|
The creation
of luminous bodies.
1. At the shows
in the circus the spectator must join in the efforts of the athletes. This
the laws of the show indicate, for they prescribe that all should have the
head uncovered when present at the stadium. The object of this, in my opinion,
is that each one there should not only be a spectator of the athletes, but
be, in a certain measure, a true athlete himself. Thus, to investigate the
great and prodigious show of creation, to understand supreme and ineffable
wisdom, you must bring personal light for the contemplation of the wonders
which I spread before your eyes, and help me, according to your power, in
this struggle, where you are not so much judges as fellow combatants, for
fear lest the truth might escape you, and lest my error might turn to your
common prejudice. Why these words? It is because we propose to study the
world as a whole, and to consider the universe not by the light of worldly
wisdom, but by that with which God wills to enlighten His servant, when He
speaks to him in person and without enigmas. It is because it is absolutely
necessary that all lovers of great and grand shows should bring a mind well
prepared to study them. If sometimes, on a bright night, whilst gazing with
watchful eyes on the inexpressible beauty of the stars, you have thought
of the Creator of all things; if you have asked yourself who it is that has
dotted heaven with such flowers, and why visible things are even more useful
than beautiful; if sometimes, in the day, you have studied the marvels of
light, if you have raised yourself by visible things to the invisible Being,
then you are a well prepared auditor, and you can take your place in this
august and blessed amphitheatre. Come in the same way that any one not knowing
a town is taken by the hand and led through it; thus I am going to lead you,
like strangers, through the mysterious marvels of this great city of the
universe. Our first country was in this great city, whence the murderous
daemon whose enticements seduced man to slavery expelled us. There you will
see man's first origin and his immediate seizure by death, brought forth
by sin, the first born of the evil spirit. You will know that you are formed
of earth, but the work of God's hands; much weaker than the brute, but ordained
to command beings without reason and soul; inferior as regards natural
advantages, but, thanks to the privilege of reason, capable of raising yourself
to heaven. If we are penetrated by these truths, we shall know ourselves,
we shall know God, we shall adore our Creator, we shall serve our Master,
we shall glorify our Father, we shall love our Sustainer, we shall bless
our Benefactor, we shall not cease to honour the Prince of present and future
life, Who, by the riches that He showers upon us in this world, makes us
believe in His promises and uses present good things to strengthen our
expectation of the future. Truly, if such are the good things of time, what
will be those of eternity? If such is the beauty of visible things, what
shall we think of invisible things? If the grandeur of heaven exceeds the
measure of human intelligence, what mind shall be able to trace the nature
of the everlasting? If the sun, subject to corruption, is so beautiful, so
grand, so rapid in its movement, so invariable in its course; if its grandeur
is in such perfect harmony with and due proportion to the universe: if, by
the beauty of its nature, it shines like a brilliant eye in the middle of
creation; if finally, one cannot tire of contemplating it, what will be the
beauty of the Sun of Righteousness? If the blind man suffers from not seeing
the material sun, what a deprivation is it for the sinner not to enjoy the
true light!
2. "And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to give
light upon the earth, and to divide the day from the night." Heaven and earth
were the first; after them was created light; the day had been distinguished
from the night, then had appeared the firmament and the dry element. The
water had been gathered into the reservoir assigned to it, the earth displayed
its productions, it had caused many kinds of herbs to germinate and it was
adorned with all kinds of plants. However, the sun and the moon did not yet
exist, in order that those who live in ignorance of God may not consider
the sun as the origin and the father of light, or as the maker of all that
grows out of the earth. That is why there was a fourth day, and then God
said: "Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven."
When once you have learnt Who spoke, think immediately of the hearer. God
said, "Let there be lights . . . and God made two great lights." Who spoke?
and Who made? Do you not see a double person? Everywhere, in mystic language,
history is sown with the dogmas of theology.
