Why do you consider the words of a 1600's man to be relevant to todays discussion on gravitational theory?
Probably because universal gravitation is Newton's 17th century creationist myth.
It would appear that your reliance on such dated quotations leads you to believe they are also applicable to today's life.
I do not believe universal gravitation applied to the universe at any moment in history let alone today.
Indeed, are you an alchemist - divining the aetheral realm to transmutate base metals into gold? Such was the alchemist theories in the 1600's.
Alchemy is one of the only things that was scientific about the 17th century.
"Do you really believe that the sciences would ever have originated and grown if the way had not been prepared by magicians, alchemists, astrologers, and witches whose promises and pretensions first had to create a thirst, a hunger, a taste for hidden and forbidden powers?" -- Friedrich W. Nietzsche, philosopher, The Gay Science, Aphorism 300, 1882
"The science in which Newton seems to have been chiefly interested, and on which he spent most of his time was alchemy." -- Arthur S. Eddington, physicist, 1938
"For many centuries scholars thought that chemical elements were stable and could not be transformed. This is why the alchemists were regarded as dreamers, charlatans, or idiots. But in the year 1919 the great English physicist Rutherford sided with the alchemists and transmuted nitrogen into oxygen and hydrogen by bombarding it with helium. That was the day of the vindication of the alchemical doctrine of transmutation." -- Andrew Tomas, author, 1971
"It is noteworthy that, according to ancient alchemy, gold was made from mercury or lead. In the periodic table of elements, the atomic number of gold is 79, that of mercury 80, and of lead 82 -- in other words they are neighbors. It was Mendeleyeff who in 1879 first formulated a table of the elements and arranged them in order of increasing weight according to their atomic structure. The question is -- had the alchemists discovered the table before Mendeleyeff?" -- Andrew Tomas, author, 1971
They were men trying to understand the elemental nature of the physical world; conflated in their ideologies, they supposed supernatural forces for simple physical processes.
So-called "supernatural" is as real if not more real than natural.
"In fairy land we avoid the word 'law'; but in the land of science they are singularly fond of it." -- G. K. Chesterton, philosopher, Orthodoxy, Chapter IV: The Ethics of Elfland, 1909
"Granted, then, that certain transformations do happen, it is essential that we should regard them in the philosophic manner of fairy tales, not in the unphilosophic manner of science and the 'Laws of Nature.' When we are asked why eggs turn into birds or fruits fall in autumn, we must answer exactly as the fairy godmother would answer if Cinderella asked her why mice turned into horses or her clothes fell from her at twelve o'clock. We must answer that it is MAGIC. It is not a 'law,' for we do not understand it's general formula." -- G. K. Chesterton, philosopher, Orthodoxy, Chapter IV: The Ethics of Elfland, 1909
"All the terms used in the science books, 'law,' 'necessity,' 'order,' 'tendency,' and so on, are really unintellectual .... The only words that ever satisfied me as describing Nature are the terms used in the fairy books, 'charm,' 'spell,' 'enchantment.' They express the arbitrariness of the fact and its mystery. A tree grows fruit because it is a MAGIC tree. Water runs downhill because it is bewitched. The sun shines because it is bewitched. I deny altogether that this is fantastic or even mystical. We may have some mysticism later on; but this fairy-tale language about things is simply rational and agnostic." -- G. K. Chesterton, philosopher, Orthodoxy, Chapter IV: The Ethics of Elfland, 1909
"But the cool rationalist from fairyland does not see why, in the abstract, the apple tree should not grow crimson tulips; it sometimes does in his country." -- G. K. Chesterton, philosopher, Orthodoxy, Chapter IV: The Ethics of Elfland, 1909
If a neurosurgeon said 2+2=4, I would congratulate him for his mathematical ability. If he suggested it equaled 5, I would correct him.
Exactly.