You see then, studious reader, how the subtle mind of Galileo, in my opinion the first philosopher of the day, uses this telescope of ours like a sort of ladder, scales the furthest and loftiest walls of the visible world, surveys all things with his own eyes, and, from the position he has gained, darts the glances of his most acute intellect upon these petty abodes of ours-the planetary spheres I mean,-and compares with keenest reason- ing the distant with the near, the lofty with the deep.
From D...