The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1870-05-07
Immensely Of Space.

The mere nothingness of this planet, as com.
pared to the known and visible collection of
worlds of which it forms part, is we'll ex.
pressed in the following article from the NORTH
British Recie1.
"In waiting ourselves in imagination to our
own satellite, the moon-the nearest Of our &c.
lestial bodes-we have passed over distance
equal to thirty times the diameter Of our globe.
In advancing to the sun, we travel over dis.
lance equal to thirty times that of the moon
and before we reach Uranus, the remotest of the
planets, we have traversed Il space equal to
twenty times the earth's distance from the sun.
Thus placed at the limits of a system inclosed
IN circle of eighteen hundred million of miles
in radius, our appreciation of distance would
appear to be exhausted. and we seem to be on
the margin of an unfathomable abyss. The tel.
escope, however, and the mura circle, enable us
to span the void, and the genius of man, proud
of the achievement-and Justly, if humbly
proud-has crossed the gulf 10000 times the
radius of his own system, that he may study
the nearest world in the armament of heaven.
Beyond this frontier lies the whole universe of
stars-their binary systems-their clusters, and
their nebulous combinations. The observed
parallax of one-fourth of second in Lyra car.
ries us four times as far into the bosom of space
but though beyond this we have no positive
measure of distance, it would be as unphilosoph-
zeal to assign Its limits to creation, as to give it
an infinite range. In this rapid fight into space
we have traversed it il but one dimension, and
the line which we have traced is but unit in
the celestial distance. Creation. in its wide pan.
orama is still above, and around us. The over.
arching heavens still inclose u.s. and innumerable
worlds sparkle in its canopy. If from this
bourne-frem which the astronomical traveller
alone returns--we look upon our course, our own
planetary system ceases to be perceived. Its sun
is dim-itsef but An invisible point in the neb.
ulous light that intervenes Where, then, is
our terrestrial ball its oceans, its continents it's
Ihouutatt-, empires, dynasties, its thrones?
w here Is our tatheraud, its factions, its Chris.
tan d'Nunlons its crimes, and its unholy wars?
Where Is our home: its peace its endearments,
its hopes, and its fears Where is man, the in
tellectual mound, the only atom of organic life
that plerces the depths, and interprets the enig-
ma OF the Universe and yet the only spark of
aspiritual nature which disclaims the authority
and resists the will of the Universal King
They have all disappeared in the far-otf per.
sPectiVe--the long vis.a of space whose apex,
Were II sun, the hugest telescope would fail TO
descry. No living thing here meets the eve, and
no sentiment associated with lite presses on the
affections. The tiny organism of earth and
ocean-everything that moves and breathes. that
lives and dies--all are engulied in the great con.
ception of the universe. The straninc mind
cannot unite the unreasonable extremes The
INFINITE IN space. the eternal in duration the
omnipotont III power the perfect in wisdom
alone fill the expanded soul, and portray in their
magnificent combination the Creator of the
Universe"
1t seems that the Indian understood the art
and mystery Of "Spiritualism, SO far at least as
the rope-tying of the Davenports and so forth,
is concerned, long time ago A resident Of
Alton, Ill., familiar for years with Indian isc.
declares that the ASSiatJoins used to be pos,ed