The motive follows which caused the lights to be created. It was to illuminate
the earth. Already light was created; why therefore say that the sun was
created to give light? And, first, do not laugh at the strangeness of this
expression. We do not follow your nicety about words, and we trouble ourselves
but little to give them a harmonious turn. Our writers do not amuse themselves
by polishing their periods, and everywhere we prefer clearness of words to
sonorous expressions. See then if by this expression "to light up," the sacred
writer sufficiently made his thought understood. He has put "to give light"
instead of" illumination." Now there is nothing here contradictory to what
has been said of light. Then the actual nature of light was produced: now
the sun's body is constructed to be a vehicle for that original light. A
lamp is not fire. Fire has the property of illuminating, and we have invented
the lamp to light us in darkness. In the same way, the luminous bodies have
been fashioned as a vehicle for that pure, clear, and immaterial light. The
Apostle speaks to us of certain lights which shine in the world without being
confounded with the true light of the world, the possession of which made
the saints luminaries of the souls which they instructed and drew from the
darkness of ignorance. This is why the Creator of all things, made the sun
in addition to that glorious light, and placed it shining in the heavens.
3. And let no one suppose it to be a thing incredible that the brightness
of the light is one thing, and the body which is its material vehicle is
another. First, in all composite things, we distinguish substance susceptible
of quality, and the quality which it receives. The nature of whiteness is
one thing, another is that of the body which is whitened; thus the natures
differ which we have just seen reunited by the power of the Creator. And
do not tell me that it is impossible to separate them. Even I do not pretend
to be able to separate light from the body of the sun; but I maintain that
that which we separate in thought, may be separated in reality by the Creator
of nature. You cannot, moreover, separate the brightness of fire from the
virtue of burning which it possesses; but God, who wished to attract His
servant by a wonderful sight, set a fire in the burning bush, which displayed
all the brilliancy of flame while its devouring property was dormant. It
is that which the Psalmist affirms in saying "The voice of the Lord divideth
the flames of fire." Thus, in the requital which awaits us after this life,
a mysterious voice seems to tell us that the double nature of fire will be
divided; the just will enjoy its light, and the torment of its heat will
be the torture of the wicked.
In the revolutions of the moon we find a new proof of what we have advanced.
When it stops and grows less it does not consume itself in all its body,
but in the measure that it deposits or absorbs the light which surrounds
it, it presents to us the image of its decrease or of its increase. If we
wish an evident proof that the moon does not consume its body whet, at rest,
we have only to open our eyes. If you look at it in a cloudless and clear
sky, you observe, when it has taken the complete form of a crescent, that
the part, which is dark and not lighted up, describes a circle equal to that
which the full moon forms. Thus the eye can take in the whole circle, if
it adds to the illuminated part this obscure and dark curve. And do not tell
me that the light of the moon is borrowed, diminishing or increasing in
proportion as it approaches or recedes from the sun. That is not now the
object of our research; we only wish to prove that its body differs from
the light which makes it shine. I wish you to have the same idea of the sun;
except however that the one, after having once received light and having
mixed it with its substance, does not lay it down again, whilst the other,
turn by turn, putting off and reclothing itself again with light, proves
by that which takes place in itself what we have said of the sun.
The sun and moon thus received the command to divide the day from the night.
God had already separated light from darkness; then He placed their natures
in opposition, so that they could not mingle, and that there could never
be anything in common between darkness and light. You see what a shadow is
during the day; that is precisely the nature of darkness during the night.
If, at the appearance of a light, the shadow always falls on the opposite
side; if in the morning it extends towards the setting sun; if in the evening
it inclines towards the rising sun, and at mid-day turns towards the north;
night retires into the regions opposed to the rays of the sun, since it is
by nature only the shadow of the earth. Because, in the same way that, daring
the day, shadow is produced by a body which intercepts the light, night comes
naturally when the air which surrounds the earth is in shadow. And this is
precisely what Scripture says, "God divided the light from the darkness."
Thus darkness fled at the approach of light, the two being at their first
creation divided by a natural antipathy. Now God commanded the sun to measure
the day, and the moon, whenever she rounds her disc, to rule the night. For
then these two luminaries are almost diametrically opposed; when the sun
rises, the full moon disappears from the horizon, to re-appear in the east
at the moment the sun sets. It matters little to our subject if in other
phases the light of the moon does not correspond exactly with night. It is
none the less true, that when at its perfection it makes the stars to turn
pale and lightens up the earth with the splendour of its light, it reigns
over the night, and in concert with the sun divides the duration of it in
equal parts.
