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When the whole town slept, Copernicus watched the heavens, and made minute records of his observations. He had brought with him from Rome copies made by himself from the works of the prominent Greek astronomers, and the "Almagest" of Ptolemy he knew by heart.
So many of these are at the limit of visibility that Ptolemy's "Almagest," a catalogue of all the stars whose places were measured with the simple instruments of the Greek astronomers, contains only 1,022 stars.
They might have guessed that they were globes like that on which we live, but they were unable to form any theory of the nature of these globes. Thus, in The Almagest of Ptolemy, the most complete treatise on the ancient astronomy which we possess, we find the motions of all the heavenly bodies carefully investigated and tables given for the convenient computation of their positions.
'Ah! thou shouldst know Ptolemy and the Almagest, said the hermit smiling, 'to understand the circuits of those wandering stars Coeli enarrant gloriam Dei. 'That is Latin, said the boy, startled. 'Are you a priest, sir? 'No, not I I am not worthy, was the answer, 'but in some things I may aid thee, and I shall be blessed in so doing. Canst say thy prayers?
The doctrines he laid down in his famous book, "The Almagest," prevailed throughout those ages. No substantial addition was made in all that time to the undoubted truths which this work contained. No important correction was made of the serious errors with which Ptolemy's theories were contaminated.
He furnished one of the first translations of the famous "Almagest" of Ptolemy, which opened the eyes of his contemporaries to the value of the Alexandrian astronomy. Leclerc gives a list of seventy-one works from his hand. For an account of that remarkable work see German translation by Manitius, Leipzig, 1912.
Perhaps some officer annexed for himself some manuscript that struck him as specially beautiful; or perhaps some stoker at some bath rejected one as slow of ignition. At all events a few probably very few were preserved, and among them must have been copies of the writings of Euclid and Ptolemy, the Elements of the one, the Almagest of the other."
All that I need for common use is a simple rule based on a few fundamental thoughts to give me a course upon the wayward ocean, and though it be full of error as the Almagest, yet it shall surpass the thumb-rules of Philistia. It must be a doctrine which allows imagination her right and durable career, and therefore not be monist.
Some allusion was made during the trial to Peters's work while he was abroad, in investigating the various manuscripts of the Almagest of Ptolemy and preparing a commentary and revised edition of Ptolemy's Catalogue of Stars. This would have been an extremely important and original work, most valuable in the history of ancient astronomy.
It comprised a critical examination and comparison of all the manuscripts of the Almagest in the libraries of Europe, or elsewhere, whether in Arabic or other languages, with a view of learning what light might be thrown on the doubtful questions growing out of Ptolemy's work.
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