Kant's Island Universe Theory

Immanuel Kant

Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens
or
An Essay on the Constitution and the Mechanical Origin of the Entire Structure of the Universe
Based on Newtonian Principles

Translated by Ian Johnston, Vancouver Island University
Nanaimo, British Columbia
Canada

[A printed paperback book of this translation is available from Richer Resources Publications. For copyright information about this e-text, please consult the following link. The German text is available here]

Translators Note

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) published The Universal Natural History and Theory of Heaven in 1755. This English text is based on Georg Reimers edition of the complete works of Immanuel Kant (1905). The translation was first completed and posted on the web in 1998. It has been considerably revised for this September 2008 version, mainly to improve the accuracy and fluency of the translation.

In the translated text, the Table of Contents has been altered to include the Dedication and the Preface and moved to the front before these sections. The endnotes (indicated with an asterisk link) come from Kants original text except for those which are provided by the translator. The latter are prefaced in the endnote by the comment [Translators Footnote]. All endnotes without that initial phrase are in Kants original text.

In the English translation I have used the original lines from the works of Alexander Pope and Addison in those places where Kant quotes the often quite loose German versions of these English poets. The translations of the von Haller quotations are my own.

There are also occasional references to two earlier English versions of Kant's text: those by Stanley L. Jaki (Scottish Academic Press, 1981) and by William Hastie (first published in 1900, reprinted by University of Michigan Press, 1969). The translator of the present text would like to acknowledge the great help he has received from these two earlier translations. Anyone seeking a detailed contextual examination of Kants scientific ideas in this essay should consult the Jaki edition, which is outstanding in this respect.

Ian Johnston
Liberal Studies Department
Vancouver Island University
September 2008
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This is an edited version for the Astronomy 360 Class, K. Aniol, Winter 2010.

PREFACE

I have selected a subject which, both in view of its inherent difficulty and also with respect to religion, can right at the very start elicit an unfavourable judgment from a large section of readers. To discover the systematic arrangement linking large parts of creation in its entire infinite extent and to bring out by means of mechanical principles the development of the cosmic bodies themselves and the cause of their movements from the first state of nature, such insights seem to overstep by a long way the powers of human reason. From another perspective, religion threatens with a solemn accusation about the presumption that one is allowed to be so bold as to attribute to nature left to itself such consequences in which we rightly become aware of the immediate hand of the Highest Being and worries about encountering in the inquiry into such views a defence of the atheist. I do perceive all these difficulties, and yet I do not become fainthearted. I feel all the power of the obstacles ranged against me, and nevertheless I am not despondent. On the basis of a slight assumption I have undertaken a dangerous journey, and I already see the promontories of new lands. Those people who have the resolution to set forth on the undertaking will set foot on these lands and have the pleasure of designating them with their very own names.

I made no commitment to this endeavour until I considered myself secure from the point of view of religious duties. My enthusiasm has doubled as I witnessed at every step the dispersal of the clouds which behind their obscurity seemed to hide monsters and which, after they scattered, revealed the majesty of the Highest Being with the most vital radiance. Since I know that these efforts are free of all reproach, I will faithfully introduce what well-meaning or even weak-minded people could find shocking in my proposal and am candidly ready to submit it to the strict inspection of a council of true believers, which is the mark of an honest disposition. The champion of the faith, therefore, may be allowed to let his reasons be heard first.

If the planetary structure, with all its order and beauty, is only an effect of the universal laws of motion in matter left to itself, if the blind mechanism of natural forces knows how to develop itself out of chaos in such a marvellous way and to reach such perfection on its own, then the proof of the primordial Divine Author which we derive from a glance at the beauty of the cosmic structure is wholly discredited, nature is self-sufficient, the divine rule is unnecessary, Epicurus lives once again in the midst of Christendom, and an unholy philosophy treads underfoot the faith which proffers a bright light to illuminate it.

