Surface

“ And as one looks over the surface of the waters, with no visible object on the vast expanse and even the clouds lying apparently dead and sterile, and when one considers that three-fourths of the earth's surface is similarly covered, one has the impression of utter waste and desolation, with no good thing abiding there for the comfort and cheer of man. ”

“ Let’s see from what you would define a mirror—from a surface per se, in quantum est superficies, or from a substance that forms the surface, or from the substance upon which the surface rests, the raw material, modified by the attribute ‘surface,’ since it is clear that, surface being an accidental property of bodies, it cannot exist without substance. ”

“ The surface of thick, lush, summer grass, the surface of rock dimly seen, the surface of ocean, the hazy sky, all together go to form a mass 19 of glowing and yet delicate color the like of which it is very hard to find in simple landscape anywhere in ancient or modern art. ”

“ As we shall hereafter see, the machinery of the earth's surface, all the life which it bears, its winds and rains—everything, indeed, save the actions which go on in the depths of the sphere—is determined by the heat and light which come from the sun. ”

“ That every visible figure will be represented by that part of the surface of the sphere, on which it might be projected, the eye being in the centre. And every such visible figure will bear the same ratio to the whole of visible space, as the part of the spherical surface which represents it, bears to the whole spherical surface. ”

“ All objects project their whole image and likeness, diffused and mingled in the whole of the atmosphere, opposite to themselves. The image of every point of the bodily surface, exists in every part of the atmosphere. All the images of the objects are in every part of the atmosphere. ”

“ To us, who conceive three dimensions, a surface is that which hath length and breadth, excluding thickness: and a surface may be either plain in this third dimension, or it may be incurvated: so that the notion of a third dimension enters into our conception of a surface ”

“ The only way to provide against this is every now and then to look at the surface from a point at which the light reflects when the lines between the varnished and unvarnished surface will be readily discerned. ”

“ One must really choose, in other words, between the benefits of the perception of surface—a perception, when fine, perhaps none of the most frequent—and those of the perception of very complex underlying matters. ”

“ In short, they believed the earth to be a flat or plain surface, bordered or capped over with the firmament, which was composed of some clear substance, through which the sun, moon, and stars travelled. ”

“ What is this wide-spread component of the surface of the earth? and whence did it come?
You may think this no very hopeful inquiry. You may not unnaturally suppose that the attempt to solve such problems as these can lead to no result, save that of entangling the inquirer in vague speculations, incapable of refutation and of verification. If such were really the case, I should have selected some other subject than a "piece of chalk" for my discourse. ”

“ Of this immense system,—all that we can examine,—this little globe that we inherit, is full of animation, and crowded with forms, organized, glowing with life, and generally sentient. No space is unoccupied; the exposed surface of the rock is incrusted with living substances; plants occupy the bark, and decaying limbs, of other plants ”

“ The forms of those bodies are accurately such as, within a given surface, to include the greatest possible amount of matter;—while the surfaces themselves are so disposed as to accommodate a denser population than could be accommodated on the same surfaces otherwise arranged. ”

“ Show the pupils how the waves dashing against the rocky coast might tear it down, and by pounding the torn pieces and rolling them about might grind them down to pebbles and sand.
1. Land.—The outside of the earth is called its surface. One part of the surface is solid, or hard. This is called the land.
We live on the land, and build our houses and towns and cities upon it. Trees and other plants grow on the land, and animals live on it. ”

“ Nothing so fair, so pure, and at the same time so large, as a lake, perchance, lies on the surface of the earth. ”

“ That which inclines to the centre, that which rises from it to the surface, and that which rolls about the centre, constitute the universal world, and make one entire nature; and as there are four sorts of bodies, the continuance of nature is caused by their reciprocal changes; for the water arises from the earth, the air from the water, and the fire from the air; and, reversing this order, the air arises from fire, the water from the air, and from the water the earth, the lowest of the four elements, of which all beings are formed. ”

“ Of the four elements of the old philosophers—fire, earth, air, and water—perhaps the sea most of all abounds with living creatures. The space occupied on the surface of our planet by the different families of animals and their remains are inversely as the size of the individual. ”

“ The natural world may be conceived of as a system of concentric circles, and we now and then detect in nature slight dislocations, which apprize us that this surface on which we now stand is not fixed, but sliding. ”

“ The variety of beautiful forms which cover the surface of this sphere, serve, beyond the physical purposes to which we have already alluded, to influence the mind, and give character to the inhabitants of every locality. There are men who appear to be dead to the mild influences of flowers ”

“ Then, when we come to examine further, I refer you to this sectional diagram of the geological strata of the earth, in which there is a more elaborate view of what is beneath the surface of our globe. ”

“ The whole of the earth, its inhabitants, the air which surrounds it, the waters upon its surface, and its vegetable products, are composed of certain substances called elements, combined and united in certain numbers and proportions. ”

“ The answer seems to be this:—We have learnt by indirect methods that the Earth is a sphere; we have formed models approximately representing its shape and the distribution of its parts; generally when the Earth is referred to, we either think of an indefinitely extended mass beneath our feet, or else, leaving out the actual Earth, we think of a body like a terrestrial globe; but when we seek to imagine the Earth as it really is, we join these two ideas as well as we can—such perception as our eyes give us of the Earth’s surface we couple with the conception of a sphere. ”

