Poem 8

luminaries Officious, but to thee, Earth’s habitant. And for the heaven’s wide circuit, let it speak The Maker’s high magnificence, who built So spacious, and his line stretched out so far, That Man may know he dwells not in his own; An edifice too large for him to fill, Lodged in a small partition, and the rest Ordained for uses to his Lord best known. The swiftness of those circles attribute, Though numberless, to his omnipotence, That to corporeal substances could add Speed almost spiritual. Me thou think’st not slow, Who since the morning-hour set out from Heaven Where God resides, and ere mid-day arrived In Eden, distance inexpressible By numbers that have name. But this I urge, Admitting motion in the heavens, to show Invalid that which thee to doubt it moved; Not that I so affirm, though so it seem To thee who hast thy dwelling here on Earth. God, to remove his ways from human sense, Placed heaven from Earth so far, that earthly sight, If it presume, might err in things too high, And no advantage gain. What if the sun Be centre to the World, and other stars, By his attractive virtue and their own Incited, dance about him various rounds? Their wandering course, now high, now low, then hid, Progressive, retrograde, or standing still, In six thou seest; and what if seventh to these The planet Earth, so steadfast though she seem, Insensibly three different motions move? Which else to several spheres thou must ascribe, Moved contrary with thwart obliquities, Or save the sun his labour, and that swift Nocturnal and diurnal rhomb supposed, Invisible else above all stars, the wheel Of day and night; which needs not thy belief, If Earth, industrious of herself, fetch day, Travelling east, and with her part averse From the sun’s beam meet night, her other part Still luminous by his ray. What if that light, Sent from her through the wide transpicuous air, To the terrestrial moon be as a star, Enlightening her by day, as she by night This Earth⁠—reciprocal, if land be there, Fields and inhabitants? Her spots thou seest As clouds, and clouds may rain, and rain produce Fruits in her softened soil, for some to eat Allotted there; and other suns, perhaps, With their attendant moons, thou wilt descry, Communicating male and female