Optical Phenomena Quotes

When we sit down to draw or paint the sun's rays, we generally use yellow because in the morning and the evening with the blue light scattered away so strongly you're left with a little bit of red and it comes out yellowish.

Qu. 31. Have not the small Particles of Bodies certain Powers, Virtues or Forces, by which they act at a distance, not only upon the Rays of Light for reflecting, refracting and reflecting them, but also upon one another for producing a great part of the Phænomena of Nature?

Doth not this Æthereal Medium in passing out of Water, Glass, Crystal, and other compact and dense Bodies into empty Spaces, grow denser and denser by degrees, and by that means refract the Rays of Light not in a point, but by bending them gradually in curve Lines? And doth not the gradual condensation of this Medium extend to some distance from the Bodies, and thereby cause the Inflexions of the Rays of Light, which pass by the edges of dense Bodies, at some distance from the Bodies?

Do not the Rays of Light which fall upon Bodies, and are reflected or refracted, begin to bend before they arrive at the Bodies; and are they not reflected, refracted, and inflected, by one and the same Principle, acting variously in various Circumstances?

My Design in this Book is not to explain the Properties of Light by Hypotheses, but to propose and prove them by Reason and Experiments: In order to which, I shall premise the following Definitions and Axioms.

One might not think of light as a matter of fact, but I do. And it is, as I said, as plain and open and direct an art as you will ever find.

Perspective is an Art Mathematical which demonstrates the manner and properties of all radiations direct, broken and reflected.

The simplest forms in the universe are the sphere and the circle. I represent them by disks and then I vary them... spheres of different sizes, densities, colours and volumes, floating in space, traversing clouds, sprays of water, currents of air, viscosities and odours - of the greatest variety and disparity.

The hues of the opal, the light of the diamond, are not to be seen if the eye is too near.

I happen to have discovered a direct relation between magnetism and light, also electricity and light, and the field it opens is so large and I think rich.

The laws of the colors are unutterably beautiful, just because they are not accidental.

Do not Bodies and Light act mutually upon one another; that is to say, Bodies upon Light in emitting, reflecting, refracting and inflecting it, and Light upon Bodies for heating them, and putting their parts into a vibrating motion wherein heat consists?

I have also a paper afloat, with an electromagnetic theory of light, which, till I am convinced to the contrary, I hold to be great guns.

The instant the atmosphere is illuminated it will be filled with an infinite number of images which are produced by the various bodies and colours assembled in it. And the eye is the target, a lodestone, of these images.