If you look at the stars, warding off the rays (as may be done by looking through a small hole made by the extreme point of a fine needle placed so as almost to touch the eye), they will appear so small as to seem as though nothing could be smaller; it is owing to their great distance that they appear so small, for many of them are very many times larger than the star which is the earth with its water. Now reflect what appearance this our star must have from so great a distance, and then consider how many stars might be placed--both in longitude and latitude--between those stars which are sown in the dark space.
太阳为宇宙能量之最
每一寸角落，每一个生灵，都沐浴在太阳的光辉下。火因它而生，以此延续生命。因为，万物生存的能量由灵魂赋予。寰宇之内，再也不见如太阳这般，拥有巨大能量和光辉的所在。
in the universe there is no body of greater magnitude and power to be seen than the sun. And its light illumines all the celestial bodies which are distributed throughout the universe; and the vital spark descends from it, because the heat which is in living beings comes from the soul, and there is no other centre of heat and light in the universe,
面相术与手相术皆迷信
面相术和手相术，没有科学支撑，纯属故弄玄虚。此类弄虚作假的事物，于我丝毫没有吸引力。诚然，某些时候人的相由心生。譬如，在脸颊与嘴唇，以及鼻翼与眼窝间，如若轮廓分明，则此人欢乐风趣，反之则是位敏感沉思之人。再如，脸部轮廓与纹路分明者，严峻冷酷，蛮横无理。如纹路凸显于眉宇间，脾气暴躁。如凸显于前额，必是悲春怀秋之人。面相或许有些许道理，手相则毫无意义。那些战死沙场的士兵们，那些被海神吞没的遇难者，难道他们的掌纹出自同一模子吗？
I will not dwell on false physiognomy and chiromancy because there is no truth in them, and this is manifest because chimeras of this kind have no scientific foundation.
It is true that the lineaments of the face partly reveal the character of men, their vices and temperaments; but in the face: the features which separate the cheeks from the lips, and the nostrils and cavities of the eyes, are strongly marked if they belong to cheerful and good-humoured men, and if they are slightly marked it denotes that the men to whom they belong are given to meditation, Those whose features stand out in great relief and depth are brutal and bad-tempered, and reason little, Those who have strongly marked lines between the eyebrows are bad-tempered。Those who have strongly marked lines on the forehead are men full of concealed or unconcealed bewailing. And we can reason thus about many features.
But the hand? You will find that whole armies perished in the same hour by the sword in which no two men had similar marks in their hands, and the same argument applies to a shipwreck.
神秘学的幻梦
奇迹，为我所盼望。然而，我没有某类人身上旺盛不衰的精力。他们久居贫困，渴求天降黄金。譬如那些眷恋金银的炼金术师。那些妄想从静止的水中，制造出无尽动力的工程师。还有那群巫师和术士，他们的无知，令人不齿。
I wish to work miracles. I may have less than other and less energetic men; and those who wish to grow rich in a day live a long time in great poverty, as happens, and will always happen, to alchemists, who seek to make gold and silver, and to the engineers who wish from still water to obtain life and perpetual motion, and to the supreme
fool,--the necromancer and the magician.
医者如炼金术士
医者，对所掌疾病一无所知。每个人都将金子花在医药上。结果，生命反而早逝，医生却财源滚滚。 要让生命持久，那就远离医者。他们开出的药物如同炼金术。关于两者的书籍，多如牛毛。
病人用病痛使人获利。他将钱拱手让人，换得身强体壮。可怜如他，却还暗暗得意。
Men are chosen to be physicians in order to minister to diseases of which they are ignorant.
Every man wishes to amass money in order to give it to the physicians who are the destroyers of life; they ought therefore to be rich.
Men will come into so wretched a plight that they will be glad that others will derive profit from their sufferings or from the loss of their real wealth, that is health.
数学永不犯错
数学永享确定性的桂冠。质疑它圣洁的人，，必定为困惑所扰，终生纠缠于矛盾和诡辩引发的争论中。失了数学的辅佐，或者与数学互为抵牾的科学，它必然充满谬误。
He who blames the supreme certainty of mathematics feeds on confusion and will never be able to silence the contradictions or sophistical sciences which lead to an everlasting clamour.
There is no certainty [in science] where one of the mathematical sciences cannot be applied, or in those [sciences] which are not in harmony with mathematics.
零的价值
零代表无。然而，若它位于其他数字后，将为其增加十倍。若两个零位于其他数字后，将为其增加百倍。以此类推，可达无穷无尽。然而，零终究是无。所有零相加，与单个零丝毫无差。
if we divide any part of this quantity of a thousand, we can very well say that this part shall equal its whole; and this we can prove by zero, or naught, that is, the tenth figure of arithmetic, which is represented by a cipher as being nothing, and placed after unity it will signify 10, and if two ciphers are placed after unity it will signify 100, and thus the number will go on increasing by ten to infinity whenever a cipher is added, and the cipher in itself is worth nothing more than naught, and all the naughts in the universe are equal to one naught alone, in regard to their substance and value.
新道路无可循之理
寻求新的道路没有既定之理。
Nothing can be written by means of new researches.
