408 
and now I shall proceed to show that, so far as our knowledge goes, we cannot 
consider it to be even improbable.” (P. 31.) 
I must make two further brief citations from the “ Wrang- 
ler's }} pamphlet. He comes to this conclusion, among 
others : — - 
“ (2.) That the law of mutual attraction is not universal ; some constella- 
tions attract while others repel.” (P. 32.) 
And he goes on — 
“ As [this] answer implies that Newton’s law of gravity is not universally 
true, and drives us to the assumption of some conflicting law of repulsion, 
there must be a more general law, comprehending these two, which shall 
determine under what circumstances each of these opposite forces is to act ; 
but of this law we know, as yet, nothing.” (P. 33.) 
41. I have made these citations from this remarkable pam- 
phlet — chiefly remarkable because it comes from a Cambridge 
wrangler — for the sake of its facts and mathematical testi- 
mony, but not as always agreeing with the candid author’s 
arguments. He takes, in fact, “ a too simply mathematical 
view of the case,^ — in that respect being thoroughly Newtonian ! 
(vide § 15.) Mathematically, no doubt, and as far as prac- 
tical astronomy is concerned, it may not signify whether the 
earth or the sun is regarded as in the centre ; but theoretically 
and physically it makes all the difference in the world. If the 
sun is regarded as the centre,, with the earth describing an orbit 
round it at a distance of 91 million miles, and the exterior 
planets are all still further and further off, then the fixed 
stars are necessarily banished far away to the inconceivably 
immense distances that current physical astronomy assigns to 
them. But if the earth is in the centre, whether at perfect 
rest or only rotating on its axis, then all these enormous 
distances would be reduced, either on the Ptolemaic theory or 
on that of Tycho Brahe. And this brings me naturally to 
another question, which I have frequently been asked, 
namely. What theory have I of my own, to substitute for that 
which I have claimed to upset ? To that question I beg leave 
to reply,* that twenty-seven years ago I should have been 
much more likely to propound a fresh theory than I am now. 
In fact, I then had a theory, and at that time it was not anti- 
Copernican, but proceeded upon the hypothesis which I had 
been taught, like you, to believe in from childhood, namely, 
that the sun is at rest and the centre of our system. I frankly 
confess, however, that the more I have studied this subject, 
only the more inclined have I become to depart from all the 
teachings of our current physical astronomy ! And I must 
observe that it is a popular delusion to suppose, that a helio- 
