, by some old astronomers, is the orb of the fixed stars, or the highest of all the heavens. But in scripture and common language it is used for the middle regions, or the space or expanse appearing like an arch quite around or above us in the heavens. Many ancients and moderns also accounted the Firmament a fluid matter; but those who gave it the name of Firmament must have taken it for a solid one.
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Entry taken from A Mathematical and Philosophical Dictionary, by Charles Hutton, 1796.
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