58 KANT'S UNIVERSAL NATURAL HISTORY 



orbits as much as possible into one plane, and has striven 

 to limit the deviations from it. 



Following out this idea, the System of the Fixed Stars 

 may be viewed as represented in some measure by the 

 System of the Planets, if the latter be regarded as in- 

 definitely enlarged. If instead of the six planets with 

 their ten companions, we suppose there to be as many 

 thousands of them; if the twenty-eight or thirty comets 

 which have been observed be multiplied a hundred or a 

 thousand times, and if we suppose these same bodies 

 to be self-luminous, then the eye of the spectator look- 

 ing at them from the earth would see before it just the 

 very appearance of what is presented to it by the fixed 

 stars of the Milky Way. For these supposed planets, 

 by their proximity to the common- plane of their relation, 

 being situated with our earth in the same plane, would 

 present to us a zone densely illuminated by innumerable 

 stars, and its direction would be that of a great circle of 

 the celestial sphere. This streak of light would be seen 

 everywhere thickly sown with stars, although, according 

 to the hypothesis, they are wandering stars and con- 

 sequently not fixed to one place ; for by their displacement 

 there would always be found stars enough on one side, 

 although others had changed from that position. 



The breadth of this luminous zone, which represents 

 a sort of zodiac, will be determined by the different 

 degrees of the deviation of the said wandering stars 

 from the plane of their relation, and by the inclination 

 of their orbits to this plane; and as most of them are 

 near this plane, their number will appear more scattered 

 according to the degree of their distance from it. But 

 the comets which occupy all the regions of space without 



