made to sympathize with one another, should not seek to trace out still more of the mystery of their union, to know more of its nature and laws, and to unravel its cause. Man is necessarily, and from the very mode and nature of his existence, a speculative being. And of all subjects of speculation, the changes in the heavens are probably those which first arrested his attention. How earnestly must the master spirits of those days, when the secret of the universe was unknown, have wished and have laboured to account for phenomena which we now so readily explain, by means of our knowledge of the form of the earth: how must the mysterious alternation of day and night, and the march of the seasons, have distracted them, wearied their imagination and perplexed their reasoning. Quæ mare compescant causæ; quid temperet annum; It was in these words that Horace described the sublime but very unsatisfactory speculations of his friend Grosphus. The mighty changes in the heavens controlling, as they do, all the phenomena of animal and vegetable life, necessarily couple themselves in the mind with the direct agency of the supernatural world, and thus it was that the astronomy of the ancients, became incorporated with their mythology. The sky was Atlas or Uranus,-it was eternal and unchangeable; the fixed stars were its organs of vision; the planets, of which the controlling power was the sun, rolled eternally, according to their notion, in concentric orbs of crystal around the earth. These planets they called gods, and their path was along the milky way, Est via sublimis, cœlo manifesta sereno; They represented them by letters in the order of their distances. Saturn, the slowest of the planets, was taken as the symbol, and made the god of time, and, like time, Saturn destroyed his offspring; he took the wings of time and his name, Xgovos (Chronos). Jupiter, the most remarkable of the planets for his splendour, supplanted his father Saturn, occupied the throne of the universe, and became the king of gods. Mars, of the colour of blood, and placed nearer to the sun, they imagined to be endued with attributes of a warrior, and called him the god of battle. * "What causes set bounds to the sea, or vary the returning seasons? Whether the stars move of themselves, or by the order of a higher power? What darkens the face of the moon, or extends her to a full orb? What is the nature and power of those principles of things, which, although always at variance, yet always agree?" "There is a way in the exalted plain of heaven, easy to be seen in a clear sky, and which, distinguishable by a remarkable whiteness, is known by the name of the milky way. Along this the road lies open to the courts of the nobler deities, and to the palace of the great Thunderer."-OVID. Venus, whose clear bright light is sometimes to be seen even through the daylight; at one time precedes the sunrise, and at another follows the twilight, alternately pursuing and pursued by the sun. They believed her to produce the fertilizing dews of the morning and the evening; named her the goddess of fecundity, of beauty, and of love, and adored her under the names of Astarte, Astaroth, &c. Mercury, the swiftest moving of the planets, was taken as the symbol of speed and lightness; he became the god of motion; and, being ever seen in the immediate neighbourhood of the sun, was designated the messenger of Olympus. The Sun was adored as the author of light, order, and fecundity; and the Moon, as destined to imbibe this influence from the Sun, in their conjunction, and transmit it to the earth. All the nations of antiquity erected altars to the Sun. In Egypt he was worshipped as Osiris, in Phenicia as Adonis, in Lydia as Athys, &c. A multitude of divinities were thus frequently worshipped in the same being; a fact not to be wondered at, since the attributes which each nation assigned to their common object of worship, would necessarily partake in the errors of their knowledge of it, and the prejudices which they had attached to it. And thus, until it pleased God to make a direct revelation of his will to mankind, the history of the developement of the religious principle among them, was little other than a history of the wanderings and uncertainties of the human understanding, which, placed in a world it could not comprehend, sought, nevertheless, with unwearied solicitude, to develop the secret of it, which, a spectator of the mysterious and visible prodigy of the universe imagined causes for it, supposed objects, and raised up systems; which, finding one defective, destroyed it to raise another not less faulty on its ruins; which, abhorred the errors that it renounced, misunderstood those which it embraced; repulsed the very truth for which it sought; conjured up chimeras of invisible agents, and dreaming on, without discretion and without happiness, was at length utterly bewildered in a labyrinth of illusions. How great is the contrast! Since the age in which the heathen mythology had its origin, the religion of mankind has fixed itself upon the sure foundation of a revelation from God, and the human understanding has acquired for itself the master-secret of the universe. The wanderings of the stars on the firmament of the heavens are at length understood. The question Sponte sua jussæne vagenter et errent? no longer perplexes us. We find throughout the whole of what appeared to our ancestors the capricious motions of powerful but