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distance as the earth a distance of 140 million versts 

 shows that the sun itself is such a boundless world 

 of furnace flame as utterly surpasses the feeble human 

 imagination. Indeed what conception can we form on 

 earth about this gigantic fire, when we consider that the 

 sun is 1,280,000 times larger than our sphere; and the 

 sun Sirius, visible from our earth in the constellation of 

 the Great Dog, and appearing on our horizon from Sep- 

 tember to May in the form of a diamond star, is 150 

 times larger than our sun? Human imagination, trained 

 to a terrestrial scale, refuses to grasp such a phenome- 

 non. And yet these inconceivable giants are in flame, 

 and. if so are obviously subject to the chemical process 

 of combustion, which is essentially identical throughout 

 the universe and everywhere alike requires the presence 

 of oxygen for its support. Without oxygen there can 

 be no fire. From whence, then, does our sun derive its 

 supply of oxygen? 



We can easily see that this oxygen is furnished by 

 the planetary worlds. Although physical science and 

 astronomy only recognize an atmosphere, properly so 

 called, to a height of 60 versts above the earth, consi- 

 dering the space beyond as being filled with what is 

 called cosmic ether, this ether, had it been really of a 

 nature different from that of air would long since have 

 been subjected to research, since, as our earth moves 

 through this medium at the rate of 28 versts a second, 

 it is not for a moment conceivable that, in the face of 

 such rapidity of movement, this ether should part be- 

 fore the vaporous substance of the atmosphere ; it would 

 infallibly permeate this envelope and penetrate to the 

 bowels of the earth, at anyrate in the parts of the globe 

 turned directly towards it. But while we see that such 

 an element, if it exists, must come in contact with our 

 globe, we notice at the same time, that nowhere, even 

 at the greatest elevations, can we trace its presence ; 

 hence we are quite justified in assuming that ether is 

 in fact a myth, and that, in the space supposed to be 



