PARALLAX OF NINE STARS. 



It appears, then, that of the vast multitudes of stars to which 

 the labours of observers have been directed, there are not more 

 than nine which are near enough to pur system to be sensibly 

 affected in their apparent directions- by the orbital motion of the 

 earth ; and that the greatest change produced in the direction 

 of any of these, when seen from opposite sides of the earth's 

 orbit, does not amount to quite so much as one second ; while, 

 for those least affected, it does not amount to so much as the tenth 

 of a second ; and the necessary inference is, that the nearest of 

 the stars which are scattered in such countless numbers over the 

 heavens, is at a distance over which light would take three years 

 and a-half to pass, moving during that interval through two hun- 

 dred thousand miles in each second of time. 



20. The solar system is, consequently, surrounded in every 

 direction, above, below, and on every side, by a vast abyss, in 

 which no masses of matter, bearing any analogy to the sun or 

 planets, are found; and, indeed, the physical necessity of such a 

 surrounding vacuum will be evident, when it is considered that 

 the proximity of any such masses to the solar system would, by 

 reason of their disturbing forces, throw that system into utter 

 confusion ; that it would derange the succession and limits of 

 seasons for all the worlds composing it ; would expose them to 

 extremes of temperature incompatible with organised life ; and 

 would, ere long, bring them into destructive and fatal collision 

 with each other, or with the masses in their neighbourhood. 



We see, therefore, that if Omnipotence has withdrawn the exer- 

 tion of its creative power from the realms of space which imme- 

 diately surround us, it has not done so without good and 

 beneficent reasons, and that there is as much to admire in the 

 absence of such manifestation of power in these regions, as in its 

 presence elsewhere. 



21. The most inattentive observer of the heavens will be struck 

 with the fact, that the multitude of stars which are presented to 

 his view vary extremely in splendour. Some few might be 

 imagined to shed a perceptible light, and are truly magnificent 

 objects, even when viewed only by the naked eye ; while others 

 are so minute and faint, as to be barely perceptible. Between 

 these extremes there are infinite gradations ; and astronomers, in 

 adopting a classification, encounter the same difficulty as is pre- 

 sented in every other case in which, for the purposes of science, 

 natural objects are required to be distributed in a limited number 

 of distinct groups. Nature has, in all cases, created them as in- 

 dividuals, distinguished one from another by infinitely minute 

 and faint gradations and characters, while our limited faculties 

 compel us to contemplate them, and reason upon them, as though 



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