Book I. the Tttnple of Wifdomc. 109'--

are men intoxicated, that willfully wink againft the light of Nature, and are eftranged from the true knowlcdg and acknowledgment of a God!
But there is another Evafion, which the fame fe- dulous Infinuator of Atheifm, would make ufe of, in cafe this ftiould not hold, which feemsmore fobcr, but no lefs falf: and that is this; That thefe fightings and skirmifliings in the Aire, are onely the reflexi- on of fome real battel on the earth; But this irt Nature is plainly impoffiblc: For of neceflity thefc Armies thus fighting, being at fuch a diftance frosa the Speftators, that the fame of the Battel never ar- rives to their ears, their eyes can never behold it by any refleftion from the Clouds, For bcfides that,re- fle6:ion makes the images more dimn then direft fight, fuch a diftance from the Army to the Clouds, and then from the Clouds to our Eye, will leflen the Species fo exceedingly, that they will not at all be vifible.
Or if we could imag!ne,that there might be fome- timcs fuch an advantage in the figure of thefe clouds, as might in fome fort remedy this Itffening of the fp polinicd, and refleftion which,as I faid, is ever dim enough of it fel f, is here fo extraordinarily imper- feft, that they can never be able, according to the courfe of nature, to return the fpccies ofTerreftri* al Objefts back again to our fight, it being fo evi- dent that they arc unfit for what is of farr Icfle diffi- culty. For we never finde them able to refleft the image of a Star , when as not onely glafle but eve- ry troubled poole or dirty plafti of water in the high. way does ufuaily do it.
But that it is fareafier for a ^tar, then for any of thefe Ob jefts here upon Earth, to be rcfledcd to
our
no the Temple of Wifdome, Book L
our Eyes by thofe rude natural Looking-glades placed among the Clouds, fundry reafons will fuf- ticieiitly inform us.
Thefirft, The Stars do not abate at all of their ufual magnitude in which they ordinarily appear to us by this reflection; the difference of many hun- dreds of Leagues making no difference of magni- tude in them> formdeed thediftanceofthe Diame- ter of the Or^z'tf of the Earth makes none, as muft be acknowledged by all thofe thacadmir of the an^ nual motion thei eof. But a very {tw miles do ex- ceedingly dmiinifh the ufual bi:;nefs of the *9pecies of an Horfe or Man, even to that littlenefTe, that they grow invifible What then will become of his fwordj Shield or Sphear? And in thefe cafes we now fpeak of 5 how great a iourneythefpecies have from the Earth to the Cloud that refleft thcm^ I have in- timated before.
Secondly u is manife'!^ that a Scar h th thcpre- heminence above thefe Tcrrc'lrial Objefts, in that it is as pi. re a ii'^ht as the Sun, though not fo big , but they but Op^ks coloured bodles5and that tbere- foiethere s nocomparifoii betwixt thcvigourand fhength ofihcSfecies of a Star and of them.
Thirdly in the Night-time, the Eye being placed in the (hadow of che Earth, thofe refiedloi.sofa ytar Will be yet moie caiily viiible j when as the great jjghtof the >nn by Day, muft needs much debilitate thtfe rtfief^ed Irajiges of the Ob e6ls upon the Farch, his beams (Inking our Eyes with .o ftrong \jbration8.
Fourthly and laftly, there being Scars all over the b n mainent, fo as there is, it fhoul d fee m a hun- dred times more ealier for natural Caufes to hit upon xFiirailer or Tarajiron (for let Analogie em- bolden