Immensity of God's Creations.
The following paragraphs are taken from the Ladies' Repository for November. The thoughtful person will not read them without being overwhelmed with the idea of the greatness of Jehovah's power, and the illimitableness of his universe! Says David, "Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; and his greatness is unspeakable." And Job declares, "But the thunder of his power, who can understand!" THE DISTANCE OF THE FIXED STARS.—In 1847 Professor Bessel, of Germany, commenced a series of astronomical measures for getting the exact distance of the fixed stars, a thing that never had been done. The instrument which he used in connection with a powerful telescope, in his experiments, was called the great Konigsburg heliometer. After three years' hard labor, he was so fortunate as to obtain a parallax, but so minute that he could hardly trust his reputation upon it. But after repeated trials and working out the result he was fully satisfied that he could give the true distance to 61 Cygni. But who can comprehend this immense space? We can only convey an idea to the mind of this distance by the fact that light, which travels 12,000,000 of miles in a minute, requires not less than ten years to reach us. Just let any one try to take in the idea. One hour would give 720,000,000 of miles; one year then—8,760 hours—this gives 6,307,200,000, and this, multiplied by ten, gives 63,072,000,000,000. This according to Bessel, is the distance of the nearest fixed star to the sun. All astronomers confirm the correctness of Professor Bessel's calculations. But this distance, great as it is, is nothing to be compared to the distance of the Milky Way. Sir William Herschel says that the stars or suns that compose the Milky Way, are so very remote that it requires light, going at the rate of 12,000,000 of miles in a minute, 120,000 years to reach the earth. He says there are stars, or rather nebulæ, five hundred times more remote. Now make your calculation; 120,000 years reduced to minutes, and then multiply that191sum by 12,000,000, and the product by 500. What an overwhelming idea! The mind sinks under such a thought; we cannot realize it; it is too vast even for comprehension.—Ladies' Repository.