BY E. WALTER MAUNDER, F.R.A.S.
OF THE ROYAL OBSERVATORY, GREENWICH
AUTHOR OF "ASTRONOMY WITHOUT A TELESCOPE"
"THE ASTRONOMY OF THE BIBLE," ETC.
LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK
67 LONG ACRE, W.C., AND EDINBURGH
NEW YORK: DODGE PUBLISHING CO.
CONTENTS
CHAP.
I. ASTRONOMY BEFORE HISTORY
II. ASTRONOMY BEFORE THE TELESCOPE
III. THE LAW OF GRAVITATION
IV. ASTRONOMICAL MEASUREMENTS
V. THE MEMBERS OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM
VI. THE SYSTEM OF THE STARS
INDEX
THE SCIENCE OF THE STARS
The plan of the present series requires each volumeto be complete in about eighty small pages. But noadequate account of the achievements of astronomycan possibly be given within limits so narrow, for sosmall a space would not suffice for a mere catalogue ofthe results which have been obtained; and in mostcases the result alone would be almost meaninglessunless some explanation were offered of the way inwhich it had been reached. All, therefore, that can bedone in a work of the present size is to take the studentto the starting-point of astronomy, show him the variousroads of research which have opened out from it, andgive a brief indication of the character and generaldirection of each.
That which distinguishes astronomy from all theother sciences is this: it deals with objects that wecannot touch. The heavenly bodies are beyond ourreach; we cannot tamper with them, or subject themto any form of experiment; we cannot bring them intoour laboratories to analyse or dissect them. We canonly watch them and wait for such indications as their{10}own movements may supply. But we are confined tothis earth of ours, and they are so remote; we are soshort-lived, and they are so long-enduring; that thedifficulty of finding out much about them might wellseem insuperable.
Yet these difficulties have been so far overcome thatastronomy is the most advanced of all the sciences, theone in which our knowledge is the most definite andcertain. All science rests on sight and thought, onordered observation and reasoned deduction; but bothsight and thought were earlier trained to the service ofastronomy than of the other physical sciences.
It is here that the highest value of astronomy lies;in the discipline that it has afforded to man's powersof observation and reflection; and the real triumphswhich it has achieved are not the bringing to light ofthe beauties or the sensational dimensions and distancesof the heavenly bodies, but the vanquishing ofdifficulties which might well have seemed superhuman.The true spirit of the science can be far betterexemplified by the presentation of some of these difficulties,and of the methods by which they have been overcome,than by many volumes of picturesque descriptionor of eloquent rhapsody.
There was a time when men knew nothing ofastronomy; like every other science it began from zero.But it is not possible to suppose that such a state ofthings lasted long, we know that t