Instead of leaving it to the sun-god to find a way of removing the rocks for him, Aurelius proceeds to give explicit instructions as to how this may be accomplished. As the highest tides occur when the moon is in opposition or in conjunction with the sun, if the moon could only be kept in either of these positions with regard to the sun for a long enough time, so great a flood would be produced, Aurelius thinks, that the rocks would be washed away. So he prays Phebus to induce the moon to slacken her speed at her next opposition in Leo and for two years to traverse her sphere with the same (apparent) velocity as that of the sun, thus remaining in opposition with him: "'Wherfore, lord Phebus, this is my requeste-- Do this miracle, or do myn herte breste-- That now, next at this opposicioun, Which in the signe shal be of the Leoun, As preyeth hir so greet a flood to bringe, That fyve fadme at the leeste it overspringe The hyeste rokke in Armorik Briteyne; And lat this flood endure yeres tweyne; . . . . . . . . . Preye hir she go no faster cours than ye, I seye, preyeth your suster that she go No faster cours than ye thise yeres two. Than shal she been evene atte fulle alway, And spring-flood laste bothe night and day.'"[104] References to eclipses of the moon occur seldom in Chaucer. In the second part of the _Romaunt of the Rose_, which is included in complete editions of Chaucer's works but which he almost certainly did not write, there is a description of a lunar eclipse and of its causes. Fickleness in love is compared to an eclipse: "For it shal chaungen wonder sone, And take eclips right as the mone, Whan she is from us (y)-let Thurgh erthe, that bitwixe is set The sonne and hir, as it may falle, Be it in party, or in alle; The shadowe maketh her bemis merke, And hir hornes to shewe derke, That part where she hath lost hir lyght Of Phebus fully, and the sight; Til, whan the shadowe is overpast, She is enlumined ageyn as faste, Thurgh brightnesse of the sonne bemes That yeveth to hir ageyn hir lemes."[105] This passage is so clear that it needs no explanation. An eclipse of the moon, since it is caused by the passing of the moon into the shadow of the earth, can only take place when the moon is full, that is, in _opposition_ to the sun. This fact is suggested in a reference in _Boethius_ to a lunar eclipse: "the hornes of the fulle mone wexen pale and infect by the boundes of the derke night;"[106] In the next lines Chaucer mentions the fact that the stars which are lost to sight in the bright rays of the full moon become visible during an eclipse: "and ... the mone, derk and confuse, discovereth the sterres that she hadde y-covered by hir clere visage."[107] 3. _The Planets_