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From hence they resolve all Beings to Eyes, some more capable of Sight and receptive of Objects than others; and as to things Invisible, they reckon nothing so, only so far as our Sight is deficient, contracted or darkened by Accidents from without, as Distance of Place, Interposition of Vapours, Clouds, liquid Air, Exhalations, &c. or from within, as wandring Errors, wild Notions, cloudy Understandings, and empty Fancies, with a Thousand other interposing Obstacles to the Sight, which darken it, and prevent its Operation; and particularly obstruct the perceptive Faculties, weaken the Head, and bring Mankind in General to stand in need of the Spectacles of Education as soon as ever they are born: Nay, and as soon as they have made use of these Artificial Eyes, all they can do is but to clear the Sight so far as to see that they can't see; the utmost Wisdom of Mankind, and the highest Improvement a Man ought to wish for, being but to be able to see that he was Born blind; this pushes him upon search after Mediums for the Recovery of his Sight, and away he runs to School to Art and Science, and there he is furnisht with Horoscopes, Microscopes, Tellescopes, Caliscopes, Money-scopes, and the D -l and and all of Glasses, to help and assist his Moon-blind Understanding; these with wonderful Skill and Ages of Application, after wandring thro' Bogs and Wildernesses of Guess, Conjectures, Supposes, Calculations, and he knows not what, which he meets with in Physicks, Politicks, Ethicks, Astronomy, Mathematicks, and such sort of bewildring Things, bring him with vast Difficulty to a little Minute-spot, call'd Demonstration; and as not one in Ten Thousand ever finds the way thither, but are lost in the tiresome uncouth Journey, so they that do, 'tis so long before they come there, that they are grown Old and good for little in the Journey; and no sooner have they obtained a glimering of this Universal Eye-sight, this Eclaricissment General, but they Die, and have hardly time to show the way to those that come after.
Nor are his wonderful Tellescopes of a mean Quality, by which such plain Discoveries are made, of the Lands and Seas in the Moon, and in all the habitable Planets, that one may as plainly fee what a Clock it is by one of the Dials in the Moon, as if it were no farther off than Windsor-Castle; and had he liv'd to finish the Speaking-trumpet which he had contriv'd to convey Sound thither, Harlequin's Mock-Trumpet had been a Fool to it; and it had no doubt been an admirable Experiment, to have given us a general Advantage from all their acquir'd Knowledge in those Regions, where no doubt several useful Discoveries are daily made by the Men of Thought for the Improvement of all sorts of humane Understanding, and to have discoursed with them on those things, must have been very pleasant, besides, its being very much to our particular Advantage.
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