The reasoning may be mistaken. We do not know the fact. What if, instead of being a much _larger_ sun, it is only a much _brighter_ sun? This possibly must be allowed for. It has, indeed, been strongly doubted by one astronomer, after close study of the sun, whether any surface of any star _could_ exceed the surface of our sun in its power of light and heat. But Sirius sheds actually forty-eight times as much light around it as does our sun; we are not exactly entitled to say that Sirius is forty-eight times as big as the sun, but we can say that Sirius is forty-eight times as brilliant or as splendid. In making this calculation we have taken a lower determination of the brightness of Sirius relatively to the sun than some other careful observations would have warranted. It will thus be seen that if there be any uncertainty in our result it must only be as to whether Sirius is not really more than forty-eight times as bright as the sun. When we picture to ourselves the star-depths, the boundless reaches of heavenly space, with these countless blazing suns scattered broadcast throughout, we have not to picture an universe in repose. On the contrary, all is life, stir, energy. Just as in the busy whirl of our Solar System no such thing as rest is to be found, so also it seems to be in the wide universe. Every star is in motion. “Fixed,” as we call them, they are not fixed. Invisible as their movements are to our eyes through immensity of distance, yet all are moving. Those silent, placid, twinkling specks of light are, in reality, huge, roaring, seething, tumultuous furnaces of fire and flame, heat and radiance. Each, too, is hurrying along his appointed pathway in space. Some move faster, some move more slowly. One mile per second; ten miles per second; twenty, thirty, forty, fifty miles per second,--thus varying are their rates of speed. But whether fast or whether slowly, still onward and ever onward they press. Some are rushing towards us, some are rushing away from us. Some are speeding to the right, some are speeding to the left.