Mathemata Mathematicis Scribuntur Mathematics Is Written For

The Earth Together With Its Surrounding Waters Must In Fact Have Such A Shape As Its Shadow Reveals, For It Eclipses The Moon With The Arc Of A Perfect Circle.

In The First Book I Shall Describe All The Positions Of The Spheres, Along With The Motions Which I Attribute To The Earth, So That The Book Will Contain As It Were The General Structure Of The Universe. In The Remaining Books I Relate The Motions Of The Remaining Stars, And All The Spheres, To The Mobility Of The Earth, So That It Can Be Thence Established How Far The Motions And Appearances Of The Remaining Stars And Spheres Can Be Saved, If They Are Referred To The Motions Of The Earth.

In The Center Of All Rests The Sun. For Who Would Place This Lamp Of A Very Beautiful Temple In Another Or Better Place That This Wherefrom It Can Illuminate Everything At The Same Time? As A Matter Of Fact, Not Unhappily Do Some Call It The Lantern; Others, The Mind And Still Others, The Pilot Of The World. Trismegistus Calls It A "visible God"; Sophocles' Electra, "that Which Gazes Upon All Things." And So The Sun, As If Resting On A Kingly Throne, Governs The Family Of Stars Which Wheel Around.

There May Be Babblers, Wholly Ignorant Of Mathematics, Who Dare To Condemn My Hypothesis, Upon The Authority Of Some Part Of The Bible Twisted To Suit Their Purpose. I Value Them Not, And Scorn Their Unfounded Judgment.

Yet The Widespread Planetary Theories, Advanced By Ptolemy And Most Other Astronomers, Although Consistent With The Numerical Data, Seemed Likewise To Present No Small Difficulty. For These Theories Were Not Adequate Unless They Also Conceived Certain Equalizing Circles, Which Made The Planet Appear To Move At All Times With Uniform Velocity Neither On Its Deferent Sphere Nor About Its Own Epicycle's Center.