746 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



How insignificant and even humble we ourselves are compelled 

 to feel, even against our wills, when we realise how small a part 

 we, and our earth on which we live, play in the totality of things ! 

 Or, to change the point of view, how happy we feel, what a quiet 

 sense of pleased satisfaction we get when we realise that the part 

 we play, even though it be so small, is an essential one and that 

 we form an integral part of that scheme of things we call the 

 Universe. This sense of awe is admirably expressed by Byron 

 in his dramatic poem Cain ; Cain is being borne through 

 space by Lucifer and is overcome with awe as millions of stars 

 seem to flash past him and he loses sight of earth — 



O thou beautiful 



And unimaginable ether ! and 



Ye multiplying masses of increased 



And still increasing lights ! what are ye ? What 



Is this blue wilderness of interminable 



Air, where ye roll along, as I have seen 



The leaves along the limpid streams of Eden ? 



Is your course measured for ye ? Or do ye 



Sweep on in your unbounded revelry 



Through an aerial universe of endless 



Expansion — at which my soul aches to think — 



Intoxicated with eternity? 



O God ! O Gods ! or whatsoe'er ye are ! 



How beautiful ye are ! how beautiful 



Your works, or accidents ! or whatsoe'er 



They may be ! Let me die as atoms die 



(If that they die), or know ye in your might 



And knowledge ! My thoughts are not in this hour 



Unworthy what I see, though my dust is ; 



Spirit, let me expire, or see them nearer ; 

 Lucifer. Art thou not nearer ? Look back to thine earth ! 

 Cain. Where is it ? I see nothing save a mass 



Of most innumerable lights. 

 Lucifer. Look there ! 



Cain. I cannot see it. 



Lucifer. Yet it sparkles still ! 



Cain. That ! Yonder ! 

 Lucifer. Yea. 



Cain. And wilt thou tell me so ? 



Why I have seen the fire-flies and fire-worms 

 Sprinkle the dusky groves and the green banks 

 In the dim twilight, brighter than yon world 

 Which bears them. 



The idea of the vastness of space was first introduced into 

 science by Copernicus and was afterwards extended by such 



