The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1914-12-31
STARRY WONDERS
The Changing, Drifting, Crum.
bling Consultations.
NOT so PLACID AS THEY SEEM

They Are AL! In a Whirling, Restless
Rush, Preparing to Assemble In 9th
er Formations-Wid Flight Earth
ward of the Andromeda Nebula.
THAT spectacle" said a friend of
mine one night, pointing up to the
starry sky. always overwhelms me
with a sense OF unchangeableness."
Yet" | replied. lit is the grandest
type of continual and stupendous
change that the imagination could pos
ableness is that of distant landscape
Seen by fash of lightning, the wheel
OF racing auto seems to be motion
less. Your whole lifetime is but
lightning fash against the spinning
wheels Of the universe The entire
history Of the world since the tradi-
tional time of Adam is but lightning
fash In the existence Of the sidereal
systems.
all changing within themselves. Look
yonder at that rich part of the Milky
way, where the millions of apparent
ly crowded stars resemble luminous
clouds. If you could stand watching
those star clouds for a million years
instead of a few moments they would
shift and roll before your eyes like the
whirling vapors of an advancing thun-
derstorm
The astronomer arrives at q knowl-
edge of the fluctuations Of the universe
by projecting his imagination back into
the past and forward into the future
He gazes through a telescope which
penetrates time instead OF space Its
lenses gather together and bend to a
focus beams OF ages instead of rays of
light. With it's aid he sweeps all past
and coming aeons into the field of his
mental vision and strives to view them
In the mass. as they are seen by the
ancient of days himself
1T is in this way that we know that
all these brilliant consultations, which
to the eye of the casual locker have
not altered their outlines since record
ed history began. are In reality as
mutable and ephemeral as SO many
swarms of snow crystals.
Yes 1t is no exaggeration to affirm
that the armament of stars would ap-
pear to an eye endowed with immortal
vision as restless and as swiftly vari-
able as winter storm sky filed with
eddying fakes.
"Ursa Major, the Great Bear, Leo
the Lion. Taurus the charging Bull,
Orion the mighty Hunter, the Southern
Cross, the Northern Crown, the Lyre
the Whale, the Scorpion, the Scales,
Virgo the Virgin. Hercules the Doer of
Deeds, Draco the Great Dragon, Ophi
uchus the Serpent Bearer. the whole
refulgent cycle OF the zodiac from
Aries round TO Pisces. all these, with
out exception. and every starry com
pany In the whole sky that mankind
has admired and made legends about
are breaking up, crumbing, drifting
asunder and preparing to assemble In
other formations, like the new heaven
that Is TO shine upon the new earth OF
the Apocalypse.
Look up at Aldebaran, the red first
magnitude star in the eye Of Taurus
1t Is going away from you at q speed
of thirty FIVE miles per second. seventy
times as fast as the swiftest cannon
ball. Every successive night 1t is
100000 miles farther than 1t was
twenty-four hours before. and yet It's
distance IS SO great that it has not ap |
preciably diminished In brightness In
q thousand years
Then fix your eyes on little star
under the feet Of Orion, which astrono. |
msTs call Delta Leporis. lt>is flying |
away from us at the rate OF sixty-two |
miles per second That means re |
treat of more than 5.25000O miles be |
tween one night and the next, and yet |
Delta Leporis does not sensibly fade |
1t is like distant steamers ight--so
far away to begin with that no aitera. |
tion of its distance can produce a
change in its apparent magnitude until
the Hms elapsed begips TO bear some