144 THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE 



that ultimately became basal in the philosophy of 

 Kant). When he claimed that the sun is a vast 

 body of blazing matter, and that the most distant 

 star is also a sun surrounded by a system of planets, 

 he knew that he was reasoning by analogy and not 

 enunciating what is immediately demonstrable. Yet 

 this multitude of worlds opens out to us an immense 

 field of probation and an endless scene of hope to 

 ground our expectation of an ever future happiness 

 upon, suitable to the native dignity of the awful 

 Mind which made and comprehended it. 



The most striking part of Wright's Original Theory 

 relates to the construction of the Milky Way, which 

 he thought analogous in form to the rings of Saturn. 

 From the center the arrangement of the systems and 

 the harmony of the movements could be discerned, 

 but our solar system occupies a section of the belt, 

 and what we see of the creation gives but a confused 

 picture, unless by an effort of imagination we attain 

 the right point of view. The various cloudy stars or 

 light appearances are nothing but a dense accumu- 

 lation of stars. What less than infinity can circum- 

 scribe them, less than eternity comprehend them, or 

 less than Omnipotence produce or support them? 

 He passes on to a discussion of time and space with 

 regard to the known objects of immensity and dura- 

 tion, and in the ninth letter says that, granting the 

 creation to be circular or orbicular, we can suppose 

 in the center of the whole an intelligent principle, 

 the to-all-extending eye of Providence, or, if the 

 creation is real, and not merely ideal, a sphere of 

 some sort. Around this the suns keep their orbits 

 harmoniously, all apparent irregularities arising from 



