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Fixt (The)

.

That is, the Firmament. According to the Ptolemaic System, the earth is surrounded by nine spheres. These spheres are surrounded by the Primum Mobĭle (or First Moved); and the Premium Mobĭle is enveloped by the empyrēan, or abode of deity

“They pass the planets seven, and pass the fixt,

And that crystalline sphere whose balance weighs

The trepidation talked, and that first moved.”

Milton: Paradise Lost, iii. 481–3.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.