16 FKOM NEBULA TO NEBULA 



taught at Cambridge and Oxford in competition with 

 those of Descartes ! Truly, a prophet is often without 

 honor in his own generation as well as in his own country. 

 tempora ! mores ! To-day Newton 's fame fills the 

 world, and a new generation has arisen that honors his 

 opinions above Nature's truths, and even counts it a 

 virtue to shield his errors against exposure and correc- 

 tion! 



The generality of men labor under the delusion that 

 in the serene domain of pure science the day is past when 

 selfish considerations and bigotry cut a figure in its de- 

 velopment. This is a pathetic mistake. Like any prosaic, 

 commercial business, the established system of astronomy 

 has been virtually capitalized in many ways, and this 

 capital calls for protection from those holding its shares, 

 and in proportion to the size of such holdings. Thousands 

 of copyrighted books and pamphlets, the reputations of 

 famous scholars, their salaried positions, and even their 

 characters as sincere and truthful men, are, in a way, 

 wagered upon the vindication of the traditional dogmas 

 of the science. They vouch, in effect : that the universe is 

 fleeting ; that the law of gravitation is at once theoreti- 

 cally exact, but objectively inexact; that the law of equi- 

 librium does not hold good of cosmic bodies ; that their 

 theory of tides is per se true, though false to nature ; that 

 gravitation is a mere abstraction and not a conservable 

 force ; that mechanical motions exist without antecedent 

 causes but the list is endless. 



The question as to whether these doctrines are true 

 or not, is no longer one for the profession of astronomers 

 to decide, but for the educated world at large. To this 

 latter court I now appeal. The highest astronomical 

 court has time and again affirmed and reaffirmed these 

 monstrous propositions, has repeatedly refused reargu- 

 ments, and, in any event, is the real defendant in the mat- 

 ters at issue and cannot be prudently trusted to render a 

 just and impartial decision in a suit involving the reten- 

 tion of all that it has so long stood for. Astronomers have 

 long recognized that their real refuge is in sphinx-like 



