GO

THE BEAUTY OF THE HEAVENS.

Mars ; the next, as seen from Jupiter ; and the smallest, as seen from Saturn :from Uranus , the sun appears a diminutive point.

Scene No. XXIII.— The Constellations of the Northern Hemisphere.

The immense and splendid scenery of the firmament, which surrounds uson all sides, and which has been already so much dwelt on in the first scene onthe fixed stars, now comes under our immediate consideration. It may bereadily imagined, that the splendour of the scene of the starry heavens, inappearance perpetually revolving around the earth, must very early havecommanded the earnest attention of mankind; and that, long before anysystematic cultivation of science, men must have remarked the regular changesof situation, in regard to the earth, of the stars apparently fixed in theheavens, and that, though they appear unequally and irregularly dispersedover it, they must, in some measure, have classed them, and reduced them tosomething like order, and that the most brilliant would chiefly attract theirattention ; and hence, that such an arrangement of the whole would be madeas to enable the learned to hold intercourse on the subject, without immediate refer-ence to the objects themselves. In what age of the world the artificial arrange-ment of the stars into constellations took place, is not known with precision,but it is most certain that it vras antecedent to any distinct historical record.

Before the discovery of the telescope, even learned men believed the numberof the stars was limited to a few hundreds ; but the number visible to the nakedeye differs according to the powers of the observer’s sight. A telescope of verymoderate power, however, shews us ten times as many stars as can be seen bythe unassisted eye; and, as the magnifying power of the instrument is increased,the number of the stars seen also increases, till, as far as we can discover, the massseems countless. Galileo , the inventor of the telescope, formed the design of com-posing a map of the stars, as they appeared to him when seen through his besttelescopes ; but, at the commencement of his task, counting twenty-one distinctstars in a space he had supposed, by observation with smaller telescopes, to beoccupied by one spot of dim light, and counting five hundred in another spot ofabout one degree square, he gave up the attempt. But the discoveries ofmodern astronomers, and more particularly of Herschel, have given us aprodigious accession of knowledge in regard to the stars ; a magnificent field ofspeculation is now opened to astronomy, in which stars and systems, extensionof space and variety of arrangement, seem multiplied to infinity.

All the stars, known to the ancients, were those which are visible to the nakedeye. These, to persons unaccustomed to seek and observe them, are only about2000 in both hemispheres ; so that, at one view, they could only see about1000. These stars are, for the most part, disposed at irregular distances ; but,in several places, we find them in clusters and nebulae (luminous spots ofcloudy appearance). Of these nebulae alone, Herschel observed and has given