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| (31) [XV]. Nunc arguo sic: Quicquid superheminet alicui parti circumferentie distantis equaliter a centro, est remotius ab ipso centro quam aliqua pars ipsius circumferentie: sed omnia littora, tam ipsius Amphitritis quam marium mediterraneorum, superheminent superficiei contingentis maris, ut patet ad oculum; ergo omnia littora sunt remotiora a centro mundi, cum centrum mundi sit centrum maris ut visum est, et superficies littorales sint partes totalis superficiei maris: et cum omne remotius a centro mundi sit altius, consequens est quod littora omnia sint superheminentia toti mari; et si littora, multo magis alie regiones terre, cum littora sint inferiores partes terre; et id flumina ad illa descendentia manifestant. | (31) I now proceed to argue thus: Anything that is higher than any part of a circumference equidistant from its centre is remoter from that centre than any part of that circumference. But all the shores, both of Amphitrite herself and of the inland seas, are higher than the surface of the contiguous sea, as is plain to the eye; therefore all the shores are remoter from the centre of the universe, since the centre of the universe is also the centre of the sea, as we have seen; and the surfaces at the shores are parts of the total surface of the sea. And since everything remoter from the universe is loftier, it follows that all the shores are higher than all the sea; and if the shores, then much more the other regions of earth, since the shores are the lower portions of the land, as the rivers show by descending to them. |