Marcu G, 1SS5.] 



♦ KNOV/LEDGE ♦ 



199 



OTHEll WORLDS THAN OURS. 



A WEEK'S COXYEESATIOX OX THE PLUKALITY OF 

 WORLDS. 



BV MONS. DE FOXTEXKLLE. 



WITH XOTES BY KICHARD A. I'KOCTOR. 



{Continued from p. 152.) 



THE FIFTH EYEXISU. 



SHEWING THAT THE Fl.XED STAK.S AKE SO MANY SUX-S 



EVERT ONE OF WHICH GIVES LIC.IIT TO A WORLD. 



THE Marchioness was verj' imiia'ient to know what 

 would become of the fixed star;;. 



" Are they peopled,"' says she, " as the planets are"! Gl- 

 are they not inhabited at all ? Or, in short, what shall wo 

 do with 'emV 



" You may soon guess," said I ; " the fixed stars can't 

 be less distant from the earth than fifty millions of 

 leagues* ; nay, if you anger an astronomer, he will set 'em 

 farther.! The distance from the sun to the farthest 

 planet is nothing in comparison of the distance from the 

 sun or from the earth to the fixed stars; it is almost 

 beyond arithmetick. You see their light is bright and 

 shining : and did they receive it from the sun, it must 

 needs be very weak after a passage of fifty millions of 

 leagues. Then judge how much it is wasted by reflection, 

 for it comes back again as far to us, so that, forwards and 

 backwards, here are an hundred millions of leagues for it to 

 pass, and it is impossible it should be so clear and strong as 

 the light of a fixed star, which cannot but proceed from 

 itself; so that, in a word, all the fixed stars are luminous 

 bodies in themselves and so many suns." 



"I perceive," says the Marchioness, " where you would 

 carry me. You are going to tell me that, if the fixed stars 

 are so many suns, and our sun the center of a vortex that 

 turns round him, why may not every fixed star be the 

 center of a vortex that turns round the fixed star? Our 

 sun enlightens the planets; why may not ever}' fixed star 

 ha\e planets to which they give light ? " 



"You have said it," I reply'd, "and I shall not con- 

 ti-adict you." 



"You have made the universe so large," said she, "that 

 I know not where I am, or what will become of me. What, 

 is it all to be divided into vortexe-s, confusedly one among 

 another ? Is every star the center of a vortex as big as 

 ours ? Is that vast space which comprehends our sun and 

 planets but an inconsiderable part of the universe t And 

 are there as many such spaces as there are fixed stars 1 I 

 protest it is dreadful ; the very idea of it confounds and 

 overwhelms me." 



" Dreadful ! madam," said I ; " I think it very pleasant. 

 When the heavens were a little blue arch, stuck with stars, 

 methought the universe was too strait and close, I was 

 almost stifled for want of air ; but now it is enlarg'd in 

 height and breadth, and a thousand and a thousand 

 vortexes taken in, I begin to breathe with more freedom, 

 and think the universe to be incomparably more magnifi- 

 cent than it was before. Xature has spar'd no cost, even 

 to prof useness ; and nothing can be so glorious as to see 

 such a prodigious number of vortexes, whose several 

 centers are possess'd by a particular sun, whicli makes the 



* This, of course, is far short of the truth. The nearest star 

 lies at a distance of about seven millions of millions of leagues.—- 

 R. P. 



t It was Galileo who first adopted this quaint form of speech. 

 He was told that the moon's surface is really perfectly smooth, 

 transparent matter covcriDg the mountains and valleys he 

 described. "If yon provoke me to it," he replied, "I will set 

 transj>arent mountains on that smooth surface, ten times as high 

 as those I have told you of yet." — R. P. 



very planets turn round it. The inhabitants of a planet 

 of one of these innumerable vortexes behold on all sidi s 

 these luminous centers of the vortex with which they aro 

 encompass'd ; but perhaps they do not see the planets, who, 

 receiving but a faint light from their sun, cannot send it 

 beyond their own world." 



" You present me with a pros|iect of so vast a length 

 that no eye can reach to the end of it. I plainly s(h) tiie 

 inhabitants of the earth, and you have made mo discover 

 those that dwell in the moon, and in other planets of our 

 vortex ; now these, indeed, I conceive pretty plainly, but 

 do not see so clearly as those of the earth. After these, 

 we come to the inhabitants of the planets which are in the 

 other vortexes, but they are sunk into so great a 

 depth that tho' I do all I can to see them, yet 1 

 must confess I can hardly perceive 'em. By the ex- 

 pression you use in speaking of 'em, they seem to 

 be almost annihilated ; you ought then to call 'em 

 the inhabitants of one of those innumerable vortexes. 

 We ourselves, for whom the same expression serves, must 

 confess, that we scarce know where we are, in the midst of 

 so many worlds ; for rcy own part, I begin to see the 

 earth so fearfully little, that I believe from henceforward 

 I shall never be coucern'd at all for any thing. That we 

 so eagerly desire to make ourselves great, that we are 

 always designing, always troubling and harassing ourselves, 

 is certainly because we are ignorant what these vortexes 

 are : but now I hope my new lights will in part justify 

 my laziness ; and when any one reproaches me with niy 

 carelessness, I will answer, ' Ah, did you but know what 

 the fixed stars are ! ' It was nob fit, said I, that Alexander 

 should know what they were; for a certain author*, who 

 maintains that the moon is inhabited, very gravely tells u.s, 

 that Aristotle (from whom no truth could be long con- 

 ceal'd) must necessarily be of an opinion back'd with so 

 much reason ; but yet he never durst acquaint Alexander 

 with the secret, fearing he might run mad with despair, 

 when he knew there was another world which he could not 

 conquer. \Vith much more reason then was this mystery 

 of vortexes and Hxii stars kept secret in Alexander's time : 

 for tho' they had been known in those days, yet a man 

 would have been a gieat fool to have said any thing of 'em 

 to Alexander ; it would have been but an ill way of making 

 his court to that ambitious Prince : for my part, I that 

 know 'em, am not a little troubled to find my.self not one 

 jot the wiser for all the knowledge I have of 'em ; the most 

 they can do, according to your way of reasoning, is but to 

 cure people of their ambition, and their unquiet restless 

 humour, which are diseases I am not at all troubled with : 

 I confess, I am guilty of so much weakness, as to be in 

 love with what is beautiful ; that's my distemper, and I 

 am confident the vortexes can never cure it. What if the 

 other worlds render ours so very little 1 they cannot spoU 

 fine eyes or a pretty mouth ; their value is still the same, 

 in spite of all the worlds that can possibly exist." 



"This love," reply'd the Marchioness smiling, "is a 

 strange thing ; let the world go how 'twill, 'tis never in 

 danger ; there is no system can do it any harm. But tell 

 me freely, is your system true I Pray conceal nothing from 

 me ; I will keep your secret very faithfully ; it seems to 

 have for its foundation, but a slight probability : which is, 

 that if a fix'd star be in itself a luminous body, like the 

 sun, then by consequence it must, as the sun is, be the 

 center and soul of a world, and have its planets turning 

 round about it. But <■ tliere an absolute necessity it must 

 besoV 



"Madam," said I, '■ a i.je we are in the humour of ming- 



- • * Hnygens. 



