Now, as God the maker play'd he taught the game to Nature whom he created in his image; taught her the selfsame game which he played to her.

Discover the force of the skies O Men: once recognised it can be put to use.

[God] is the kind Creator who brought forth nature out of nothing.

Why waste words? Geometry existed before the Creation, is co-eternal with the mind of God, is God himself (what exists in God that is not God himself?): geometry provided God with a model for the Creation and was implanted into man, together with God's own likeness - and not merely conveyed to his mind through the eyes.

Why are things as they are and not otherwise?

I am much occupied with the investigation of the physical causes [of motions in the Solar System]. My aim in this is to show that the celestial machine is to be likened not to a divine organism but rather to a clockwork ... insofar as nearly all the manifold movements are carried out by means of a single, quite simple magnetic force. This physical conception is to be presented through calculation and geometry.

Astronomy would not provide me with bread if men did not entertain hopes of reading the future in the heavens.