"If God had given instruction by means of books, and of letters, he who knew letters would have learnt what was written, but the illiterate man would have gone away without receiving any benefit…This however cannot be said with respect to the heavens…Upon this volume the unlearned, as well as the wise man, shall be able to look, and wherever any one may chance to come, there looking upwards towards the heavens, he will receive a sufficient lesson from the view of them…"

Homilies to the People of Antioch, IX.5, 162-63 by John Chrysostom