isolated beings, evidences of one impulse, one will, one design, one Almighty power, originating, sustaining, and controlling the whole. These beings then, to whom, calling them their gods, it was natural that they should attribute a separate, independent, and capricious existence, subject to the indecision, the error, and the feebleness of humanity, appear to us but as the creatures of one sovereign intelligence, bound down in as passive obedience to that intelligence, as the stone that falls from the hand, or the apple that falls from the tree; with no other thought, or will, or power, than that of any particle of dust blown about by the Summer's wind. Thus the whole of the sublime and gorgeous pageantry of the heathen mythology vanishes like the baseless fabric of a dream. We know that this magnificent phantom retained its shadowy control over the intellect of man, in an age of great literary refinement, of profound knowledge in the philosophy of morals, and of high civilization; and had no revelation interposed, there could be nothing found in the mere literature, ethics, and civilization of our day, as distinguished from the literature, ethics, and civilization of theirs, to overthrow it; thus we might still, in respect to these, be what we are, and yet the worshippers of a host of gods: but combine with these the science of our times, and the supposition becomes impossible; a single ray penetrating the mystery of the universe is sufficient to dispel the illusion of Polytheism, and instruct us in the knowledge of the one only and true God. How prodigious has been the progress which the universal mind of man has since made, how wonderful the vantage ground on which we stand, when we look forth upon nature; the human intellect now walks to and fro in creation, as with the strength of a giant, the growth of whose stature has been through ages, and who but yet approaches the noontide of his vigour. The first question which suggests itself to a mind curious to understand the phenomena of the heavens, is probably this-ARE THE SUN, MOON, PLANETS, AND STARS, really as they seem to be, at the same distance from us, and almost within our reach? or are they, as we are told, some of them infinitely more remote from us than others; and the nearest of them distant more than half a million of miles? Our first inquiry shall then be WHAT IS THE PROBABLE DISTANCE OF THE FIXED STARS? Are they, as we are told, many millions of miles away from us; so far, indeed, that their light, travelling as it does at the rate of 80,000 leagues in a second, has from the nearest been six or eight years in reaching us? And if it be so, how is this known? Let us suppose an observer to have travelled about, far and wide, on the earth's surface, and accurately to have observed, as he went on, the appearances of the heavens; he will at once have perceived the stars to be bodies scattered about in that great space, whatever it may be, which contains the earth, and he will have remarked that they do not alter their apparent relative positions, as he moves about on it. Their apparent positions, with regard to the horizon, are, indeed, continually altering; but with regard to one another, he finds them always the same. This will appear to him very extraordinary, when he considers that the various objects around him on the earth's surface, are continually subject to apparent changes of relative position, as he moves about from one place to another. Thus for instance-let him be sailing along the sea-coast at night, and let him observe two lights upon projections of the shore. At one instant, when he is in the line joining the lights, they will appear to him to coincide, blending momentarily into one light; as he proceeds, they will appear to separate, or, in the nautical phrase, they will open; and this opening of the lights will continue, until they have at length acquired a certain maximum apparent distance. They will then appear to approach one another; and, as he finally leaves them behind him, they will go through all the same circumstances of apparent motion as attended his approach to them. If the lights be sufficiently remote, all these changes in their apparent distance from one another, will be referred to, and apparently take place upon, the circular margin of the horizon. They will seem like two beads of light moving towards one another on the circumference of that circle; coinciding, then receding, and again approximating to one another. These apparent motions are called parallactic*. Analogous changes of bearing may be observed in objects situated at different distances from us, in the day time. Now, why are there not changes of apparent relative position like these among the stars? A slight consideration will show him that this can only be accounted for by supposing the distance of the stars to be exceedingly great, as compared with any distance through which he can himself move. He can prove demonstratively that the parallactic motion arising from any given change in his point of view, is necessarily less as his distance is greater; and that when that distance is extremely great in comparison, and then only, the parallactic change in the position of the object is insensible. Let a man look through his window at any two stationary objects without,-two chimneys for instance; if these be no great distance from him, he will perceive, that by moving his position ever so slightly, their apparent angular