The innumerable images of the solar rays reflected from the innumerable waves of the sea, as they fall upon those waves, are what cause us to see the very broad and continuous radiance on the surface of the sea.
897.
That the sun could not be mirrored in the body of the moon, which is a convex mirror, in such a way as that so much of its surface as is illuminated by the sun, should reflect the sun unless the moon had a surface adapted to reflect it—in waves and ridges, like the surface of the sea when its surface is moved by the wind.
[Footnote: In the original diagrams sole is written at the place marked A; luna at C, and terra at the two spots marked B.]
The waves in water multiply the image of the object reflected in it.
These waves reflect light, each by its own line, as the surface of the fir cone does [Footnote 14: See the diagram p. 145.]
These are 2 figures one different from the other; one with undulating water and the other with smooth water.
It is impossible that at any distance the image of the sun cast on the surface of a spherical body should occupy the half of the sphere.
Here you must prove that the earth produces all the same effects with regard to the moon, as the moon with regard to the earth.
The moon, with its reflected light, does not shine like the sun, because the light of the moon is not a continuous reflection of that of the sun on its whole surface, but only on the crests and hollows of the waves of its waters; and thus the sun being confusedly reflected, from the admixture of the shadows that lie between the lustrous waves, its light is not pure and clear as the sun is.