Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1884-05-30
The Birth Of Planets. \

The Birth Of Planets.
First, let us take, the highway of
science and travel back throughtHe un-
told cons of time. We r poised in
space near the Pleiades ("seven s~tars''),
in the constellation Taurus. Robsd in
the brightest garments of imagination,
with eyes that are telescope, having the
wings of an angel. we start from Tau
gus, fly at the rate of a million Of miles
2 minute, and yet years must elapte be-
fore we car reach the boundaries of
| what is now u solar system. We az
rive here. ALI is void. There Is no
sun, no moon, no earth o sister plan
ct. Gas and vapor are everywher{, but
solids and liquids nowhere. Millions
| of ages before there had been cdntral
| orb and its train of worlds, a heatenly
battalion wheeling through spacdwith
a speed that almost deGes the power of
thought. But the bounds of thei} ex-
istence had been fixed. One by ole, as
their hour of dissolution arrived the
planets returned to the central orAEthe
parent that gave them birth. AAthcy
impinged upon her disc there wasIa re-
port, a flash, and in the wink of Al eye
each had been dissolved into it's orkinal
primates, molecules, atoms andy GAS.
Then, by the operation of an infinite
force, a property of the parent mhnet,
the great central orb was also dissolved,
the empty void in boundless space.y
What an awful space lieasbefoA US!
Our eyes, though telescope, can NOT
pierce it. No brain can comprehend
its immensely. Silently reposing, like
the storm forces before a cyclone, a
sea of wastefuI, gaseous matter, more
than a hundred thousand million miles
in diameter, floats in space. Intensely
heated by the awful catastrophe, which
dissolved the old worlds, all the met
ais and minerals, all the fluids and
solids, float lazily IN clouds OF vapor.
They have been cooling for millions
of years, yet their heat is still intense.
But now, while we are gazing upon
this ruinous waste, the cooling process
condenses a single atom. we see it
not, nor can we without the aid of a
microscope that magniies hundreds of
diameters. Condensation goes on.
The atom, like a cell. begins to null
tiply. A nucleus is formed and
slowly increases in size. The nebu-
lous matter flows steadily toward it.
Now we a see 1.-THE smallest speck
| possible to perceive. 1t is revolving
and has polarity. As the windmill re-
wolves under the action of = cur
rent of air, so this speck of liquid
fire is made to turn under the force ex-
erted by the flow of the condensing
gas. AS WI gaze in silent awe this lit
tie nucleus expands into a huge ball
into an immense globe! Millions Of
ages elapse, but this fiery globe con
tinues its t%ireless revolutions. Like a
sponge it has taken up the nebulous
matter. and appropriated it as apart Of
itself, until it has expanded and fills all
the space within the orbit of the most
distant planet belonging to our present
| solar system. Its diameter is more
than six thousand million of miles. A
great force holds 1t in a solid mass, else
the surface would fly off by force of the
revolution on its imaginary axis. But
the central attraction has its limit, and
when that is attained, the accretion
continuing, portions Of it's surface must
be thrown off, like balls of mud from
the wheels Of a coach when fapidly
driven.
Behold! even while we are watching,
the limit of the central force hal been
| reached and passed. See thas huge
mass of liquid fire as it is hurled into
space! Mark how quickly it tskes q
globular form, polarity and revolution
upon an imaginary axis, like it's 3arent.
| We are catching the first glim1ses of
heredlty. Neptune, the first bo1h from
our sun, wheels into his orbit aid be-
gins his planetary life. But as he off
spring in turn becomes a parent, so
Neptune threw off a portion OF himself
and moon were born to him. A child
and grandchildren trace their an
cestry to u sun. But others are being
born; we see Uranus, Saturn ald Ju-
piter as they fly off and join the celes-
tial train.
A wonderful catastrophe riv5ts u
attention on the birth of the next (and
filthy planet. By the operation Of some
occult force, instead of wrapping it's
fiery garments into globular form: and
taking its place in the train of worlds,
like a well-bred planet, it barsts into
hundreds of fragments, eech becoming
q little world, named by mortals of the
present time '.planetoids" (like planets,
the Greek sufix OH, meaning "like.'')
Fixing u gaze once more upon the
parent plant, we behold the birth Of
Mars, of our own earth, of Venus and
Of Mercury.
AS everything that our earth evolves
must return to it again, so it seems from
the analogies in Nature, that the des-
tiny of all the planets is to return to
the sun, when they have accomplished
the mission for which Infinite Intelli-
| gence called them into existence
Portland (Or.) West Shore.
Embarrassing to the American.
A friend of mine who spent some time