on bench or roof,
and scan the whole vault of heaven at one view. He can do this with the
greatest pleasure and profit in late summer or autumn--winter would do
equally well were it possible for the mind to rise so far above bodily
conditions that the question of temperature should not enter. The
thinking man who does this under circumstances most favorable for calm
thought will form a new conception of the wonder of the universe. If
summer or autumn be chosen, the stupendous arch of the Milky Way will
pass near the zenith, and the constellation Lyra, led by its beautiful
blue Vega of the first magnitude, may be not very far from that point.
South of it will be seen the constellation Aquila, marked by the bright
Altair, between two smaller but conspicuous stars. The bright Arcturus
will be somewhere in the west, and, if the observation is not made too
early in the season, Aldebaran will be seen somewhere in the east. When
attention is concentrated on the scene the thousands of stars on each
side of the Milky Way will fill the mind with the consciousness of a
stupendous and all-embracing frame, beside which all human affairs sink
into insignificance. A new idea will be formed of such a well-known
fact of astronomy as the motion of the solar system in space, by
reflecting that, during all human history, the sun, carrying the earth
with it, has been flying towards a region in or just south of the
constellation Lyra, with a speed beyond all that art can produce on
earth, without producing any change apparent to ordinary vision in the
aspect of the constellation. Not only Lyra and Aquila, but every one of
the thousand stars which form the framework of the sky, were seen by
our earliest ancestors just as we see them now. Bodily rest may be
obtained at any time by ceasing from our labors, and weary systems may
find nerve rest at any summer resort; but I know of no way in which
complete rest can be obtained for the weary soul--in which the mind can
be so entirely relieved of the burden of all human anxiety--as by the
contemplation of the spectacle presented by the starry heavens under
the conditions just described. As we make a feeble attempt to learn
what science can tell us about the structure of this starry frame, I
hope the reader will allow me to at least fancy him contemplating it in
this way.

The first question which may suggest itself to the inquiring reader is:
How is it possible by any methods of observation yet kno