Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1857-05-30
MISCELLANEOUS.
From tho New York Evening Post.
THE PhEDICTED COMET.
The Comet and its "Tsn Billion Leagues Of zaa.'

1neeusd with Indignation, Satan stood
Unterridel, and like a Comet burned,
That fires the length of ophicus huge
In tn Arctic sky, and from his horrid hair
Shakes pestlence and war;
The recent appearance of two telescope Comets
ADDS new zest to the prediction of a millennium
Comet, which u distinguished popular lecturer ot
France has used, on the authority of some obscure
German dreamer, to tickle the faucies of his won
der-l0ving cOuntrymen. 1t Is certain that no data
exist on which The predicted collision Of q Comet
with our earth can be founded. and no intimation
of such an event has appeared in any responsible
scientific periodical.
Our scientific lecturers and popular writers
seem quite as much given to the invention of
fables as the older bards of mythic stories, and
find quite as willing an ear in the undyiug love OF
wonder of a credulous people. Instead OF sum-
moning the gods to fight mems battles and destroy
cities, they predict deluges and fundamentally at
the hands Of those celestial will-o'-the-wisps tho
comets.
Science makes strange compromises with Gre
dulity. and popular lecturers dwell more on what
is uncertain or purely fabulous in science than on
well established facts. We hear a great deal from
the lyceum about the nebulous origin Of the solar
system. the existence Of a central sun in the group
of the Pleiadea, and the malignant disposition OF
the comets. These vague and unfOunded specula-
tons are set by the side of the best established
certainties of science in borrowed light, and are
thus accredited precisely as the llomeric tales
were through the traditions of popular religions.
But nave we nothlnb 10 Tear from tue Wuuuer-
ing comets? Most certainly we have. "The
thing in the world" says Montague, 81 am most
afraid of is fear :" and this, we think, is the direst
calamity comets have ever brought in their trains.
Men are nightly given to the ~worshsip of occult
causes, and when anything does appear new
under the sun 1t is invested with an omnipOtence of
evil painful to ~ontemplate
The facts in regard to these wanderers are few
and sim pie; the conjectures many and miraculous.
In the first place. comets are much more numerous
chan opualS'fvisits obNut fvn"n vaar having bppu !
observed during the period when the prize OF q
comet-medal, offered by the King Of Denmark,
stimulated the zeal of amateur astronomers.
1t is probable that all the comets visible in the
northern hemisphere, with. the optical means of
the amateurs, were seen during this period for
there was scarcely a comet which had not several
independent discoveries. Since the comet-medals
have been withdrawn the annual average of dis
coveries has sensibly diminished, and it may not
be out of place here to suggest to our American
princes, what indeed was urged before the Amer
lean Association for the Advancement Of Science"
last Summer, that a renewal of these prize-medals
in this country might be OF signal service to Amer
lean astronomy.
The comets already discovered are unques-
tionably but u very small part of the swarm which
are fitting like great celestial m usquitoes round
the sun.
While modern observations have thus estab-
lished the gregarious habits of the long-tailed
monsters, the minutest observations and the exact
est calculations have failed to detect the slightest
disturbing effect from them in the motions of the
planets, though the comets themselves have sui
fered great Disturbances.
The remarkable case Of Lexell's comet deserves
special meption. This comet passed in ITO very
near the earth. after having made a similar ap-
proach to Jupiter. Its orbit was determined and
its return predicted from Observable ms then made
but it never came back, and subsequent calcula-
tons showed that its return was prevented by the
notion of Jupiter during a second and still nearer
approach OF the comet, even within the iowa
circle of the old fellows retainers. The comet en-
tirely changed its course after ttis interview ant
was never recognized again, yet the c~ircumjovia
satellites kept steadily in their courses.
1t is highly probable that comets make a grea
show with very little material, and the chance o
the earth's being hit by the little solid matte
there is in any Of them is very small, The pre-
diction of q collision is beyond the power of math
mates, for the position Of a comets obit, and thu
comets position at any time in its orbit, cannot b
determined with sufficient precision; and even
the data were sufficiently exact to predict a col
lision of the earth and comet in their undis
turbed orbits, it would be impossible to determin
with precision the modifying effect of their mutua
action. In all probability a comet, even comm
within the dominant influence of the earth's a
traction, would pass by and be whisked off int
another orbit. The earth's body is q small mar
for q comet to aim at.
The comets tail is, to be sure, sometimes
very inconvenient length; but it gives 50 many il
dications of a ghost,y nature. Is SO Transporter
and uusubstantial, that our atmosphere is as &C
amant to it. Yet it is possible, in a collisic
where no actual confusion may occur, that the m
lignaut Influences and dire ,alumities may soak i
and 20 there is unfortunately Il chance of cOuvic
ing these heavenly vagabonds Of the charge
which superstition and ignorance have in past az
made against them.
Meteors, dark days. and diseases are still to
accounted for, and until thew are traced to the
causes men will stand, rs Lord Kenyon used
say, super anti quaS UiaS-on their old superst
tions.
The large number Of the comets, their eve
vary ing appearance, and the great PERTURBATION
of their orbits, make the identification Of any bu
those of short periods extremely difficult and, q
yet, Little or nothing is known about their natur
and constitution. C3netic astronomy is in it's il
fancy. All that is unknown is common ground
and 50 we find the physicians and chemists STORM
away ralarias and sublimated pUisons in the pei
nicious tails eager apparently to be in at tn
judgement and have a hand with the astronomer
and preachers 10 the destruction Of the world.
Various hypothesis have been advanced abo,
the nature OF the comets tail. Some have su,
posed they are vaporous exhalations from I'll
nucleus driven off by heat by their own ~elastici
and by q supposed repellent force of the su
These forces must be very vigorous to account {
the rapid formation of the trains in some record
cases. Others suppose that the apparent tails a
only the reflections Of light from portions of
much more extended substance, somewhat q 10
line of the RULED surface OF the sea is illuminat
by the sun or moon. Others again resort to Il
prince of occult causes, electricity, and thus G.
centrate all their ignorance 10 IL single word.
There our readers had better let il be left; q
meantime we ecommen them to possess tn
souls in peace. We promise them sufficient not
of the comets approach to enable them 10 M
out of its way and, if tney will leave us their
dress, we will send them the Evening Post"
the following day with a full account of its adv,