In the rainbow-cloud whose nature is in question, there is no proper substance or material: there is only a sham and a likeness without reality. Will you be convinced that this is so? The proof is, the 5 rainbow will cease if you conceal the sun. Place another cloud, I repeat, in front of the sun, and all the bright hues of the bow are gone. But what is to be said, you may ask, in explanation of the size of the bow which is considerably greater than that of the sun? I have already said that there are certain mirrors that multiply every object they reflect. I may now add that every object much exceeds its natural size when seen through water. Letters, however small and dim, are comparatively large and distinct when seen through a glass globe filled with water. Apples floating in a glass vessel seem more beautiful than they are in reality. The stars appear bigger if seen through a cloud, 6 because our vision is blurred in the moisture, and cannot accurately grasp its object. This will become plain to demonstration if you fill a cup with water and throw a ring into it. While the ring lies right at the bottom its appearance is visible on the surface of the water. Anything, in fact, that is: seen through moisture appears far larger than. in reality it is. What wonder that the image of the sun, being 7 seen in a moist cloud, should be reproduced on a scale larger than the original, and that for the two reasons indicated? The cloud contains the two elements, one like glass, which can transmit light, and one also of the character of water; at any rate, if it does not just yet contain the actual water, it is now forming it, its nature is already such as can easily be changed into water. VII As you have mentioned glass, some one interposes, I can draw from 1 this same material an argument to confute you. Glass sticks are manufactured, either fluted or bulging,[29] with many corners like a club. If one of these sticks is placed obliquely in the path of the sun’s rays, it sends back the colour which is wont to be seen in the rainbow. This proves that there is not here an image of the sun, but an imitation of his colour from reflection. Now, in this argument there are many points that make for my view. First of all, it is plain that 2 there must be some smooth surface like a mirror to reflect the sun. Secondly, it is plain that no colour is formed in the rod, but only a false appearance of colour, such as I mentioned above, which the neck of a pigeon, as it is bent hither and thither, alternately puts on and off. This, I say, is seen likewise in the case of a mirror, which assumes no real colour, but only a certain imitation of the colour of a foreign body. [29] Another reading gives “twisted.”