@wrestlemaniac, try the link I placed on the word figuratively above:
Whilst he was pensively meandering in a garden it came into his thought that the power of gravity (which brought an apple from a tree to the ground) was not limited to a certain distance from earth, but that this power must extend much further than was usually thought. Why not as high as the Moon said he to himself & if so, that must influence her motion & perhaps retain her in her orbit, whereupon he fell a calculating what would be the effect of that supposition.
—John Conduitt, Newton’s assistant at the Royal Mint and husband of Newton’s niece, described the event when he wrote about Newton’s life