4. "And let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years."
The signs which the luminaries give are necessary to human life. In fact
what useful observations will long experience make us discover, if we ask
without undue curiosity! What signs of rain, of drought, or of the rising
of the wind, partial or general, violent or moderate Our Lord indicates to
us one of the signs given by the sun when He says, "It will be foul weather
to-day; for the sky is red and lowering." In fact, when the sun rises through
a fog, its rays are darkened, but the disc appears burning like a coal and
of a bloody red colour. It is the thickness of the air which causes this
appearance; as the rays of the sun do not disperse such amassed and condensed
air, it cannot certainly be retained by the waves of vapour which exhale
from the earth, and it will cause from superabundance of moisture a storm
in the countries over which it accumulates. In the same way, when the moon
is surrounded with moisture, or when the sun is encircled with what is called
a halo, it is the sign of heavy rain or of a violent storm; again, in the
same way, if mock suns accompany the sun in its course they foretell certain
celestial phenomena. Finally, those straight lines, like the colours of the
rainbow, which are seen on the clouds, announce rain, extraordinary tempests,
or, in one word, a complete change in the weather.
Those who devote themselves to the observation of these bodies find signs
in the different phases of the moon, as if the air, by which the earth is
enveloped, were obliged to vary to correspond with its change of form. Towards
the third day of the new moon, if it is sharp and clear, it is a sign of
fixed fine weather. If its horns appear thick and reddish it threatens us
either with heavy rain or with a gale from the South. Who does not know how
useful are these signs in life? Thanks to them, the sailor keeps back his
vessel in the harbour, foreseeing the perils with which the winds threaten
him, and the traveller beforehand takes shelter from harm, waiting until
the weather has become fairer. Thanks to them, husbandmen, busy with sowing
seed or cultivating plants, are able to know which seasons are favourable
to their labours. Further, the Lord has announced to us that at the dissolution
of the universe, signs will appear in the sun, in the moon and in the stars.
The sun shall be turned into blood and the moon shall not give her light,
signs of the consummation of all things.
5. But those who overstep the borders, making the words of Scripture their
apology for the art of casting nativities, pretend that our lives depend
upon the motion of the heavenly bodies, and that thus the Chaldaeans read
in the planets that which will happen to us. By these very simple words "let
them be for signs," they understand neither the variations of the weather,
nor the change of seasons; they only see in them, at the will of their
imagination, the distribution of human destinies. What do they say in reality?
When the planets cross in the signs of the Zodiac, certain figures formed
by their meeting give birth to certain destinies, and others produce different
destinies.
Perhaps for clearness sake it is not useless to enter into more detail about
this vain science. I will say nothing of my own to refute them; I will use
their words, bringing a remedy for the infected, and for others a preservative
from falling. The inventors of astrology seeing that in the extent of time
many signs escaped them, divided it and enclosed each part in narrow limits,
as if in the least and shortest interval, in a moment, in the twinkling of
an eye, to speak with the Apostle, the greatest difference should be found
between one birth and another. Such an one is born in this moment; he will
be a prince over cities and will govern the people, in the fulness of riches
and power. Another is born the instant after; he will be poor, miserable,
and will wander daily from door to door begging his bread. Consequently they
divide the Zodiac into twelve parts, and, as the sun takes thirty days to
traverse each of the twelve divisions of this unerring circle, they divide
them into thirty more. Each of them forms sixty new ones, and these last
are again divided into sixty. Let us see then if, in determining the birth
of an infant, it will be possible to observe this rigorous division of time.
The child is born. The nurse ascertains the sex; then she awaits the wail
which is a sign of its life. Until then how many moments have passed do you
think? The nurse announces the birth of the child to the Chaldaean: how many
minutes would you count before she opens her mouth, especially if he who
records the hour is outside the women's apartments? And we know that he who
consults the dial, ought, whether by day or by night, to mark the hour with
the most precise exactitude. What a swarm of seconds passes during this time!
