Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1919-03-19
BY GARRETT p. SERVISS

The clue to the mystery of crea-
tlon no doubt lies in those glowing
clouds called gaseous nebulae. which
seems to float like phosphorescent
thistledowns among the stars. They
are the seedgrounds out of which
spring suns and worlds. Or they
may be called the protoplasm of the
universe. Undeveloped in them lie
all the possibilities of organic life.
As an amorphous mass of jelly
like living substance" crawls
slowly over fiat surface and with
an uncanny suggestion of dim cum
nlng envelopes and abSorbs some
for it, nutritious morset. behaving
all the while like q living animal
that has neither head or body nor
limbs nor organs, nor fixed shape.
but yet can move and deVour and
in Il low sense, mediate and plan,
ana as such masses split up and by
fission multiply, so many of the
nebulae. like the marvellous one
! in Orion, appear to be convulsed
with forces which are directed to-
ward definite, organic aim, the
transformation of nebulous sub
stance into stars.
1t is only when we comprehend
in its fullness the evolutionary
! doctrine that absolutely every
thing that now exists on the earth.
| including our precious selves and
our very intelligence, was once n
mere sleeping force in the womb
OF nebula, that we begin to ap-
! preciate to what daring heights
scientific theory can go. But in
our generation we have witnessed
an enormous change in public sem
timent concerning these things.
1t is forty-eight years ago, Just
when Bismarck was setting up an
imperial throne for the Hohenzol-
lerns, that John Tyndan startled
many good people by declaring in
a lecture, which was published all
/ over the world: Not alone the
more ignoble forms of animalcular
or animal life, not alone the nobler
forms of the horse and the lion,
not alone the exquisite and Won
derful mechanism of the human
body, but the human mind itself.
emotion, intellect, will and all
| their phenomena were once latent
in n fiery cloud"
1t may be that there are still
| people who are startled and of
| Tended by that statement. but
scientific progress since Tyndalrs
day has been steadily making the
statement good. Even at this very
moment something comes to
strengthen it. A bulletin of the
| Lowell Observatory, which / have
/ just received contains the an
nouncement from DR.. V. NJ. Slipher
! of new type of nebular spectrum,
! the discovery of which serves to
! link up yet more firmly the con-
nection between stars and nebulae.
! This new type of spectrum is
shown by a curious comet-shaped
| object. known as bubbles variable
nebula, which is attached to the
variable star r Monocerots.
Photographs of the cpectrum of
this object, made at the Lowell
| Observatory, lead DIR. Slipher to
think that the luminosity of this
nebula, and of another similar one
| in the southern hemisphere On. c.
| c. 6729), may be of the nature of
reflected light, the source of the
! light being the-star embedded in,
or at least connected with, the ne
bula. Taking Hubble's nebula as a
whole, both star and gaseous mass,
| its spectrum bears a close resem-
| blance to that of a temporary star,
as. for instance, the new star that
shone out in uAriga in 1892. The
star in Hubble's nubla is placed
at one end, like the nucleus of a
comet Ca similar arrangement ap-
pears to prevail with the other
nebula mentioned), and the light
| of the star is of the same char
acter as that of the nebula. If the
latter shines by reflection from the
former the spectral similarity is
Accounted for.