ASTRONOMICAL.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2497, 6 January 1877, Page 3

ASTRONOMICAL.

No. XL

"ITB ONLY A STAB." When walking homeward the other evening I overheard the last portion of

an argument then going on 'twixt two men in regard to a light on one of the hilltops; it ended thus—" Its only a star." Now there is no object in God's creation so grand, so wonderful, and so overwhelming in its character as a star—only a star, indeed! Let us view the matter of a star under several heads, and sum up in our next and last letter on these interesting subjects :— Our glorious sun that rules this and the other planets, the sustainer of life, I would almost say'the creator of it, so wholly dependent are we on that grand luminary, and " its only a star." The Points you see twinkling so brightly are so distant, and so immense i in" size, that the mere thought of them is perfectly bewildering; each and every one of these sources of light are suns, and no doubt each is attended by a retinue of worldly planets, peopled, and each clothed with every kind of life and Verdure, and yet "its only a star." Our Sun carrying all the planets and their life, this world with its kings, queens, popes, bishops and people carrying rail these along through space at a fearful pace as it does—let me ask whither are we going P! Worn whence did we come? " Its only a Star." The heat and light given off, by our Sun in every second would equal the complete combustion of a bit of coal the iSize of our earthi not in a year's time, but in a solitary second, during the single tick of your watch ! What has kept up the supply^* How long will it last? Will it continu^'for ever. Oh, "it's only a. ■starve U:..-- ■ ■ ■ ■ Where is yyonder star we once saw? There is the place where it sparkled ! but » gap is there now; the star seems gone. But what has become of it with its atten-. dant worlds of teeming life E Is it the Millennium cycle of that system ? Is that blotted out sun still there, but now unseen and unknown? Is it still in existence, and yet out of existence, being now a. black, unillumined sphere? Are its planets all clad in darkness?, each carrying its own dead; each still under the will of gravitation; each and all awaiting, to be re-illuminated ; re-light-ened and requickened &fter a period of J[ong ages passed in the repose of outer-darkness. Tell me reader what means all this? "It's only a Star." Let us wish that we could scrape the scales from off our eyes and see these things as we hope to" see them, or that we could realise Richter's grand dream. . God called up from dreams ■ a man liito the vestibule of Heaven, say--Ing^t'!:Gome ,thou hither and see the glories of My Kingdom." And to the angels that stood around His throne he said i " Take him; strip from him his robes of flesh; cleanse his vision, and put ,a new breath into his nostrils; only touch not with any change his human heart, the heart that weeps and trembles." It was done, and with a mighty angel for his guide the man stood ready for his in&aite voyage, and from the terraces of Heaven, without sound or farewell, on a sudden they swept into infinite space. Sometimes, with the aqlemn flight of angerwings, they passed through" "SaUaraS of darkness, through wildernesses of death- that divided the worlds of life; .sometimes they passed over thresholds that were quickening tinder prophetic motions from God i then, (pom beyond distances that are counted only in Heaven, light dawned as through a shapeless film; by unutterable pace they passed,to the light; the light by un» unutterable* pace passed them. In a moment the blaze of suns was upon them, • in. a moment the rush of planets was around them. Then came eternities of twilight that r revealed, but Were not revealed. On the right hand and on the loft towered gigantic constellations that by self-repetitions and answers from afar -i-that by counter-positions, built up triumphal gateways whose archways,! whose architraves, horizontal, upright, reatjidfc, rose, tt altitude of, spans that; seemed ghostly from infinitude; without measure were the architraves, past number the archways, beyond memory the gates. Within were stairs, that sealed th*eternities around; above was below and below was above, toman stripped of his gravitating body. Depth was swallowed up in height insurmountable; height was swallowed up in depth unfathomable. On a sudden, as thus they rode from infinite to infinite, on a sudden, as thus they tilted over abysmal worlds, a mighty cry arose that systems more mysterious, that worlds more billowy, other heights, other depths, were coming, were nearing, were at hand. ■ „ Then the man. sighed and stopped, shuddered and wept. His overladen heart uttered itself in tears, and he said: " Angel, I will go no further, for the spirit of man acheth with this infinity. Insufferable is the glory of God 1 Let me lie down, and hide m<3 in the grave from the persecution of the infinite, for end I see there'is none." And from all" the listening \stars that shone around there issued a choral voice : " The

man speaks truly. End is there none -~ that ever yet we heard of." " End there is none I" The angel demanded: "Is there jndeed no end, and is this the sorrow that kills you ? " But no voice answered that he might answer himself. Then the angel threw up his glorious hands to the heaven of ibeavens, saying " End there is none to the universe of God! Lo ! also, there is no beginning !" " C4od of the granite and the rose, Soul »f the sparrow and the bee, . The mighty tide of being flows Through countless channels, Lord, to Thee. It leaps to life in grass and flowers ; Through every grade of being runs ; While from creation's radiant towers ■..-., Its glories flame in stars and suns," It's only a Star! Sigma. Shortland, 4fch January, 1877.

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