42 .History of Nature. [BooK II. 



CHAPTER IX. 

 Of the Moons Nature. 



BUT the Moon, being the last of all, most familiar with 

 the Earth, and devised by Nature for the Remedy of Dark- 

 ness, exceedeth the Admiration of all the rest. She with her 

 changing in many Shapes, hath troubled much the Minds of 

 Beholders, angry because that of this Star, the nearest of all, 

 they should be the most ignorant; growing as it doth, or 

 else wasting continually. One while she bended into Horns ; 

 another while divided in the half, and again moulded into a 

 rounded Figure : spotted sometime, arid soon after, on a 

 sudden, exceeding bright : one while large and full, and sud- 

 denly nothing to be seen. Sometime shining all Night long, 

 and at others late ere she riseth ; she also helpeth the Sun's 

 Light some Part of the Day; eclipsed, and yet visible in 

 that Eclipse. The same at the Month's End lieth hidden, 

 at which Time (it is supposed) she laboureth not. At one 

 Time she is below, and presently aloft : and that not after 

 one Manner, but one while reaching up to the highest Hea- 

 ven, and another while close to the Mountains ; now mounted 

 to the North, and again brought down to the South. Which 

 several Motions in her, the first Man that observed was 

 Endymion : and hence sprung the Report that he was ena- 

 moured of the Moon. We are not thankful, as we ought to 

 be, to those who by their Labour and Care have given us 

 Light in this Light ; but we are delighted rather (such is the 

 wicked Disposition of Man) to record in Chronicles, Blood- 

 shed and Murders: that Men's mischievous Deeds should be 

 known, while we are ignorant of the World itself. The 

 Moon being next to the Centre, and therefore of least Com- 

 pass, performeth the same Course in seven-and-twenty Days, 

 and one-third Part of a Day : which Saturn, the highest 

 Planet, runneth (as we said before) in thirty Years. After 



their orbits ; and which, in ancient times, was commonly received without 

 dispute. Wern. Club. 



