e hoped a perfection of
_Dioptricks_, and a transmigration into heaven, even whil'st we remain here
upon earth in the flesh, and a descending or penetrating into the center
and innermost recesses of the earth, and all earthly bodies; nay, it would
open not onely a cranney, but a large window (as I may so speak) into the
Shop of Nature, whereby we might be enabled to see both the tools and
operators, and the very manner of the operation it self of Nature; this,
could it be effected, would as farr surpass all other kind of perspectives
as the vast extent of Heaven does the small point of the Earth, which
distance it would immediately remove, and unite them, as 'twere, into one,
at least, that there should appear no more distance between them then the
length of the Tube, into the ends of which these Glasses should be
inserted: Now, whether this may not be effected with parcels of Glass of
several densities, I have sometimes proceeded so farr as to doubt (though
in truth, as to the general, I have wholly despair'd of it) for I have
often observ'd in Optical Glasses a very great variety of the parts, which
are commonly called Veins; nay, some of them round enough (for they are for
the most part, drawn out into firings) to constitute a kind of _lens_.

This I should further proceed to hope, had any one been so inquisitive as
to have found out the way of making any transparent body, either more dense
or more rare, for then it might be possible to compose a Globule that
should be more dense in the middle of it, then in any other part, and to
compose the whole bulk, so as that there should be a continual gradual
transition from one degree of density to another; such as should be found
requisite for the desired inflection of the _transmigrating_ Rays; but of
this enough at present, because I may say more of it when I set down my own
Trials concerning the melioration of _Dioptricks_, where I shall enumerate
with how many several substances I have made both _Microscopes_, and
_Telescopes_, and by what and how many, ways: Let such as have leisure and
opportunity farther consider it.

The next Quaery shall be, whether by the same collection of a more dense
body then the other, or at least, of the denser part of the other, there
might not be imagin'd a reason of the apparition of some new fix'd Stars,
as those in the Swan, _Cassiope's Charr_, _Serpentarius_, _Piscis_,
_Cetus_, &c.

Thirdly, Whether it be possible to define the height