The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1896-05-02

TIME heavens declare the glory of
God" wrote the royal Psalmist,
and it remains to be true that God
is never without witness. Day and
night his greatness is declared, and
both in sunlight and starlight, the
heavens express his glory. 1t has
often been said, since it was first
written, that "the undevout astrono-
mer is mad" and yet it is verify true,
as Maria Mitchell once assured me
on a housetop of our island home,
where we had been viewing the heav-
ems through her telescope, that an
astronomer is often so occupied with
the scientific results and mathemati-
cal observations and calculations OF
his vocation that he does not pause
to think of him who made the stars
also.
And yet there they shine, in their
serenity, a type of theeternal calm, OF
a will that knows no hindrance to its
potent sway. And when the astron-
omer does pause and lift his thought
full brow to the skies, barring his head
to the cooling night breeze, and re-
hitting, for a season, his untiring
diligence in observation and calcula-
ton, l am constrained still to believe
that to him, as to many others, 'the
heavens declare the glory of God"
He whose scientific and patriotic
career we may now consider &C
knowledged this, when he wrote his
book called planetary and Stellar
Worlds" whose chapters he had de-
livered previously in the form of lect-
ures. His words very appropriately
introduce this biographical sketch:
Ear away from the earth on which
we dwell, in the blue ocean of space,
thousands of light orbs, in cluster
ings and confgurations of exceeding
beauty, invite the upward gaze OF
man, and tempt him to the examina-
ton of the wonderful sphere by which
he is surrounded. The starry heav-
ems do not display their glitterlng
consultations in the glare of day,
while the rush and turmoil of bust
ness incapacitate man for the enjoy
ment of their solemn grandeur. 1t
is in the stiffness of the midnight
hour, when all nature is hushed in
repose, when the hum of the worlds
on-going is no longer heard, that the
planets roll and shine, and the bright
stars trooping through the deep
heavens, speak to the willing spirit
that would learn of their mysterious
being.
"Often have l swept backward in
imagination 5000 years and stood
beside our Great Ancestor, as he
gazed for the first time upon the going
down of the sun. What strange SEN
sations must have swept through his
bewildered mind, as he watched the
last departing ray of the sinking orb,
unconscious whether he should ever
behold it's return Wrapt in a maze
of thought, strange and startling, his
eye long fingers about the point at
which the sun had slowly faded from
his view. A mysterious darkness,
hitherto inexperienced, creeps over
the face of nature. The beautiful
scenes of earth, which, through the
swift hours of the first wonderful day
of his existence had so charmed his
senses, are slowly fading one by one
from his d.mmed vision. A gloom
deeper than that which covers earth
steals across the mind of earth's soil
tary inhabitant He raises his inquir-
ing eyes toward heaven, and 10! a
silver crescent of light, clear and
beautiful, hanging in the western
sky, meets his astonished gaze. The
young moon charms his astonished
vision and leads him upward to her
bright attendants, which are now
stealing, one by one, from out the
deep blue sky The solitary gazer
bows and wonders and adores. The
hours glide blythe silver moon is
gone-the stars are rising-slowly
ascending the heights of heaven and
solemnly sweeping downward in the
stiffness of the night. The first grand
revolution to mortal vision is nearly
completed. A faint streak of rosy
light is seen in the East-it brightens,
the stars fade, the planets are extin-
guished, the eye is fixed in mute aston
ishment on the growing splendor, till
the first rays of the returning sun
dart their radiance on the young
earth and its solitary inhabitant. To
him the evening and the morning
were the first day
"The curiosity excited on this first
solemn night,-the consciousness that
in the heavens Gcd had declared his
glory-the eager desire to compre-
bend the mysteries that dwell in
those bright orbs. have chung to the