olony of the same." They merely believe her to be environed with
air, and thus habitable. And when we recall our own Sir David
Brewster, Professor Bonnycastle, Dr. Brinkley, Dr. Dick, Mr.
Neison, and Mr. Proctor; and reckon with them the continental
astronomers, Dr. Gruithuisen, Dr. Olbers, and Schroeter, all of
whom attempted to fix the idea of planetary inhabitation on the
popular mind, we must acknowledge that they, with their opponents,
have a strong claim on our attention. The only verdict we are able
just now to render, after hearing these conflicting testimonies, is the
Scotch one, _Not proven_. We but append the legal indorsement
_ignoramus_, we do not know. The subject must remain _sub
judice_; but what we know not now, we hope to know hereafter.

Having interrogated _sense_ and _science_, with the solution of our
enigma anything but complete, we resort last of all to the argument
from _analogy_. If this can illumine the obscurity, it will all be on
the positive side of the inquiry. At present the question resembles a
half-moon: analogy may show that the affirmative is waxing
towards a full-orbed conviction. We open with Huyghens, a Dutch
astronomer of note, who, while he thinks it certain "that the moon
has no air or atmosphere surrounding it as we have," and "cannot
imagine how any plants or animals whose whole nourishment
comes from fluid bodies, can thrive in a dry, waterless, parched
soil," yet asks, "What, then, shall this great ball be made for;
nothing but to give us a little weak light in the night time, or to raise
our tides in the sea? Shall not we plant some people there that may
have the pleasure of seeing our earth turn upon its axis, presenting
them sometimes with a prospect of Europe and Africa, and then of
Asia and America; sometimes half and sometimes full?" [454] Ray
was "persuaded that this luminary doth serve many ends and uses,
especially to maintain the creatures which in all likelihood breed
and inhabit there." [455] Swedenborg's _ipse dixit_ ought to
convince the most incredulous; for he speaks "from what has been
heard and seen." Thus he says: "That there are inhabitants in the
moon is well known to spirits and angels, and in like manner that
there are inhabitants in the moons or satellites which revolve about
Jupiter and Saturn. They who have not seen and discoursed with
spirits coming from those moons still entertain no doubt but there
are men inhabiting them, because they are earth