Wilkins, John, A discovery of a new world : or a discourse tending to prove, that 'tis probable there may be another Habitable World in the Moon ; with a discourse concerning the Probability of a Passage thither; unto which is added, a discourse concerning a New Planet, tending to prove, that 'tis probable our earth is one of the Planets

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2816That the Moon may be a World. Unity of the firſt Mover. Ut enim forma ſub-
11Nic. Hill. de
Philoſopb.
Epic. par-
tic. 379.
ſtantialis, ſic primum efficiens apparentem ſolum
modo multiplicitatum induit per ſignatum mate-
riam (ſaith a Country-Man of ours.)
As the
ſubſtantial form, ſo the efficient cauſe hath on-
ly an appearing Multiplicity from its particu-
lar Matter.
You may ſee this point more
largely handled, and theſe Arguments more
fully anſwered by Plutarch in his Book (why
Oracles are ſilent) and Jacob Garpentarius in
his Comment on Alcinous.
But our Oppoſites, the Interpreters them-
ſelves (who too often do jurare in verba ma-
giſtri) will grant that there is not any Strength
in theſe Conſequences, and certainly then ſuch
weak Arguments could not convince that wiſe
Philoſopher, who in his other Opinions was
wont to be ſwayed by the Strength and Pow-
er of Reaſon:
wherefore I ſhould rather think
that he had ſome by-reſpect, which made him
firſt aſſent unto this Opinion, and afterwards
ſtrive to prove it.
Perhaps it was becauſe he
feared to diſpleaſe his Scholar Alexander, of
22Plutarcb.
de tranq.
onim.
whom ’tis related that he wept to hear a Diſ-
putation of another World, ſince he had not
then attained the Monarchy of this;
his reſt-
leſs wide Heart would have eſteemed this
Globe of Earth not big enough for him, if
there had been another, which made the Sa-
tyriſt ſay of him,
33Juvenal.
Æſtuas infelix auguſto limite mundi.
‘That he did Vex himſelf, and ſweat in his
‘deſires, as being Pend up in a narrow Room,
‘when he was Confin'd but to one World.

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