If I found this criticism had a firm basis, then the conviction which I have of the infallibility of divine truths is for me so empowering, that I would consider everything which contradicts it sufficiently refuted by that fact and would reject it. But the very agreement which I encounter between my system and religion raises my confidence in the face of all difficulties to an unshakable composure.

I recognize all the value of those proofs which people derive from the beauty and perfect organization of the cosmic structure to confirm the most eminently wise Author. If we do not obstinately deny all conviction, then we must agree with such incontrovertible reasons. But I maintain that the people who defend religion in this way, by using these reasons badly, perpetuate the conflict with the naturalists, because they present an unnecessarily weak case.

People are accustomed to take note of and to point out the harmonies, beauty, purposes, and a perfect interplay of means and ends in nature. But while they, on the one hand, extol nature, on the other hand, they seek to diminish it again. This fine arrangement, they say, is foreign to nature. Left alone to its universal laws, it would bring forth nothing but disorder. The harmonies demonstrate a foreign hand, which knew how to force material left without any regularity into a wise design. But I answer that if the universal efficient material laws were established equally as a result of the highest design, then they could presumably have no purposes except to strive to act on their own to fulfil the plan which the Highest Wisdom has set out for Itself or, if this is not the case, should we not be drawn into the temptation of believing that at least matter and its general laws were independent and that the most eminently wise power, which knew how to make use of them so splendidly, may indeed be great, but not infinite, certainly powerful, but not totally self-sufficient?

The defender of religion fears that the harmony which can be explained by a natural tendency of matter would demonstrate the independence of nature from divine providence. He clearly confesses that if people can discover natural reasons for all the order in the cosmic structure, reasons which can bring this into existence from the most universal and essential characteristics of matter, then it may be unnecessary to invoke a highest Ruling Power. According to the natural scientists calculations, he finds nothing to quarrel with in this claim. He acquires examples which establish the fertility of general natural laws for perfectly beautiful consequences and brings true believers into danger through reasons, which in their hands could become invincible weapons. I wish to cite examples. People have already often proposed, as one of the clearest proofs of a benevolent providence solicitous of human welfare, that in the hottest parts of the earth the sea winds, right at the very time when the heated soil most requires their cooling, spread over the land and refresh it, as if they had been summoned. For example, in the island of Jamaica, as soon as the sun has climbed sufficiently high to heat the soil most strongly, just after 9 in the morning, a wind begins to rise from the sea and blows from all sides over the land. Its strength increases proportionally with the elevation of the sun. Around 1 in the afternoon, when it naturally is the hottest, the wind is at its strongest. It gradually decreases again with the setting of the sun, so that in the evening the very same stillness reigns as at the start. Without this welcome arrangement, the island would be uninhabitable. All coastal lands lying in the hot places on the Earth enjoy this same benefit. Moreover, it is most essential for them, because, since they are the lowest places on dry land, they also suffer the greatest heat. For the higher regions in the country, which this sea wind does not reach, are also in less need of it, because their higher location places them in a region of cooler air. Is not all this beautiful? Are there not clear purposes which have been realized by judiciously applied means? However, by way of a counterargument the natural scientist must find the natural causes of this in the most general characteristics of air, with no need to assume any special arrangements for the phenomenon. He observes correctly that these sea winds have to go through such periodic movements, even if no human beings lived on the island, thanks to no property other than the elasticity of air and gravity, without having any purposeful intention in the matter, even if it is indispensibly necessary merely for the growth of plants. The suns heat upsets the airs equilibrium by thinning out the air over the land, thus allowing the cooler sea air to rise from its position and take its place.

What benefits generally advantageous to our planet Earth do the winds not possess? And what uses does the keen intelligence of human beings not make of them? However, no other arrangements were necessary to create them except these same general properties of air and heat, which also had to occur on the Earth without reference to these purposes.

At this point the freethinker says: if you concede the point that when people can derive useful and purposeful arrangements from the most general and simplest natural laws, then we have no need for the special rule of a Highest Wisdom and thus you see here proofs which will catch you by your own admission. All nature, especially inorganic nature, is full of such proofs, which permit us to recognize that matter, which organizes itself through the mechanical operation of its own forces, has a certain correctness in its effects and without compulsion satisfactorily acts by rules of what is appropriate. When, in order to come to the rescue of the worthy cause of religion, a well-meaning person wishes to contest this capacity of general natural laws, then he will embarrass himself and by a poor defence give atheism a chance to triumph.