“ Hitherto the sidereal heavens have, not inadequately for the purpose designed, been represented by the concave surface of a sphere in the centre of which the eye of an observer might be supposed to be placed.... ”

“ The boundaries of bodies are the least of all things. The proposition is proved to be true, because the boundary of a thing is a surface, which is not part of the body contained within that surface; nor is it part of the air surrounding that body, but is the medium interposted between the air and the body, as is proved in its place. ”

“ The sun’s rays, striking at all angles a sphere, that from moment to moment presents and withdraws different parts of its surface, and each of them for a different time daily throughout the year, would produce a considerable variety of changes even were the sphere uniform. ”

“ The outer surface of a pencil line represents the surface of the earth; the inner surface of the line represents the depth of man's explorations; the highest mountain would be represented by a comma resting on the line. ”

“ Each man is always in the middle of the surface of the earth and under the zenith of his own hemisphere, and over the centre of the earth. ”

“ Where are all our intermediate distances to come from?—how are we to express the aerial relations among the parts themselves, for instance, of foliage, whose most distant boughs are already almost black?—how are we to come up from this to the foreground, and when we have done so, how are we to express the distinction between its solid parts, already as dark as we can make them, and its vacant hollows, which nature has marked sharp and clear and black, among its lighted surfaces? ”

“ The first is, that the objects of geometry, those surfaces, lines and points, whose proportions and positions it examines, are mere ideas in the mind; and not only never did, but never can exist in nature. ”

“ It takes up the proximate grounds and causes for the elements of difference on the earth’s surface, already become familiar to him through his elementary studies, and pushes them back into deeper, simpler, and more satisfactory principles. ”

“ We notice the distribution of light and shade; a morning or evening landscape, a shaded face or sphere, looks deeper, more solid, more plastic, than the landscape at high noon or the outline drawing. We notice the course of boundary lines and the visibility of surfaces ”

“ From the descriptions now given, we see the operation of the waters upon the surface of the earth; we perceive a regular system of mountains and valleys, of rivulets and rivers, of fertile hills and plains, of all that is valuable to the life of man, and that which is still more valuable to man than life, viz. ”

“ The plane faces, the sharp edges, and the definite angles of crystals, and the spherical contours of the heavenly bodies, have been contrasted with the undulating surfaces, the less geometrical and more softly defined profiles of plants and animals. ”

“ As on the smooth expanse of crystal lakes The sinking stone at first a circle makes; The trembling surface by the motion stirr'd, Spreads in a second circle, then a third; Wide, and more wide, the floating rings advance, 440 Fill all the watery plain, and to the margin dance: Thus every voice and sound, when first they break, On neighbouring air a soft impression make; ”

“ As it lay there with the shadows of the mountains brilliantly photographed upon its still surface I thought it must surely be the fairest picture the whole earth affords. ”

“ In ascertaining and noting the shape of their spires, the changes of aspect, the sunny warmth of their surfaces, I felt that I was not penetrating to the full depth of my impression, that something more lay behind that mobility, that luminosity, something which they seemed at once to contain and to conceal. ”

“ This fact of reflection and the fact that the so-called angle of reflection is the same as the angle of incidence, or, in other words, the angle at which the light falls upon the object, explains a familiar sight. Have you never seen, late in the afternoon, when the sun is above the horizon, a blaze upon a hill side, so bright that your first thought is it must be a house on fire? ”

“ In point of space the object is larger and richer than any of the individual objects in nature which are beautiful and interesting in themselves. The varying forms of the clouds and the water, the outline of the blue mountains in the background, the woods and meadows in the middle-distance, and the living figures in the foreground, excite in the mind of the spectator a number of different impressions which are woven together into a harmonious whole by a most elaborate association of ideas. ”

“ They passed, dispersed and swift about the entire landscape, a very part of it, diffused in terms of light and air and color, scattered in radiance, distributed through flowers, spread through the sky and grass and forests. Space is a form of thought. ”

“ When the foundations of the earth were laid, we know who it was that “measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out the heavens with a span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance;” ”

“ It follows therefore from this, first, that these rocks, hills, and mountains, must present themselves to view in stages rising above each other, the mountains clustering together towards the central point; and next, that an observer familiar with the several vales, must, from their various position in relation to the sun, have had before his eyes every possible embellishment of beauty, dignity, and splendour, which light and shadow can bestow upon objects so diversified. ”

“ Land or water, mountain or lake, man or beast, bird or reptile, cold or heat, light or darkness, all are the reflection in physical matter of the true and real thing in the invisible and intangible world about us. ”

“ And behold, as we look further into it, it is all touched and troubled, like waves by a summer breeze; rippled far more delicately than seas or lakes are rippled; they only undulate along their surfaces—this rock trembles through its every fibre, like the chords of an Eolian harp, like the stillest air of spring, with the echoes of a child's voice. Into the heart of all those great mountains, through every tossing of their boundless crests, and deep beneath all their unfathomable defiles, flows that strange quivering of their substance. ”

“ But a rock is a rock, and a field is a field, and who wants to know whether a tree is elm or maple? I am not a geological survey, and you can get mountains enough from Craddock. Not that I am insensible to the beauties of Nature—as I have proved before now. ”

“ Every physical fact, every expression of nature, every feature of the earth, the work of any and all of those agents which make the face of the world what it is, and as we see it, is interesting and instructive. ”