Curiosities of the Sky

by Garrett Putman Serviss

Lunar craters Theophilus and surrounding region

The next photograph shows, if possible, a still wilder region. It is the part of the moon lying between Tycho and the south pole. Tycho is seen in the lower left-hand part of the picture. To the right, at the edge of the illuminated portion of the moon, are the crater-rings, Longomontanus and Wilhelm I, the former being the larger. Between them are to be seen the ruins of two or three more ancient craters which, together with portions of the walls of Wilhelm I and Longomontanus, have been honeycombed with smaller craters. The vast crateriform depression above the center of the picture is Clavius, an unrivaled wonder of lunar scenery, a hundred and forty-two miles in its greatest length, while its whole immense floor has sunk two miles below the general surface of the moon outside the ring. The monstrous shadow-filled cavity above Clavius toward the right is Blancanus, whose aspect here gives a good idea of the appearance of these chasms when only their rims are in the sunlight. But observe the indescribable savagery of the entire scene. It looks as though the spirit of destruction had gone mad in this spot. The mighty craters have broken forth one after another, each rending its predecessor; and when their work was finished, a minor but yet tremendous outbreak occurred, and the face of the moon was gored and punctured with thousands of smaller craters. These relatively small craters (small, however, only in a lunar sense, for many of them would appear gigantic on the earth) recall once more the theory of meteoric impact. It does not seem impossible that some of them may have been formed by such an agency.

One would not wish for our planet such a fate as that which has overtaken the moon, but we cannot be absolutely sure that something of the kind may not be in store for it. We really know nothing of the ultimate causes of volcanic activity, and some have suggested that the internal energies of the earth may be accumulating instead of dying out, and may never yet have exhibited their utmost destructive power. Perhaps the best assurance that we can find that the earth will escape the catastrophe that has overtaken its satellite is to be found in the relatively great force of its gravitation. The moon has been the victim of its weakness; given equal forces, and the earth would be the better able to withstand them. It is significant, in connection with these considerations, that the little planet Mercury, which seems also to have parted with its air and water, shows to the telescope some indications that it is pitted with craters resembling those that have torn to pieces the face of the moon.

Upon the whole, after studying the dreadful lunar landscapes, one cannot feel a very enthusiastic sympathy with those who are seeking indications of the continued existence of some kind of life on the moon; such a world is better without inhabitants. It has met its fate; let it go! Fortunately, it is not so near that it cannot hide its scars and appear beautiful—except when curiosity impels us to look with the penetrating eyes of the astronomer.

Mare Crisium

XIII
The Great Mars Problem

Let any thoughtful person who is acquainted with the general facts of astronomy look up at the heavens some night when they appear in their greatest splendor, and ask himself what is the strongest impression that they make upon his mind. He may not find it easy to frame an answer, but when he has succeeded it will probably be to the effect that the stars give him an impression of the universality of intelligence; they make him feel, as the sun and the moon cannot do, that his world is not alone; that all this was not made simply to form a gorgeous canopy over the tents of men. If he is of a devout turn of mind, he thinks, as he gazes into those fathomless deeps and among those bewildering hosts, of the infinite multitude of created beings that the Almighty has taken under his care. The narrow ideas of the old geocentric theology, which made the earth God’s especial footstool, and man his only rational creature, fall away from him like a veil that had obscured his vision; they are impossible in the presence of what he sees above. Thus the natural tendency, in the light of modern progress, is to regard the universe as everywhere filled with life.

But science, which is responsible for this broadening of men’s thoughts concerning the universality of life, itself proceeds to set limits. Of spiritual existences it pretends to know nothing, but as to physical beings, it declares that it can only entertain the supposition of their existence where it finds evidence of an environment suited to their needs, and such environment may not everywhere exist. Science, though repelled by the antiquated theological conception of the supreme isolation of man among created beings, regards with complacency the probability that there are regions in the universe where no organic life exists, stars which shine upon no inhabited worlds, and planets which nourish no animate creatures. The astronomical view of the universe is that it consists of matter in every stage of evolution: some nebulous and chaotic; some just condensing into stars (suns) of every magnitude and order; some shaped into finished solar bodies surrounded by dependent planets; some forming stars that perhaps have no planets, and will have none; some constituting suns that are already aging, and will soon lose their radiant energy and disappear; and some aggregated into masses that long ago became inert, cold, and rayless, and that can only be revivified by means about which we can form conjectures, but of which we actually know nothing.