However, let us see how these reasons, which we fear in the hands of our opponents as injurious, are, by contrast, strong weapons to use in the fight against them. Matter, which organizes itself according to its most general laws, produces through its natural behaviour or, if we prefer, through a blind mechanical process, good consequences, which appear to be the design of a supremely High Wisdom. When we observe air, water, and heat left to themselves, they produce wind and clouds, rain, streams which moisten the lands, and all the useful consequences without which nature would have had to remain sad, empty, and barren. However, they produce these results not through mere chance or accident, which could just as readily have resulted in something detrimental. But we see that these consequences are limited by its natural laws so as to work only in this way. What should we then think of this harmony? How would it really be possible that things with different natures should strive to work in cooperation with one another for such perfect coordination and beauty, even with purposes in such matters which are to a certain extent beyond the range of lifeless material stuff, namely, for the benefit of human beings and animals, unless they recognized a common origin, that is, an Infinite Understanding, in which all things were designed with reference to their essential properties? If their natures were necessarily isolated and independent, what an astonishing contingency that would be, or rather, how impossible it would be that with their natural efforts they should mesh so exactly together, as if an overriding wise selection had united them.

Now, I confidently apply this concept to my present enterprise. I summon up the material stuff of all worlds in a universal confusion and create out of this a perfect chaos. According to the established laws of attraction, I see matter developing and modifying its motion through repulsion. Without the assistance of arbitrary fictions, I enjoy the pleasure of seeing a well-ordered totality emerge under the influence of the established laws of motion, something which looks so similar to the same planetary system which we see in front of us, that I cannot prevent myself from believing that it is the same. This unanticipated unfolding of the order of nature on a grand scale I find at first suspicious, because it establishes such a well-coordinated and correct system on such a meagre and simple foundation. Finally, on the basis of the previously outlined observation, I advise myself that such a natural development is not something unheard of in nature but that its fundamental striving necessarily brings such things with it and that this is the most marvellous evidence of its dependence on that Primordial Essence which has within Itself the source of being and the first laws by which nature operates. This insight doubles my trust in the proposal I have made. The confidence increases with each step I take as I continue on, and my timidity disappears completely.

But the defence of your system, it will be said, is at the same time a defence of the opinions of Epicurus, to which it has the closest similarity.I will not completely deny all agreement with him. Many people have become atheists through the apparent truth of such reasons which, with a more scrupulous consideration, could have convinced them as forcibly as possible of the certain existence of the Highest Being. The consequences which a perverse understanding infers from innocent basic principles are often very blameworthy. Although his theory was what one would expect from the keen intelligence of a great spirit, Epicurus' conclusions were also of this kind.

I will also not deny that the theory of Lucretius or of his predecessors (Epicurus, Leucippus, and Democritus) has much similarity to mine. Like those philosophers, I set out the first condition of nature as that state of the world consisting of a universal scattering of the primordial materials of all planetary bodies, or atoms, as they were called by these writers. Epicurus proposes a principle of heaviness which drives these elementary particles downwards, and this appears not very different from Newton's power of attraction, which I assume. He also assigned to these particles a certain deviation from the straight linear movement of their descent, although at the same time he had an absurd picture of the cause and consequences of this deviation. This deviation comes about to some extent with the alteration in the straight linear descent, a change which we derive from the force of repulsion of the particles. Finally, came the eddies, which arose from the confused movement of the atoms, a major part of the theories of Leucippus and Democritus. We will meet them also in our theory. But such a close affinity with a theory which was the true theory of atheism in ancient times does not lead mine to be grouped in the company of their errors. Even with the most foolish opinions which can win popular applause, sometimes there is some truth to remark upon. A false basic assumption or a pair of unexamined coordinating principles lead people from the footpath of truth through unnoticed misdirections right into the abyss. Nonetheless, there remains, in spite of the above-mentioned similarity, a fundamental difference between the ancient cosmogony and the present one, so that one can derive from the latter totally opposite consequences.

