The moon hoax : $b or, A discovery that the moon has a vast population of human beings — John Locke — John Shaqi
The moon hoax : $b or, A discovery that the moon has a vast population of human beings
John Locke · en
Believe
it or believe it not, it was one entire crystallization!--its edge,
throughout its whole length of 340 miles, is an acute angle of solid
quartz crystal, brilliant as a piece of Derbyshire spar just brought
from a mine, and containing scarcely a fracture or a chasm from end to
end! What a prodigious influence must our thirteen times larger globe
have exercised upon this satellite, when an embryo in the womb of time,
the passive subject of chemical affinity! We found that wonder and
astonishment, as excited by objects in this distant world, were but
modes and attributes of ignorance, which should give place to elevated
expectations, and to reverential confidence in the illimitable power of
the Creator.
"The dark expanse of waters to the south of the first great ocean
has often been considered a fourth; but we found it to be merely a
sea of the first class, entirely surrounded by land, and much more
encumbered with promontories and islands than it has been exhibited
in any lunar chart. One of its promontories runs from the vicinity
of Pitatus (No. 19), in a slightly curved and very narrow line, to
Bullialdus (No. 22), which is merely a circular head to it, 264 miles
from its starting place. This is another mountainous ring, a marine
volcano, nearly burnt out, and slumbering upon its cinders. But
Pitatus, standing upon a bold cape of the southern shore, is apparently
exulting in the might and majesty of its fires. The atmosphere being
now quite free from vapor, we introduced the magnifiers to examine
a large bright circle of hills which sweep close beside the western
abutments of this flaming mountain. The hills were either of snow-white
marble or semi-transparent crystal, we could not distinguish which,
and they bounded another of those lovely green valleys, which,
however monotonous in my descriptions, are of paradisaical beauty and
fertility, and like primitive Eden in the bliss of their inhabitants.
Dr. Herschel here again predicated another of his sagacious theories.
He said the proximity of the flaming mountain, Bullialdus, must be so
great a local convenience to dwellers in this valley during the long
periodical absence of solar light, as to render it a place of populous
resort for the inhabitants of all the adjacent regions, more especially
as its bulwark of hills afforded an infallible security against any
volcanic eruption that could occur. We therefore applied our full power
to explore it, and rich indeed was our reward.