Curiosities of Science, Past and Present / A Book for Old and Young

by John Timbs

VAST NUMBERS IN THE UNIVERSE.

The number of telescopic stars in the Milky Way uninterrupted by any nebulæ is estimated at 18,000,000. To compare this number with something analogous, Humboldt calls attention to the fact, that there are not in the whole heavens more than about 8000 stars, between the first and the sixth magnitudes, visible to the naked eye. The barren astonishment excited by numbers and dimensions in space when not considered with reference to applications engaging the mental and perceptive powers of man, is awakened in both extremes of the universe—in the celestial bodies as in the minutest animalcules. A cubic inch of the polishing slate of Bilin contains, according to Ehrenberg, 40,000 millions of the siliceous shells of Galionellæ.