The celestial worlds discover'd : $b or, conjectures concerning the inhabitants, plants and productions of the worlds in the planetsHuygens, Christiaan
Science
The celestial worlds discover'd : $b or, conjectures concerning the inhabitants, plants and productions of the worlds in the planets
Huygens, Christiaan
Cosmology -- Early works to 1800; Life on other planets -- Early works to 1800; Plurality of worlds -- Early works to 1800
But it’s a little ſtrange, that when Jupiter is ſo much bigger than our
Planet, their Days and Nights ſhould be but five of our Hours. By this
we may ſee that Nature has not obſerv’d that proportion that their Bulk
ſeems to require, ſeeing in Mars the Days are very little different
from ours. But in the length of their Years, that is, in the Revolution
of the Planets round the Sun, there is an exact proportion to their
diſtances from the Sun followed. For as the Cubes of their Diſtances,
ſo are the Squares of their Revolutions, as Kepler firſt ſound out.
Which proportion the Moons of Jupiter and Saturn keep in their Courſes
round thoſe [Always of the ſame length.] Planets. As the Years and Days
in Jupiter are different from ours in this reſpect, ſo are the Days in
another; namely, that they are all of the ſame length. For they there
enjoy a perpetual Equinox, their Axis having little or no inclination
to their Orbit, as the Earth’s has, as has been diſcovered by
Teleſcopes. The Countries that lie near their Poles have little or no
Heat, by reaſon the Rays of the Sun fall ſo obliquely upon them; but
then they are freed from the Inconveniency that ours are troubled with,
of tedious long half-year Nights, and have the conſtant returns of Day
and Night every five Hours. Indeed ſuch ſhort Days would not be
agreeable to us, but we think our ſelves much better done by, that ours
are more than twice as long, tho’ upon no other account, but that
whatever is our own, we are apt to imagine, muſt be beſt.
The reſt of the Planets are ſo near the Sun (Mars himſelf never being
above 18 degrees from it) that in Jupiter they have the ſight only of
Saturn. But we cannot deny but that their four Moons ſtand them in
greater ſtead than our one doth us, if ’twere only that they ſeldom
know any ſuch Thing as to be without Moonſhiny Nights. And they are of
great Advantage to them, as we ſaid before, in their Navigation, if
they have any ſuch thing. Not to mention the pleaſant Sights of their
frequent Conjunctions and Eclipſes, Things that they are ſeldom a Day
without.
Saturn enjoys all thoſe Pleaſures and Advantages in a ſtill higher
Degree, as well for his five Moons, as for the delightful Proſpect that
the Ring about him affords his Inhabitants Night and Day. But we will
give an account of their Aſtronomy, as we have done of the reſt of the
Planets.
[They ſee the fix’d Stars juſt as we do.]
And firſt of all we ſhall obſerve what we might have remark’d before,
but which will be more ſtrange here, that the fix’d Stars appear to
them of the ſame Figure and Magnitude, and with the ſame degree of
Light that they do to us: and this, by reaſon of their immenſe
diſtance, of which we ſhall have occaſion to ſpeak by and by. In
compariſon with which the Space that a Bullet-ſhot out of a Cannon
could travel in 25 Years, would be almoſt nothing.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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