They are the arms, I suppose, pointing into the dark space near, as much as to say,—‘You know nothing about us, or of what we can see around us, looking so black to you, and so bright to us.’
Not a bad idea, boy. When Sir John Herschel had a look at our southern hemisphere, he observed beyond the Nebulæ a few scattered, faint bits of light in the dark region, too fine for him to turn into Nebulæ by his glass, and looking like some more distant light blushing through the darkness.
They are like telegraphic messages, father.
About forty of these strange glimmerings of future universes yet to be revealed were seen by Sir John.
Well, dear father, you can’t go further than that. If it take 60,000 years for some of the stars to send us their light, just to say ‘How do you do?’ how long would it take for these faint, modest blushes of the distant sky?
How great, then, is God, my son, and how grateful should we be for His notice! Let us so please Him here, that after death our souls may fly to that heaven of joy He has prepared, wherever in the vast universes of His it may be.”
THE SUN AND PLANETS.
The planet Venus had been shining brilliantly evening after evening. “Why, father,” said the boy, “does Venus shift her place so rapidly among the stars?