80 SCENERY IN A PATCH 



the nearest. It is visible to the naked eye in the absence of 

 the moon, and has often been mistaken for a comet. A no- 

 tice of it occurs as early as the commencement of the tenth 

 century. The first telescopic view was obtained by Simon 

 Marius, December 15, 1612, who compared it to a candle 

 shining through a horn, that is, a diluted light increasing 

 in density towards a centre. This nebula is of an oval or 

 lenticular shape, and forms nearly a right-angled triangle 

 with Alrnaach Mirach, the two chief stars of Andromeda. 

 A good eye may pick it up on a favorable night, by project- 

 ing a line from Sheratan, the second star in Aries, through 

 Mirach to about 4d beyond. It is about half a degree long, 

 and from 15' to 20' broad. Herschel, who deemed this 

 one of the nearest nebulas in the heavens, remarks : " The 

 brightest part of it approaches to the resolvable nebulosity, 

 and begins to show a faint red color ; which from many ob- 

 servations on the magnitude and color of nebulae, I believe 

 to be an indication that its distance in the colored part does 

 not exceed 2000 times the distance of Sirius." This is the 

 rather extensive interval of 38,000,000,000,000,000, of 

 miles, a space which light will reytiire more than 6000 

 years to traverse, so that a ray that now meets the eye 

 must have started from its source before the creation of 

 man, and a ray that is now leaving it will not accomplish 

 the distance till the world is six thousand years older. 



Those who have treated the nebulae hypothesis with ridi- 

 cule have strangely forgotten what is daily passing before 

 their eyes forgotten the uniform plan of Providence with 

 reference to the world in which we live. What is man 

 full-grown, active, intellectual man as he appears in the 

 maturity of his powers, the noontide of his day, but an 

 example of ascension from a crude to a higher condition ? 

 By gradual and slow degrees, he acquires his vigor of frame, 

 fluency of speech, agility of movement, and furniture of mind. 



We have no more occasion to stumble at the idea that 