distances from one another will be changed, and he may, indeed, readily so far change them as to cause one to appear behind the other. Let him now look at two other objects more remote than these, he will find that the same motion of his point of view will not produce the same variation in their relative positions: and if the objects be very distant, the variation which he can thus produce will be imperceptible. Were he, however, to use an instrument, such as are every day constructed for measuring the angular distances of distant objects, there are scarcely any two within the reach of his vision, which would not appear under different angles, when viewed from different parts of his room. It is upon this principle, as has been observed by Sir J. Herschel, that in Alpine regions visited for the first time, we are surprised and confounded at the little progress we appear to make by a considerable change of place. An hour's walk, for instance, produces but small apparent change in the relative situations of the vast and distant masses by which we are surrounded. Whether we walk round a circle of a hundred yards in diameter, or merely turn ourselves round upon its centre, the distant panorama presents almost exactly the same aspect-we hardly seem to have changed our point of view. On the whole, then, since, when we pass from one point on the earth's surface to that which is even the most remote from it, we perceive no change in the apparent relative positions of the stars of that kind * Parallax, the angle formed by two different lines of view drawn towards one and the same object. Suppose a point is seen from the two ends of a straight line, the two lines of view towards that point form, with the first line, a triangle, whose angle at the point seen is the parallax, or parallactic angle. Annual parallax-the angle formed by two lines from the ends of one of the diameters of the earth's orbit to a fixed star, which angle, on account of the immense distance of the fixed star, is too small to be observed. which has been called parallactic; it follows, with the most certain evidence, that these stars are immensely distant from us. But a still more accurate notion of the effect of parallactic change may be obtained as follows: let a circle be measured only a few yards in diameter, and an observer walk round it, measuring, with an instrument contrived for that purpose, the angular distances of two objects, only just visible on the edge of the horizon; he will obtain in every different position, a different measurement; and instruments have been made of such nicety, that different positions on such a circle would give differences in the angles observed, even when the distances of the objects were at least 100,000 times the diameter of the circle. Now instruments of this kind, and of the most perfect workmanship, have been employed to observe the angular distances of the stars from points differently situated on a great circle of the earth, and no parallax has ever been traced*. It follows, therefore, demonstrably, that the distance of the stars is more than 100,000 times the diameter of the earth. Now the earth's greater diameter is 7925 miles. Imagine, then, these 7925 miles taken 100,000 times, and a great sphere described, having that line for its diameter, and the earth for its centre; we are certain that the region of the fixed stars is without that sphere. Although the fixed stars are thus observed to have no parallactic motion, yet the sun, the moon, and the planets have. These we may conclude then, with equal certainty, to lie within that imaginary sphere of which we have spoken; and their distance from us to be less than 7952 miles taken 50,000 times. The fixed stars, then, belong to a region greatly more remote than that of the sun, moon, and planets. Now what are these dwellers in the infinity of space? are they material existences, or are they bright spiritual agencies, free of the trammels by which each particle of the system around us is bound eternally to every other particle-free of the laws by which motion, in all the variety of its forms, is coupled here with motion? If not, what are the laws which govern them? are they the same with those infixed upon the component material of our nether world, or are they other than these? Do they constitute a portion of the same infinite and immutable sequence of passive being, or of some other? Did the same Hand strew them upon the face of the heavens; are the laws by which they are governed emanations of the same Intelligence? Astronomy answers these questions unhesitatingly. The ancients believed them to be the eyes of Uranus, the spirit of the universe. Astrologers of the middle ages attributed to them superhuman powers, and an active and capricious agency in the affairs of men. The astronomer declares them to be of brute matter; as passive and inert as that beneath our feet-as the clod or the pebble which we kick from our path,matter subject to the same law by which the stone, thrown into the air, is made to deflect itself in a curve to the ground; the moon to gyrate about the earth, and the earth and planets about the sun. Thus the astronomer, as with a chain, binds the whole of visible existence by one great and immutable law to the throne of one great Intelligence; and, with * Still further experiments have, for sometime, been preparing, or are in contemplation, at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich. |