We know that by means of the air, which is an invisible and impalpable
body, Sound spreads around the spot where it has been produced, by a
movement which is passed on successively from one part of the air to
another; and that the spreading of this movement, taking place equally
rapidly on all sides, ought to form spherical surfaces ever enlarging
and which strike our ears. Now there is no doubt at all that light
also comes from the luminous body to our eyes by some movement
impressed on the matter which is between the two; since, as we have
already seen, it cannot be by the transport of a body which passes
from one to the other. If, in addition, light takes time for its
passage--which we are now going to examine--it will follow that this
movement, impressed on the intervening matter, is successive; and
consequently it spreads, as Sound does, by spherical surfaces and
waves: for I call them waves from their resemblance to those which are
seen to be formed in water when a stone is thrown into it, and which
present a successive spreading as circles, though these arise from
another cause, and are only in a flat surface.

To see then whether the spreading of light takes time, let us consider
first whether there are any facts of experience which can convince us
to the contrary. As to those which can be made here on the Earth, by
striking lights at great distances, although they prove that light
takes no sensible time to pass over these distances, one may say with
good reason that they are too small, and that the only conclusion to
be drawn from them is that the passage of light is extremely rapid.
Mr. Des Cartes, who was of opinion that it is instantaneous, founded
his views, not without reason, upon a better basis of experience,
drawn from the Eclipses of the Moon; which, nevertheless, as I shall
show, is not at all convincing. I will set it forth, in a way a little