pliny, Nat. Hist. ii. LXV. 



