But what is the meaning of Moses when he says, "And let them be for signs," etc.? Lyra explains it as signifying signs of rains and storms, etc. This in an interpretation which I would not strongly oppose; though I have great doubts whether these "Lights in the firmament of heaven" do, or can, pre-signify rains, tempests, etc., with any certainty, as the poet Virgil and others represent in their writings. The gospel does indeed make a "reddened" evening a sign of "fair weather," and on the contrary a "lowering" morning a sign of "foul weather," Math. 16:2-3. With respect therefore to the common saying that the rising of the constellation of the Pleiades indicates rain and other proverbs of a similar description, I will not with great concern tear them to pieces, nor will I at once admit and confirm them, because I cannot see that they are all uniformly sure and certain. I hold the simplest meaning of the text is that he does not speak of such inferior signs, but greater signs, such as eclipses and collisions of heavenly bodies, so that a sign is a wonder, a prophecy or miracle, by which he reveals his wrath or the misfortune of the world. If any think this explanation is too coarse, let us remember that Moses wrote for a rude people. Here belong meteors and the rare phenomena which take place in the air, when stars are seen to fall, when halos surround the sun and moon, when the rainbow appears and similar things happen in the sky. For Moses calls the heaven the whole aqueous mass in which the stars and planets move, also the highest sphere. We speak of spheres and circles to make the explanation plainer. For the Scriptures know nothing of these and say that the moon with the sun and stars are not each in its sphere, but in the firmament of heaven, below and above are the waters. That they are signs of future events, experience teaches concerning planet collisions and meteors.