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Heareafter, when they come to model Heaven
And calculate the stars, how they will wield
The mighty frame, how build, unbuild, contrive
To fave appearances, how gird the sphere

With centric and eccentric fcribled o'er,
Cycle and epicycle, orb in orb:

Already by thy reasoning this I guess,

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Who art to lead thy ofspring, and fuppofest

That bodies bright and greater fhould not ferve
The less not bright, nor Heav'n fuch journeys run,
Earth fitting ftill, when he alone receives
The benefit: confider firft, that great
Or bright infers not excellence: the earth
Though, in comparison of Heav'n, so small,
Nor glift'ring, may of folid good contain
More plenty than the fun that barren fhines,

80. And calculate the ftars,] The fenfe is, And form a judgment of the stars by computing their motions, diftance, fituation, &c, as to calculate a nativity fignifies to form a judgment of the events attending it, by computing what planets, in what motions, prefided over that nativity. But Dr. Bentley takes calculating the fars here to mean counting their numbers. That might be one thing intended; but it is not all. To cal

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Whofe virtue on itself works no effect,

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But in the fruitful earth; there firft receiv'd
His beams, unactive elfe, their vigor find.
Yet not to earth are those bright luminaries
Officious, but to thee earth's habitant.

And for the Heav'n's wide circuit, let it fpeak 100
The Maker's high magnificence, who built
So fpacious, and his line ftretch'd out fo far;
That Man may know he dwells not in his own;
An edifice too large for him to fill,

Lodg'd in a small partition, and the reft
Ordain'd for uses to his Lord best known.
The swiftness of thofe circles attribúte,
Though numberlefs, to his omnipotence,
That to corporeal fubftances could add
Speed almost spiritual; me thou think'st not flow,

another circle. Expedients of the Ptolemaics to folve the apparent difficulties in their fystem.

Richardfon. 102.- and his line ftretch'd out fo far:] A Scripture expreffion, Job XXXVIII. 5. Who bath fretched the line upon it? as if God had meafur'd the Heavens and the Earth with a line.

108. Though numberless,] It may be join'd in conftruction with circles,

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Who fince the morning hour set out from Heaven

Where God refides, and ere mid-day arriv'd

In Eden, distance inexpreffible

But this I urge,

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By numbers that have name.
Admitting motion in the Heav'ns, to show
Invalid that which thee to doubt it mov'd;
Not that I fo affirm, though so it seem
To thee who haft thy dwelling here on earth.
God to remove his ways from human sense,
Plac'd Heav'n from Earth so far, that earthly fight,
If it prefume, might err in things too high,
And no advantage gain. What if the fun
Be center to the world, and other stars
By his attractive virtue and their own
Incited, dance about him various rounds?
Their wand'ring courfe now high, now low, then hid,

128. In fix thou feeft, &c.] In the moon, and the five other wand'ring fires, as they are call'd V. 177. Their motions are evident; and what if the earth fhould be a feventh planet, and move three different motions though to thee infenfible? The three different motions which the Copernicans attribute to the earth are the diurnal round her own axis, the annual round the fun, and the motion of libration as it is call'd, whereby

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Progreffive, retrograde, or standing still,
In fix thou feeft, and what if fev'nth to thefe
The planet earth, fo ftedfast though she seem,
Infenfibly three different motions move?
Which else to several spheres thou must ascribe,
Mov'd contrary with thwart obliquities,
Or fave the fun his labor, and that swift
Nocturnal and diurnal rhomb fuppos'd,
Invisible else above all stars, the wheel

Of day and night; which needs not thy belief,
If earth industrious of herself fetch day
Traveling eaft, and with her part averse

From the fun's beam meet night, her other part
Still luminous by his ray. What if that light
Sent from her through the wide tranfpicuous air,
To the terreftrial moon be as a star

obferved in the note on VII. 619. that when Milton ufes a Greek word, he frequently fubjoins the English of it, as he does here, the wheel of day and night. So he calls the primum mobile: and this primum mobile in the ancient aftronomy was an imaginary fphere above thofe of the planets and fixed ftars; and therefore faid by our author to be fuppos'd and invifible above all ftars. This was conceived to be the firft mover,

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Inlight

and to carry all the lower spheres
round along with it; by its rapidity
communicating to them a motion
whereby they revolved in twenty-
four hours. Which needs not thy belief,
if earth &c. But there is no need to
believe this, if the earth by revolv-
ing round on her own axis from west
to eaft in twenty-four hours (travel-
ing eaft) enjoys day in that half of
her globe which is turn'd towards
the fun, and is cover'd with night

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Inlightning her by day, as the by night

This earth? reciprocal, if land be there,
Fields and inhabitants: Her fpots thou feeft

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As clouds, and clouds may rain, and rain produce
Fruits in her foften'd foil, for fome to eat
Allotted there; and other funs perhaps
With their attendent moons thou wilt defcry
Communicating male and female light,
Which two great fexes animate the world,
Stor'd in each orb perhaps with fome that live.

in the other half which is turn'd away from the fun.

145. Her Spots thou feeft As clouds,] It feems by this and by another paffage V. 419. as if our author thought that the spots in the moon were clouds and vapors: but the most probable opinion is, that they are her feas and waters, which reflect only part of the fun's rays, and absorb the reft. They cannot poffibly be clouds and vapors, because they are observed to be fix'd and permanent. But (as Dr. Pearce obferves) Mr. Auzout in the Philofophical Tranfactions for the year 1666 thought that he had obferved fome difference between the spots of the moon as they then appear'd, and as they are defcribed to have appear'd long before: and Milton, who wrote this poem about that time, might approve of Auzout's observation, though others do not.

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For

150. Communicating male and fe

male light,] The funs communicate male, and the moons female light. And thus Pliny mentions it as a tradition, that the fun is a mafculine ftar, drying all things: on the contrary the moon is a foft and feminine ftar, diffolving humors: and fo the balance of nature is preferved, fome of the ftars binding the elements, and others loofing them. Plin. Nat. Hift. Lib. 2. C. 100. Solis ardore ficcatur liquor; et hoc effe mafculum fidus accepimus, torrens cuncta forbenfque. E contrario ferunt lunæ femineum ac molle fidus, atque nocturnum folvere humorem. -Ita penfari naturæ vices, femperque fufficere, aliis fiderum elementa cogentibus, aliis vero fundentibus.

155. Only to fhine, get fcarce to contribute] The accent here upon contribute is the fame as upon attribute in ver. 107. The

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