For the planet of nativity ought to be found, not only in one of the twelve
divisions of the Zodiac, and even in one of its first subdivisions, but again
in one of the sixtieth parts which divide this last, and even, to arrive
at the exact truth, in one of the sixtieth subdivisions that this contains
in its turn. And to obtain such minute knowledge, so impossible to grasp
from this moment, each planet must be questioned to find its position as
regards the signs of the Zodiac and the figures that the planets form at
the moment of the child's birth. Thus, if it is impossible to find exactly
the hour of birth, and if the least change can upset all, then both those
who give themselves up to this imaginary science and those who listen to
them open-mouthed, as if they could learn from them the future, are supremely
ridiculous.
6. But what effects are produced? Such an one will have curly hair and bright
eyes, because he is born under the Ram; such is the appearance of a ram.
He will have noble feelings; because the Ram is born to command. He will
be liberal and fertile in resources, because this animal gets rid of its
fleece without trouble, and nature immediately hastens to reclothe it. Another
is born under the Bull: he will be enured to hardship and of a slavish character,
because the bull bows under the yoke. Another is born under the Scorpion;
like to this venomous reptile he will be a striker. He who is born under
the Balance will be just, thanks to the justness of our balances. Is not
this the height of folly? This Ram, from whence you draw the nativity of
man, is the twelfth part of the heaven, and in entering into it the sun reaches
the spring. The Balance and the Bull are likewise twelfth parts of the Zodiac.
How can you see there the principal causes which influence the life of man?
And why do you take animals to characterize the manners of men who enter
this world? He who is born under the Ram will be liberal, not because this
part of heaven gives this characteristic, but because such is the nature
of the beast. Why then should we frighten ourselves by the names of these
stars and undertake to persuade ourselves with these bleatings? If heaven
has different characteristics derived from these animals, it is then itself
subject to external influences since its causes depend on the brutes who
graze in our fields. A ridiculous assertion; but how much more ridiculous
the pretence of arriving at the influence on each other of things which have
not the least connexion! This pretended science is a true spider's web; if
a gnat or a fly, or some insect equally feeble falls into it it is held
entangled; if a stronger animal approaches, it passes through without trouble,
carrying the weak tissue away with it.
7. They do not, however, stop here; even our acts, where each one feels his
will ruling, I mean, the practice of virtue or of vice, depend, according
to them, on the influence of celestial bodies. It would be ridiculous seriously
to refute such an error, but, as it holds a great many in its nets, perhaps
it is better not to pass it over in silence. I would first ask them if the
figures which the stars describe do not change a thousand times a day. In
the perpetual motion of planets, some meet in a more rapid course, others
make slower revolutions, and often in an hour we see them look at each other
and then hide themselves. Now, at the hour of birth, it is very important
whether one is looked upon by a beneficent star or by an evil one, to speak
their language. Often then the astrologers do not seize the moment when a
good star shows itself, and, on account of having let this fugitive moment
escape, they enrol the newborn under the influence of a bad genius. I am
compelled to use their own words. What madness! But, above all, what impiety!
For the evil stars throw the blame of their wickedness upon Him Who trade
them. If evil is inherent in their nature, the
Creator is the author of evil. If they make it themselves, they are animals
endowed with the power of choice, whose acts will be free and voluntary.
Is it not the height of folly to tell these lies about beings without souls?
Again, what a want of sense does it show to distribute good and evil without
regard to personal merit; to say that a star is beneficent because it occupies
a certain place; that it becomes evil, because it is viewed by another star;
and that if it moves ever so little from this figure it loses its malign
influence.
But let us pass on. If, at every instant of duration, the stars vary their
figures, then in these thousand changes, many times a day, there ought to
be reproduced the configuration of royal births. Why then does not every
day see the birth of a king? Why is there a succession on the throne from
father to son? Without doubt there has never been a king who has taken measures
to have his son born under the star of royalty. For what man possesses such
a power? How then did Uzziah beget Jotham, Jotham Ahaz, Ahaz Hezekiah? And
by what chance did the birth of none of them happen in an hour of slavery?
