_Plutarch_[1] one of the chiefe patrons of this world in the Moone, doth directly contradict this proposition; affirming, that those who live there may discerne our world as the dregges and sediment of all other creatures, appearing to them through clouds and foggy mists, and that altogether devoid of light, being base and unmoveable, so that they might well imagine the darke place of damnation to be here situate, and that they onely were the inhabiters of the world, as being in the midst betwixt Heaven and Hell. [Sidenote 1: _Plut. de fac. lunæ._] To this I may answere, ’tis probable that _Plutarch_ spake this inconsiderately, and without a reason, which makes him likewise fall into another absurditie, when he sayes our earth would appeare immoveable, whereas questionlesse though it did not, yet would it seeme to move, and theirs to stand still, as the Land doth to a man in a Shippe; according to that of the Poet: _Provehimur portu, terræque urbesque recedunt._ And I doubt not but that ingenuous Authour would easily have recanted if hee had beene but acquainted with those experiences which men of latter times have found out, for the confirmation of this truth. 2. Unto him assents _Macrobius_, whose words are these; _Terra accepto solis lumine clarescit, tantummodò, non relucet._ “The earth is by the Sunne-beames made bright, but not able to enlighten any thing so farre.” And his reason is, because this being of a thicke and grosse matter, the light is terminated in its superficies, and cannot penetrate into the substance; whereas the moone doth therefore seeme so bright to us, because it receives the beames within it selfe. But the weaknesse of this assertion, may bee easily manifest by a common experience, for polished steele (whose opacity will not give any admittance to the rayes) reflects a stronger heate then glasse, and so consequently a greater light. 3. ’Tis the generall consent of Philosophers, that the reflection of the Sunne-beames from the earth doth not reach much above halfe a mile high, where they terminate the first region, so that to affirme they might ascend to the moone, were to say, there were but one region of aier, which contradicts the proved and received opinion. Unto this it may be answered: That it is indeed the common consent, that the reflexion of the Sunne-beames reach onely to the second region, but yet some there are, and those too Philosophers of good note, who thought otherwise. Thus _Plotinus_ is cited by _Cælius_,[1] _Si concipias te in sublimi quopiam mundi loco, unde oculis subjiciatur terræ moles aquis circumfusa, & solis syderumque radiis illustrata, non aliam profecto visam iri probabile est, quam qualis modo visatur lunaris globi species._