The previously mentioned teachers of the mechanical development of the cosmic structure derived all order which can be observed in it from chance accident, which allowed the atoms to come together in such a fortunate way that they created a well-ordered totality. Epicurus was even so unconscionable that he demanded that the atoms swerved from their direct linear movement without any cause, so that they could run into each other. Collectively these writers pushed this absurdity so far, that they even attributed the origin of all living creatures to this blind collision and, in effect, derived reason from irrationality. In my theory, by contrast, I find matter bound to certain necessary laws. I see a beautiful and orderly totality developing quite naturally in its complete dissolution and scattering. This does not happen through accident or chance. By contrast, we see that natural characteristics necessarily bring this condition with them. Hence, will we not be moved to inquire why matter had have just such laws which aim at order and propriety? [Comment: K. Aniol - The issue of the origin of natural law is still a deep physical and philosophical area of contemplation. See the article "Law without Law" by John Wheeler and W.H. Zurek and the commentary by D. Deutsch. Also see in the Bible, Wisdom 13:1-9, basically paraphrased by Kant.] Was it really possible that many things, each of which has its own nature independent of the others, should on their own constitute themselves in such a way that a well-ordered totality thereby arises? And if they do this, is there not an undeniable proof of the commonality of their first primordial origin, which must be a self-sufficient Highest Reason, in which the natures of things were designed for harmonious purposes?

The material which is the primordial stuff for all things is thus bound to certain laws. Freely left subject to these laws, it must necessarily bring forth beautiful combinations. It has no freedom to deviate from this plan of perfection. Since it also finds itself subject to the loftiest wise purpose, it must of necessity be set in such harmonious relationships through a First Cause which rules over it. There is a God for just this reason, that nature, even in a chaotic state, can develop only in an orderly and rule-governed manner.

I have such a high opinion of the honest minds of those people who confer upon this proposal the honour of testing it, that I remain confident that, where the basic principles mentioned above will still not be able to get rid of all worries about the deleterious consequences of my system, nevertheless at least they place the sincerity of my intentions beyond doubt. If, in spite of this, there are malicious zealots who consider it a duty worthy of their holy calling to attach shameful explanations to the most innocent opinions, then I am sure that their judgment will have precisely the opposite effect among reasonable people. Besides, people will not deprive me of the right which Descartes enjoyed in his time among disinterested critics when he ventured to explain the development of world bodies from merely mechanical laws. I wish therefore to quote from the author of Universal World History: Thus we can do nothing other than believe that the attempt of this philosopher, who endeavoured to explain the development of the world in a certain time from confused matter simply through the continuation of a movement once impressed on it using a few easy and universal laws of motion, or of others who since then have, with more approval, attempted the same thing through the primordial properties of matter, with which it was created, is far from being worthy of punishment or demeaning to God, as many have imagined, since in this way a higher idea of His infinite wisdom is far more likely to be brought about.

