Micrographia - Some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies Made by Magnifying Glasses with Observations and Inquiries Thereupon by Robert Hooke
page 202 of 465 (43%)
page 202 of 465 (43%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
every way. And, according as these pores are more or greater in respect of
the _interstitial_ bodies, the more transparent are the so constituted concretes; and the smaller those pores are, the weaker is the _Impulse_ of light communicated through them, though the more quick be the progress. Upon this Occasion, I hope it will not be altogether unseasonable, if I propound my conjectures and _Hypothesis_ about the _medium_ and conveyance of light. I suppose then, that the greatest part of the _Interstitia_ of the world, that lies between the bodies of the Sun and Starrs, and the Planets, and the Earth, to be an exceeding fluid body, very apt and ready to be mov'd, and to communicate the motion of any one part to any other part, though never so far distant: Nor do I much concern my self, to determine what the Figure of the particles of this exceedingly subtile fluid _medium_ must be, nor whether it have any interstitiated pores or vacuities, it being sufficient to solve all the _Phænomena_ to suppose it an exceedingly fluid, or the most fluid body in the world, and as yet impossible to determine the other difficulties. That being so exceeding fluid a body, it easily gives passage to all other bodies to move to and fro in it. That it neither receives from any of its parts, or from other bodies; nor communicates to any of its parts, or to any other body, any impulse, or motion in a direct line, that is not of a determinate quickness. And that when the motion is of such determinate swiftness, it both receives, and communicates, or propagates an impulse or motion to any imaginable distance in streight lines, with an unimaginable celerity and vigour. |
|