If the origin of our virtues and of our vices is not in ourselves, but is
the fatal consequence of our birth, it is useless for legislators to prescribe
for us what we ought to do, and what we ought to avoid; it is useless for
judges to honour virtue and to punish vice. The guilt is not in the robber,
not in the assassin: it was willed for him; it was impossible for him to
hold back his hand, urged to evil by inevitable necessity. Those who laboriously
cultivate the arts are the maddest of men. The labourer will make an abundant
harvest without sowing seed and without sharpening his sickle. Whether he
wishes it or not, the merchant will make his fortune, and will be flooded
with riches by fate. As for us Christians, we shall see our great hopes vanish,
since from the moment that man does not act with freedom, there is neither
reward for justice, nor punishment for sin. Under the reign of necessity
and of fatality there is no place for merit, the first condition of all righteous
judgment. But let us stop. You who are sound in yourselves have no need to
hear more, and time does not allow us to make attacks without limit against
these unhappy men.
8. Let its return to the words which follow. "Let them be for signs and for
seasons and for days and years." We have spoken about signs. By times, we
understand the succession of seasons, winter, spring, summer and autumn,
which we see follow each other in so regular a course, thanks to the regularity
of the movement of the luminaries. It is winter when the sun sojourns in
the south and produces in abundance the shades of night in our region. The
air spread over the earth is chilly, and the damp exhalations, which gather
over our heads, give rise to rains, to frosts, to innumerable flakes of snow.
When, returning from the southern regions, the sun is in the middle of the
heavens and divides day and night into equal parts, the more it sojourns
above the earth the more it brings back a mild temperature to us. Then comes
spring, which makes all the plants germinate, and gives to the greater part
of the trees their new life, and, by successive generation, perpetuates all
the land and water animals. From thence the sun, returning to the summer
solstice, in the direction of the North, gives us the longest days. And,
as it travels farther in the air, it burns that which is over our heads,
dries up the earth, ripens the grains and hastens the maturity of the fruits
of the trees. At the epoch of its greatest heat, the shadows which the sun
makes at mid-day are short, because it shines from above, from the air over
our heads. Thus the longest days are those when the shadows are shortest,
in the same way that the shortest days are those when the shadows are longest.
It is this which happens to all of us "Hetero-skii" (shadowed-on-one-side)
who inhabit the northern regions of the earth. But there are people who,
two days in the year, are completely without shade at mid-day, because the
sun, being perpendicularly over their heads, lights them so equally from
all sides, that it could through a narrow opening shine at the bottom of
a well. Thus there are some who call them "askii" (shadowless). For those
who live beyond the land of spices see their shadow now on one side, now
on another, the only inhabitants of this land of which the shade falls at
mid-day; thus they are given the name of "amphiskii," (shadowed-on-both-sides).
All these phenomena happen whilst the sun is passing into northern regions:
they give us an idea of the heat thrown on the air, by the rays of the sun
and of the effects that they produce. Next we pass to autumn, which breaks
up the excessive heat, lessening the warmth little by little, and by a moderate
temperature brings us back without suffering to winter, to the time when
the sun returns from the northern regions to the southern. It is thus that
seasons, following the course of the sun, succeed each other to rule our
life
"Let them be for days" says Scripture, not to produce them but to rule them;
because day and night are older than the creation of the luminaries and it
is this that the psalm declares to us. "The sun to rule by day ... the moon
and stars to rule by night." How does the sun rule by day? Because carrying
everywhere light with it, it is no sooner risen above the horizon than it
drives away darkness and brings us day. Thus we might, without self deception,
define day as air lighted by the sun, or as the space of time that the sun
passes in our hemisphere. The functions of the sun and moon serve further
to mark years. The moon, after having twelve times run her course, forms
a year which sometimes needs an intercalary month to make it exactly agree
with the seasons. Such was formerly the year of the Hebrews and of the early
Greeks. As to the solar year, it is the time that the sun, having started
from a certain sign, takes to return to it in its normal progress.
