PARADISE LOST.
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Book Vm. Which else to several spheres thou must ascribeMoved contrary with thwart obliquities,Or save the sun his labor, and that swiftNocturnal and diurnal rhomb supposed.Invisible else above all stars, the wheelOf day and night ; which needs not thy belief,If earth, industrious of herself, fetch dayTravelling east, and with her part averseFrom the sun's beam meet night, her other partStill luminous by his ray. • What if that light.Sent from her through the wide transpicuous airTo the terrestrial moon, be as a starEnlightening her by day, as she by nightThis earth ? reciprocal, if land be there.Fields and inhabitants. Her spots thou seestAs clouds, and clouds may rain, and rain produceFruits in her softened soil, for some to eatAllotted there ; and other suns perhapsWith their attendant moons thou wilt descry, 185 140 145 Of these, the first is her dailymotion on her own axis ; the sec-ond, her yearly motion roundthe Sun ; the third, the motionof libration, as it is called, bywhich the axis of the Earth isalways kept parallel to itself. 131-136. Otherwise (that is,supposing the earth to be thecentre of motion to the heavenlybodies) thou mxtst ascribe thesethree different motions to severalspheres moved in directions op-posite or contrary.^ with orbitscrossing one another, thwartobliquities ; or else (as before sup-posed, line 122) thou must savethe sun his labor ^ and also save thelabor of that stvijl nocturnal anddiurnal rhomb supposed, this be-ing the imaginary sphere whichincluded the earth and all theheavenly bodies, and by its ownmotion set in motion all thelower spheres and was hencecalled " primum mobile," or first mover. See agahi III. 481-483.It was thus the wheel of dayand nighty invisible above allstars. 187-140. This complicated sys-tem is not needed, if the earth,by moving on her own axis fromwest to east, causes the changesof day and night. This moresimple explanation of the appear-ances of the heavenly bodiesforms a part of the system taughtby Copernicus (from whom it iscalled the Copernican system),and adopted by Galileo, who wascontemporary with Milton. Thepoet here makes the angel andAdam anticipate the inquiriesand discussions of his own time. 140. luminous^ illumined ormade bright. 141. transpicuous, transparent. 142. be a^ a star^ be to her asthat of a star. d by Google BooKVra.] PARADISE LOST, 227
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