Evening star., 1934-03-26
The Largest Eye. :"

Perhaps 1t would be inaccurate to
speak Of the mirror poured" yes
terday at Corning, N. Y. as an 'eye,"
but doubtless there will be many who
will think of it in that regard. And,
so considered, the scientists who wit
messed the spreading of the twenty
tons Of molten glass may be said to
have witnessed miracle.
Indeed, a philosopher might use the
incident as a springboard for line
Of thought reaching back into the
beginnings Of the human race. What.
he might ask, has earthly progress
been but an expanding projection of
human faculties? The undetermined
genius who heightened and strength
ened mans arm by inventing the
hammer operated on that principle.
Those who conceived the sword, the
spear, the bow and arrow, the rife,
the saw, the plane, the spade, the hoe,
the rake, the pick, the derrick, the
steam shovel were similarly motivated
by desire to render more efficient the
fingers Of mans normal hand.
And the evolution of transportation
has been nothing more than a steady
improvement Of the power Of walk
ing possessed by mans legs and feet.
Saddle horse, wagon, railroad train,
automobile, sailing ship and ocean
liner, airplane and dirigible all have
come into being in response to human
ingenuity applied to natural circum-
stance in behalf Of better and quicker
locomotion.
Meanwhile the voice and the Ca
pacity to hear have been extended by
the device of writing. by signal sys-
TENS, by telegraph, telephone, phono-
graph and radio, and the faculty OF
sight has been aided by spectacles,
the camera and the telescope, while
memory has been enlarged by the art
of printing
The end, Of course, Is not yet.
Rather, the theoretical termination OF
human struggle for dominion over
nature has been removed to a date
beyond the reach Of the imagination.
With each new tool or instrument the
realm Of investigation, the arena Of
action, the sphere of conquest has
been widened. Calico, for example,
might have been excused for believing
that he really had gained thorough
going knowledge of the heavens
through the dininutive lens of his
primitive actually, he mere
ly opened a single door on i'm
mensity. George Ellery Hale, writing
in the Atlantic Monthly, says:
His telescope, with its simple convex
lens about two and one-quarter inches
in diameter, collected about eighty
times as much light as the pupil OF the
eye. This gain was sufficient to add
hundreds Of thousands of stars to the
two or three thousand previously seen.
Now it is a question, not SO much OF
multiplying the hundreds of millions
of stars already known, as of brighten
ing their images and of making pos
Sible satisfactory exploration of the
vast world of distant galaxies lying
beyond the limits of the Milky Way.
The largest "eye," then, will be but
a more effective reflector for a limit
less and ever-cnanging universe Of
incomprehensibly infinite proportions.
Its major significance, when it has
been set up on its mountain top in
California, will be that of the lesson
of humility, but also of aspiration,
which it will teach to a race which
may be sadly handicapped and yet is
ceaselessly moved to toll and sacri-
flee in an endless search for truth and
freedom.