9. "And God made two great lights " The word "great," if, for example we
say it of the heaven of the earth or of the sea, may have an absolute sense;
but ordinarily it has only a relative meaning, as a great horse, or a great
ox. It is not that these animals are of an immoderate size, but that in
comparison with their like they deserve the title of great. What idea shall
we ourselves form here of greatness? Shall it be the idea that we have of
it in the ant and in all the little creatures of nature, which we call great
in comparison with those like themselves, and to show their superiority over
them? Or shall we predicate greatness of the luminaries, as of the natural
greatness inherent in them? As for me, I think so. If the sun and moon are
great, it is not in comparison with the smaller stars, but because they have
such a circumference that the splendour which they diffuse lights up the
heavens and the air, embracing at the same time earth and sea. In whatever
part of heaven they may be, whether rising, or setting, or in mid heaven,
they appear always the same in the eyes of men, a manifest proof of their
prodigious size. For the whole extent of heaven cannot make them appear greater
in one place and smaller in another. Objects which we see afar off appear
dwarfed to our eyes, and in measure as they approach us we can form a juster
idea of their size. But there is no one who can be nearer or more distant
from the sun. All the inhabitants of the earth see it at the same distance.
Indians and Britons see it of the same size. The people of the East do not
see it decrease in magnitude when it sets; those of the West do not find
it smaller when it rises. If it is in the middle of the heavens it does not
vary in either aspect. Do not be deceived by mere appearance, and because
it looks a cubit's breadth, imagine it to be no bigger. At a very great distance
objects always lose size in our eyes; sight, not being able to clear the
intermediary space, is as it were exhausted in the middle of its coarse,
and only a small part of it reaches the visible object. Our power of sight
is small and makes all we see seem small, affecting what it sees by its own
condition. Thus, then, if sight is mistaken its testimony is fallible. Recall
your own impressions and you will find in yourself the proof of my words.
If you bare ever from the top of a high mountain looked at a large and level
plain, how big did the yokes of oxen appear to you? How big were the ploughmen
themselves? Did they not look like ants? If from the top of a commanding
rock, looking over the wide sea, you cast your eyes over the vast extent
how big did the greatest islands appear to you? How large did one of those
barks of great tonnage, which unfurl their white sails to the blue sea, appear
to you. Did it not look smaller than a dove? It is because sight, as I have
just told you, loses itself in the air, becomes weak and cannot seize with
exactness the object which it sees. And further: your sight shows you high
mountains intersected by valleys as rounded and smooth, because it reaches
only to the salient parts, and is not able, on account of its weakness, to
penetrate into the valleys which separate them. It does not even preserve
the form of objects, and thinks that all square towers are round. Thus all
proves that at a great distance sight only presents to us obscure and confused
objects. The luminary is then great, according to the witness of Scripture,
and infinitely greater than it appears.
10. See again another evident proof of its greatness. Although the heaven
may be full of stars without number, the light contributed by them all could
not disperse the gloom of night. The sun alone, from the time that it appeared
on the horizon, while it was still expected and had not yet risen completely
above the earth, dispersed the darkness, outshone the stars, dissolved and
diffused the air, which was hitherto thick and condensed over our heads,
and produced thus the morning breeze and the dew which in fine weather streams
over the earth. Could the earth with such a wide extent be lighted up entirely
in one moment if an immense disc were not pouring forth its light over it?
Recognise here the wisdom of the Artificer. See how He made the heat of the
sun proportionate to this distance. Its heat is so regulated that it neither
consumes the earth by excess, nor lets it grow cold and sterile by defect.
To all this the properties of the moon are near akin; she, too, has an immense
body, whose splendour only yields to that of the sun. Our eyes, however,
do not always see her in her full size. Now she presents a perfectly rounded
disc, now when diminished and lessened she shows a deficiency on one side.
When waxing she is shadowed on one side, and when she is waning another side
is hidden. Now it is not without a secret reason of the divine Maker of the
universe, that the moon appears from time to time under such different forms.
It presents a striking example of our nature. Nothing is stable in man; here
from nothingness he raises himself to perfection; there after having hasted
to put forth his strength to attain his full greatness he suddenly is subject
to gradual deterioration, and is destroyed by diminution. Thus, the sight
of the moon, making us think of the rapid vicissitudes of human things, ought
to teach us not to pride ourselves on the good things of this life, and not
to glory in our power, not to be carried away by uncertain riches, to despise
our flesh which is subject to change, and to take care of the soul, for its
good is unmoved. If you cannot behold without sadness the moon losing its
splendour by gradual and imperceptible decrease, how much more distressed
should you be at the sight of a soul, who, after having possessed virtue,
loses its beauty by neglect, and does not remain constant to its affections,
but is agitated and constantly changes because its purposes are unstable.
