The Cook County herald., 1897-09-04

SfA6X6b& CAAAh1A6 VI
WGpp vastness of e b Ell
great dome above
us, but the simple
human mind falls
co. grasp the extent of the mighty
grandeur shown in the authentic
statements of the astronomer. The
TACT is, the figures are beyond compre-8
hension of the ordinary intellect when
set down in rows that bewilder. We
are told that the first three figures are
units, tens ana hundreds, the next
three thousands, the next millions andS
the next billions. The figures look in-ss
nocent enough and we can smile att
hundreds of dollars and think with
pleasurable feelings of thousands
which melt into Millions, but the brow
clouds with. care when we endeavor3
to get a comprehensive idea Of th1ts
wonderfully overwhelming quantity
set down as billion. Now, what is
. instantaneous action? The mind is
incapable of comprehending the all
most inf1nitesimal divisions of time
that are recorded upon some of the.
wonderful machines used by scientific
searchers after the truth. Light trav-5
els at the rate of two hundred thousand
miles a second, and is, therefore, in
Simultaneous. The astronomers tell us
that when a flash of lightning occurs
upon our earth it is not visible on the
moon until a second and a quarter at
terwards, nor on the suns surface un-&
til eight minutes, or on Uranus for
two hours, and upon Neptune until
four and a quarter hours after its
passage through the ether. Nov
away, far, far away, beyond Neptune,
there are such stars as Vega, of the
first magnitude and on them the inn
aginarys lightsof the flash would not
fall lthol1gh trayeIi the amazing
rate Of twelve million miles minute,
till forty-f1ve years had passed, but
further, much further on in the never
ending space above US, there are still
more distant worlds, sparkling like
diamonds on blue velvet, and those of
the eighth magnitude would require
one hundl ed and eighty years, and
those of the twelfth magnitude four
thousand years, for the same flash to
reach them, rushing through space
nearly two hundred thousand miles
each time that watch makes single
tick.
A shadowy sense of eternity and in
finite distance can be formed from a
o0nfor1o nj a. fiNr Of ho 1;cfo ~f
stars from the earth. The moon is two
hundred and forty thousand miles dis
tant, but the sun is ninety three mil
lion two hundred and fifty thousand
miles from our planet. The immen-
sity of the sun seems almost too much
for the human mind to comprehend,
for it is more than a million and
| quarter times larger than this great
earth on which we live. Sir John Her.
schel remarks that if the whole of the
earth were laid upon the surface of the
sun it would not cover more than one
thirteenth-thousandth part of it's sur
face, and so great is it's heat that from
every square yard of it's surface there
| is exhaled temperature equal to that
which the burning of sixteen tons of
coal every hour would produce-suffi-
| clent to keep steam engine of sixty
three thousand horsepower at work.
Still, the sun is but star of the fourth
magnitude. Everybody is familiar
| with 'the dog STAR Sirius, the 1earest
fixed star to earth, sun of suns. This
star is upwards of thirteen millions of
| miles from this EARTH So much great
er is it than our mighty sun that if
| broken to pieces it would provide ma
terial for about two hundred and fifty
| suns as large as our own, although our
sun, if broken into pieces, would pro-
vide material for one million, four
| hundred thousand globes of the size of
the earth. We hear the astronomers
talk Of billions Of miles and years and
other things, but few people can form
| a conception of the quantity comprised
| in billion. The mind is incapable of
| ccnceiving such an enormous number.
| In order to comprehend this. fact, it
| may be stated that, in order that a
person may count a billion, he would
require nineteen thousand, three hum
dred and twenty-five years and, three
hundred and nineteen days. The arith-
metical symbol Of a billion is simple
| and without great pretention. Let us
considera a billion as a measure of time
and distance s3s.ss
It is no easy matter to bring under
the cognizance Of the human eye a
billion Of any kind Of objects. Take:
| a ten-d dollar gold piece as once fanlil-
lar object. Put one in the ground and
stand upon It as many Of its kind as
will reach twenty feet in height, then
place the numbers Of similar columns