Ptolomy and his followers produce another experiment prefer to that of the Projections,An argument taken from the Clouds, and from Birds. And I know not on what grounds it is best to censure Nature, as one that for a lot of Ages hath been lazie, and forgetful to produce speculative wits; and that knoweth not tips on how to make extra such, unlesse they be such form of men as slavishly giving up their judgments to Aristotle, do perceive together with his brain, and resent together with his senses. Sophist would disturb and muddy it, the extra clear would its certainty seem: And that on the contrary to make a false position passe for true, and to perswade the idea thereof, there cannot be any thing produced but fallacies, Sophisms, Paralogismes, Equivocations, and Discourses vain, inconsistant, and stuffed with repugnances and contradictions. Being very young, and having scarcely finished my course of Philosophy, which I left off, as being set upon different employments, there chanced to come back into these components a certain Foreigner of Rostock, whose identify, as I remember, was Christianus Vurstitius,Christianus Vurstitius learn certain Lectures touching the opinion of Copernicus, & what ensued thereupon. Moreover, if when we run a Horse at his velocity, we really feel the air beat vehemently in opposition to our face, what an impetuous blast ought we perpetually to really feel from the East, being carried with so speedy a course against the wind?
And the stability of the Earth is not any lesse confirmed by two other pictures made North and South; for they would by no means hit the mark, but the Ranges could be alwayes huge, or in the direction of the West, by meanes of the remove the mark would make, being carried together with the Earth in the direction of the East, whil’st the ball is flying.And it’s likewise confirmed by two pictures towards the East, and in direction of the West. Salv.Before I proceed any farther, I need to tell Sagredus, that in these our Disputations, I personate the Copernican, and imitate him, as if I have been his Zany; however what hath been effected in my private ideas by these arguments which I appear to alledg in his favour, I would not have you ever to judg by what I say, whil’st I’m in the heat of acting my part in the Fable; but after I have laid by my disguise, for chances are you’ll likelihood to find me totally different from what you see me upon the Stage. They againe adde a third, and very evident experiment, scilicet, that capturing a bullet point clean (or as Gunners say, neither above nor underneath metal) out of a Culverin in the direction of the East, and afterwards one other, with the identical charge, and at the identical elevation or disport in the direction of the West, the vary in the direction of the West ought to be very much larger then the opposite towards the East: for that whil’st the ball goeth Westward, and the Peece is carried along by the Earth Eastward, the ball will fall from the Peece as far distant as is the aggregate of the 2 motions, one made by it self in the direction of the West, and the other by the Peece carried about by the Earth towards the East; and quite the opposite, from the range of the ball shot Eastward you are to substract the area the Peece moved, being carried after it.
And never onely pictures made by the Meridians, but additionally those aimed East or West would show uncertain; for those aim’d East could be too high, and those directed West too low, though they have been shot level clean, as I mentioned. Now suppose, for example, that the vary of the ball shot West had been 5 miles, and that the Earth in the same parallel and within the time of the Bals ranging ought to take away three miles, the Ball in this case would fall eight miles distant from the Culverin, particularly, its own five Westward, and the Culverins three miles Eastward: however the vary of the shot towards the East can be however two miles lengthy, for so much is the remainder, after you’ve gotten substracted from the 5 miles of the vary, the three miles which the Peece had moved in direction of the identical part. Earth had run East. For the Range of the Ball in each the shots being made by the Tangent, that is, by a line parallel to the Horizon, and being that within the diurnal motion, if it be of the Earth, the Horizon goeth continually descending towards the East, and rising from the West (due to this fact the Oriental Stars appear to rise, and the Occidental to decline) in order that the Oriental mark would descend under the aime, and thereupon the shot would fly too excessive, and the ascending of the Western mark would make the shot aimed that manner range too low; in order that the Peece would never carry true in the direction of any point; and for that experience telleth us the contrary, it is requisite to say, that the Earth is immoveable.