What Scripture says is very true, "As for a fool he changeth as the moon."
I believe also that the variations of the moon do not take place without
exerting great influence upon the organization of animals and of all living
things. This is because bodies are differently disposed at its waxing and
waning. When she wanes they lose their density and become void. When she
waxes and is approaching her fulness they appear to fill themselves at the
same time with her, thanks to an imperceptible moisture that she emits mixed
with heat, which penetrates everywhere. For proof, see how those who sleep
under the moon feel abundant moisture filling their heads; see how fresh
meat is quickly turned under the action of the moon; see the brain of animals,
the moistest part of marine animals, the pith of trees. Evidently the moon
must be, as Scripture says, of enormous size and power to make all nature
thus participate in her changes.
11. On its variations depends also the condition of the air, as is proved
by sudden disturbances which often come after the new moon, in the midst
of a calm and of a stillness in the winds, to agitate the clouds and to hurl
them against each other; as the flux and reflux in straits, and the ebb and
flow of the ocean prove, so that those who live on its shores see it regularly
following the revolutions of the moon. The waters of straits approach and
retreat from one shore to the other during the different phases of the moon;
but, when she is new, they have not an instant of rest, and move in perpetual
swaying to and fro, until the moon, reappearing, regulates their reflux.
As to the Western sea, we see it in its ebb and flow now return into its
bed, and now overflow, as the moon draws it back by her respiration and then,
by her expiration, urges it to its own boundaries.
I have entered into these details, to show you the grandeur of the luminaries,
and to make you see that, in the inspired words, there is not one idle syllable.
And yet my sermon has scarcely touched on any important point; there are
many other discoveries about the size and distance of the sun and moon to
which any one who will make a serious study of their action and of their
characteristics may arrive by the aid of reason. Let me then ingenuously
make an avowal of my weakness, for fear that you should measure the mighty
works of the Creator by my words. The little that I have said ought the rather
to make you conjecture the marvels on which I have omitted to dwell. We must
not then measure the moon with the eye, but with the reason. Reason, for
the discovery of truth, is much surer than the eye.
Everywhere ridiculous old women's tales, imagined in the delirium of drunkenness,
have been circulated; such as that enchantmeats can remove the moon from
its place and make it descend to the earth. How could a magician's charm
shake that of which the Most High has laid the foundations? And if once torn
out what place could hold it?
Do you wish from slight indications to have a proof of the moon's size? All
the towns in the world, however distant from each other, equally receive
the light from the moon in those streets that are turned towards its rising
If she did not look on all face to face, those only would be entirely lighted
up which were exactly opposite; as to those beyond the extremities of her
disc, they would only receive diverted and oblique rays. It is this effect
which the light of lamps produces in houses; if a lamp is surrounded by several
persons, only the shadow of the person who is directly opposite to it is
cast in a straight line, the others follow inclined lines on each side. In
the same way, if the body of the moon were not of an immense and prodigious
size she could not extend herself alike to all. In reality, when the moon
rises in the equinoctial regions, all equally enjoy her light, both those
who inhabit the icy zone, under the revolutions of the Bear, and those who
dwell in the extreme south in the neighbourhood of the torrid zone. She gives
us an idea of her size by appearing to be face to face with all people. Who
then can deny the immensity of a body which divides itself equally over such
a wide extent?
But enough on the greatness of the sun and moon. May He Who has given us
intelligence to recognise in the smallest objects of creation the great wisdom
of the Contriver make us find in great bodies a still higher idea of their
Creator. However, compared with their Author, the sun and moon are but a
fly and an ant. The whole universe cannot give us a right idea of the greatness
of God; and it is only by signs, weak and slight in themselves, often by
the help of the smallest insects and of the least plants, that we raise ourselves
to Him. Content with these words let us offer our thanks, I to Him who has
given me the ministry of the Word, you to Him who feeds you with spiritual
food; Who, even at this moment, makes you find in my weak voice the strength
of barley bread. May He feed you for ever, and in proportion to your faith
grant you the manifestation of the Spirit in Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom
be glory and power for ever and ever. Amen. |
|
