Now this could not be, nor could it shine so remarkably, unlesse the beames of light, were reflected from it. And therefore the same _Fromondus_ expresly holds, that the first region of ayre is there terminated, where the heate caused by reflexion begins to languish, whereas the beames themselves doe passe a great way further. The chiefe argument which doth most plainely manifest this truth, is taken from a common observation which may be easily tryed.
[Sidenote 3: _Meteor. l. 1. c. 2. Art. 2._]
If you behold the Moone a little before or after the conjunction, when she is in a sextile with the Sunne, you may discerne not onely the part which is enlightned, but the rest also to have in it a kind of a duskish light, but if you chuse out such a scituation, where some house or chimney (being some 70 or 80 paces distant from you) may hide from your eye the enlightned hornes, you may then discerne a greater and more remarkeable shining in those parts unto which the Sunne beames cannot reach; nay there is so great a light, that by the helpe of a good perspective you may discerne its spots. Inso much that _Blancanus_ the Jesuite speaking of it sayes[1]
_Hæc experientia ita me aliquando fefellit, ut in hunc fulgorem casu ac repente incidens, existimarim novo quodam miraculo tempore adolescentis lunæ factum esse plenilunium._
"This experiment did once so deceive mee, that happening upon the sight of this brightnesse upon a sudden, I thought that by some new miracle the Moone had beene got into her full a little after her change."
[Sidenote 1: _De mundi fab. p. 3ª. c. 3._]
But now this light is not proper to the Moone, it doth not proceed from the rayes of the Sunne which doth penetrate her body, nor is it caused by any other of the Planets and Starres. Therefore it must necessarily follow, that it comes from the earth. The two first of these I have already proved, and as for the last, it is confidently affirmed by _Cælius_,[1]
_Quod si in disquisitionem evocet quia, an lunari syderi lucem foenerent planetæ item alii, asseveranter astruendum non foenerare_.
"If any should aske whether the other Planets lend any light to the Moone; I answer they doe not." True indeed, the noble _Tycho_[2] discussing the reason of this light attributes it to the Planet _Uenus_, and I grant that this may convey some light to the Moone; but that it is not the cause of this whereof wee now discourse, is of itselfe sufficiently plaine, because _Uenus_ is sometimes over the Moone, when as shee cannot convey any light to that part which is turned from her.