Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1880-03-19
The TerrOrs of PeriheliOn.

r 1t may not be criminal 10 the eyes
of the law, but certainly it is only
one step from it for public journals
kto herald with display headlines, and
| in high colored sentences, the terri.
eble calamities tc follow the coming
Iperihelion of the planets. One
would think that science itself had
Edecided that the two years immedi-
ately in the future were destined to
be filled with war, famine, fires,
plaques and general destruction,
whereas all this talk is the sheerest
nonsense, in which no man of sci
ence would for moment indulge.
1t was started by lingering faith in
astrology, and making startling
paragraph, it has gone the rounds of
the press, nowhere meeting with
the condemnation it deserves. 1t is
q discouraging sign when journalists
(whose high calling is to teach the
people, who look to them for daily
focd) sacrifice the truth to the love
of the wonderful and startling.
2 Now, it may be said that the
statement that wonderful and unus-
ual changes occurred at the time of
perihelions, is utterly without foun-
dation, or that any planet has ever
been demonstrated to have more de-
cided influence at one time than
another over mankind, That the
planets have such influence we do not
dispute, but that it is so great as to
cause mighty organic or spiritual
changes, is a baseless assertion.
That passing planet may influence
the earth may be quite possible, for
the earth is much less in size than
any of the exterior orbs, but their
influence on the sun, and thus indi-
rectly on the earth, is quite another
consideration, and when we regard
thp insignificant size of the planets
il comparison with the sun, we per-
cl3vs that the cause is wholly made
qihte to the effect. Besides the fact
tl IL at perihe!ion it is always posi-
bie for the planets to be at their fur
thest from the earth, renders the
idea Of their greater influence on our
orb untenable.
I The planets are usually balanced
|injtheir orbits around the sun, as
|..Eeir periodic times are various, and
rarely ever reach their perihelion. or
in other words, the nearest point in
their orbit to the sun at the same
time. The reader vii! better under
stand this subject if he will remem-
ber that the planets do not revolve
around the sun in circles, but in
slight ellipses, and the sun is. placed
out of tue centre towards one end of
the elliptic orbit. This bring the
planets at one point'of their revolu-
ton nearer the sun than at any 9TH
er. Jupiter, the largest of the plan
cts, revolve around the sun in eleven
years ten months and nine days, and
once in that time approaches 45, 1884,
900 nearer than at the other half Of
its long year, when instead of being
452, 744 900 miles, it is 49S, ,63S, 900
miles distant.
Now the influence of Jupiter,
whatever it may be, is more than
all the rest of the planets combined,
FOR if we take the mass of the earth
as 1000, that OF Jupiter is 300, 800,
and that of all the remaining men,
bers Of the solar system except the
sun. is only 121 ,243. But when we
compare the combined mass of the
planets and asteroids with that OF
tho sun, it will be seen that it forms
very insignificant factor, for while
the masses of the sun, taking the
earth as 1000, is 215 900 900, that
Of all the planets and asteroids is
only 422. JOB. This proportion, ex-
pressed in popular terms, would be
about that sustained by pea to a
good sized orange.
In case Of the earth, it is seen that
although in perihelion it is about
three millions of miles nearer the sun
than in aphelion, and as this takes
place every year, it certainly should
have been observed to have some
effect on organic beings. That none
such have been observed is almost
conclusive proof that no sensible
influence is directly exerted.
The great size of Jupiter is urged
as more potent cause, yet this ar
gument is superficial. True his vol
ume is l, 233 times that of the earth
but he is formed of lighter material
and this means proportional diminu'
ton of gravitation, or attactive intiu'
ence. His density is only about
one-fourth that of the earth, so tha,
he really exceeds the earth only 3Ol
times. Again, as every body il
nature attracts every other body with
a force directly as its mass and in
versely as the square of its distance
the power of Jupiter is still further
greatly diminished. Thus as Jupi
ter is more than five times farthel
from the sun than the earth, it fol
lows that it's attaction is twenty-five
times less, so that if the attraction