Of the whole of Greece, as it then appeared to me from above, being about the size of four fingers, I think Attica was in proportion a mere speck.
So that I wondered on what condition it was left to these rich men to be proud."[14] [Footnote 14: Ikaromenippus; or, Above the Clouds.

Prof.D.C.

Brown's translation.] Such scenes as Lucian beheld, in imagination, upon the earth while looking from the moon, many would fain behold, with telescopic aid, upon the moon while looking from the earth.

Galileo believed that the details of the lunar surface revealed by his telescope closely resembled in their nature the features of the earth's surface, and for a long time, as the telescope continued to be improved, observers were impressed with the belief that the moon possessed not only mountains and plains, but seas and oceans also.
It was the discovery that the moon has no perceptible atmosphere that first seriously undermined the theory of its habitability.

Yet, as was remarked in the introductory chapter, there has of late been some change of view concerning a lunar atmosphere; but the change has been not so much in the ascertained facts as in the way of looking at those facts.
But before we discuss this matter, it will be well to state what is known beyond peradventure about the moon.
Its mean distance from the earth is usually called, for the sake of a round number, 240,000 miles, but more accurately stated it is 238,840 miles.