ORIGIN OF THE WORLD 



of the curious phenomena involved has been given by 

 the famous Swedish chemist and cosmologist Pro- 

 fessor Svante Arrhenius. This profound student of 

 cosmical conditions believes that the spread of a 

 luminous nebulosity in the region of the new star 

 really marked the dissipation through space of matter 

 thrown out from the star. He thinks the light of the 

 star itself due to the collision of two dark stellar 

 bodies. The volumes of minute particles thus en- 

 gendered were driven off, according to his theory, 

 from the central body under the influence of the pres- 

 sure of light. Hence they traveled at approximately 

 the speed of light. The fading out of the star, he 

 explains, is due to the obscuring of its light through 

 the accumulation of clouds of this cosmical dust 

 about it. 



It should be understood that this explanation is in 

 keeping with a general theory of the scattering of 

 cosmical dust through the universe through the in- 

 fluence of light pressure, which Professor Arrhenius 

 has elaborated and given a prominent place among 

 recent speculations as to solar and sidereal physical 

 conditions. On trig whole, however, the theory of a 

 dark body ploughing through a nebula is the more 

 plausible explanation of the observed phenomena of 

 the new star. On this assumption, the phenomena 

 take on peculiar interest when we reflect that they 

 seem to suggest that invisible nebulae may be scat- 

 tered everywhere throughout stellar space. For 

 aught we know to the contrary, our solar system may 

 be darting directly into one of these great nets. The 

 case of the new star in Perseus seems to show that 



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