Another step leads us to a standpoint whence we can form a correct estimate of the vast distance of the fixed stars; for we learn that so enormous is the distance of even the nearest fixed star, that the tremendous space separating the earth from that star sinks in turn into the merest point, insomuch that if a globe as bright as the sun had the earth's orbit as a close fitting girdle, then this glorious orb (with a diameter of some 184,000,000 of miles) would look very much smaller than such a globe as our earth would look at the sun's distance--would, in fact, occupy but about one-fortieth part of the space in the sky which she, though she would then look a mere point, would occupy if viewed from that distance. But there is a way of viewing the immensities of space which, though not aiding us indeed to conceive them, enables the mind to picture their proportions better than any other. The dimensions of the earth's path around the sun sink into insignificance beside those of the outermost planets; but these in their turn dwindle into nothingness beside those of some among the comets. From the paths of these comets, if only sentient and reasoning beings could trace out in a comet's company those mighty orbits, and could have for the duration of their existence not the brief span of time which measures the longest human life, but many circuits of their comet home around the same ruling orb (as we live during many circuits of our globe around the sun), the dimensions of the star-depths, which even to scientific insight are all but immeasurable, would be directly discernible. Not only would the proportions of that mighty system be perceived, whose fruits and blossoms are suns and worlds, but even the gradually changing arrangement of its parts could be discerned. Some comets, indeed, as I pointed out in an essay on comets several months ago (see Expanse of Heaven, p. 149), do not travel around the sun, but flit from sun to sun on journeys lasting millions of years, paying each sun but a single visit. A being inhabiting such a comet, and having these interstellar journeys as the years of his existence, so that he could live through many of them, would have a wonderful insight into the economy of the stellar system. If his powers of conception as far exceeded ours as the range of his travels and the duration of his existence, he would be able to recognise the proportions of a large part of the stellar universe as clearly as we recognise the proportions of the solar system. But leaving these wonderful wanderers, whose journeys are as far beyond our powers of conception as the immensity of the regions of star-strewn space, we may find, among the comets belonging to the sun's domain, bodies whose range of travel would give their inhabitants far clearer views of the architecture of the heavens than even the profoundest terrestrial astronomer can possibly obtain.