"ONE'S IMAGINATION CRAC 151 



1 on the same scale and partakes of the 

 same procedure an thin profusion in creating * 



nt bounds of nature is a 



iM"ii thiit results from Herschel's dU- 



ooreii i 



The worst objection taken to the writings of thin 

 ight watcher was the strange English he some- 

 times used. M Stupendous as Mr. Heruchel'a investi- 

 gations are," Horace Walpole wrote to a and 

 table as are his talents, his expression of 'our 

 retired corner of the universe' seems a little improper. 

 When a little emmet, standing on its anthill, could get 

 a peep into infinity, how could he think he saw an 

 comer in it If there are twenty millions of 

 worlds, why not as many, and as many, and as many 

 f Oh, one's imagination cracks!" 1 "To the in- 

 litants of the nebulae of the present catalogue/' 

 ?1 wrote, "our sidereal system must appear 

 r as a small nebulous patch ; an extended streak 

 milky light; a large resolvable nebula; a very corn- 

 cluster of minute stars hardly discernible ; or 

 an immense c of large scattered stars of 

 various sizes." \V--11 may we repeat in sobriety and 

 humility what the poet, in contempt and fun, uttered 

 about the same time, 



"Oh wad tome Power the giftic gie as 

 To tee ooneli * ithen tee us." 



The last two papers which Herachel wrote on The 

 of the Heavens were given to the world 

 about four years before his death. They show the same 

 grasp of details, the same enthusiasm in working out 



1 L<tt*rt, vi. 461, 258. 



