THE FINITE UNIVERSE 



turus, but there are other stars indefinitely more 

 distant whose light is pure white. The inference, 

 then, is that light is not absorbed or diminished as 

 it traverses space. 



If light is not absorbed, and the number of stars 

 were infinite, then the sky would be ablaze night 

 and day, and we could distinguish the sun only as a 

 rather yellowish disk. The sky is not so lighted; 

 the inference, then, is that the stars are countable. 

 In another place 1 I have reviewed the facts which 

 indicate that the actual number is comprised be- 

 tween sixty millions and sixty thousand millions. 

 These are rather wide limits, and they will prob- 

 ably be reduced to a much narrower range as as- 

 tronomical science advances. In fact, it is possible 

 that the upper limit is at least ten times too high, 

 so that the number of stars probably lies between 

 sixty millions and six thousand millions. This fig- 

 ure has nothing to do, of course, with planets or 

 "dark" suns. 



The second line of reasoning which would indi- 

 cate a finite universe is this : So far as we now know, 

 the law of gravitation, found by Newton, holds 

 throughout space. The observed action of the so- 

 called double suns, two stars revolving about each 



1 See "The World Beyond Our Senses," p. 41. 

 75 