I have sought to clear away the difficulties which seem, from a religious point of view, to threaten my propositions. There are some no less significant difficulties with respect to the subject matter itself. Even if it is true, people will say, that God has set in the forces of nature a hidden art of developing a perfect world order out of chaos on their own, will human understanding, which is so stupid in the commonest circumstances, be capable of investigating hidden properties in such a massive enterprise? Such an undertaking amounts to much the same thing as when people say: Give me only the material, and I will create a world out of it for you. Can the weakness of your insights, which are shamed by the most insignificant things, which come into your mind daily and close by, not teach you that it is vain to discover the infinite and what was happening in nature even before there was a world? I demolish this difficulty, for I clearly show that of all the attempts which could be devised to learn about nature, this very endeavour may be the one in which we can most easily and surely go right to the origin. Just as among all problems of research into nature, none will be resolved more correctly and certainly than the true constitution of the planetary structure on a large scale, the laws of motions, and the inner workings which drive all planetary orbits, in which Newtonian philosophy can provide such insights that we find nothing like them in any other part of philosophy, in the same way I maintain that among all the natural phenomena whose first cause we are investigating, the origin of the planetary system and the production of the heavenly bodies, together with the causes of their movements, is the one which we may hope to consider reliably from first principles. The reason for this is easy to perceive. The heavenly bodies are round masses with the simplest development which a body whose origin we are exploring can ever have. Their movements are equally clear. They are nothing other than a free continuation of an impetus impressed upon them once, a motion which, combined with the force of attraction of the body at the mid-point, becomes circular. Moreover, the space in which they move is empty, the intermediate distances, which separate them from each other, are exceptionally large, and thus everything is laid out for undisturbed motion as well as for clear observation of them in as manifest a way as possible. In my view, we could say here with certain understanding and without presumption: Give me the material, and I will build a world out of it! That is, give me the material, and I will show you how a world is to come into being out of it. For if there is material present which is endowed with an inherent power of attraction, then it is not difficult to establish those causes which could have led to the arrangement of the planetary system, considered on a large scale. We know what is involved for a body to acquire a spherical shape. We grasp what is required for freely suspended spheres to take on a circular movement around the middle point towards which they are attracted. The position of the orbits relative to each other, the agreement in the direction, the eccentricity, everything can arise from the simplest mechanical causes, and we may hope with confidence to discover them, because they can be established with the easiest and clearest reasons. However, can we boast of such advantages for the smallest plants or insects? Are we in a position to say, give me the material, and I will show you how a caterpillar could have developed? Do we not remain here on the bottom rung because of our ignorance of the true inner constitution of the object and of the development inherent in its multiple elements? Thus, people must not let themselves be disconcerted when I venture to say that we will be able to understand the development of all the cosmic bodies, the causes of their movements, in short, the origin of the entire present arrangement of the planetary system, before we completely and clearly understand the development of a single plant or caterpillar on mechanical principles.

These are the reasons on which I base my confidence that the physical part of natural philosophy gives us hope that in future it will indeed have the same perfection to which Newton raised the mathematical part of the subject. Next to the laws according to which the arrangement of the cosmic structure stands in its present state perhaps there are no others in the entire study of nature so capable of such mathematical accuracy as those laws by which it has developed, and without doubt the hand of an experienced surveyor would find work in these fields unproductive.

Now that I have allowed myself to promote a favourable reception for what I am proposing in my examination, I will be permitted briefly to explain the way I have dealt with it. The first part is concerned with a new system for the structure of the cosmos on a large scale. Mr. Wright from Durham, whose essay I learned about in the Freie Urteile from Hamburg for the year 1751, first gave me the occasion to consider the fixed stars, not as a scattered teeming mass without perceptible order, but as one system with the closest similarity to a planetary system. Thus, just as in the latter the planets are located very near to a common plane, the fixed stars in their positions are also related as closely as possible to a certain plane which must be imagined drawn through the entire heavens, and because of their densest accumulation toward this same plane they project that band of light called the Milky Way. I have become convinced that, since this zone illuminated by countless suns is very precisely structured in the orientation of an extremely large circle, our sun must similarly be located very near this large interconnecting plane. While I was exploring the causes of this structure, I have found it very probable that the so-called fixed or firm stars could really be slowly moving, wandering stars of a higher order. To endorse what will be found about this concept later in its own section, I wish only to cite here a passage from a text by Mr. Bradley concerning the movement of the fixed stars: If we wish to judge the result of a comparison between our best contemporary observations and earlier ones with tolerable accuracy, then it seems clear that some fixed stars really have changed position with respect to each other and, indeed, in such a way, that we see this is not the result of some movement in our planetary system, but can be ascribed only to a movement of the stars themselves. Arcturus readily provides strong proof of this point. For when we compare the present declination of Arcturus with its location as determined by Tycho as well as by Flamsteed, we will find that the difference is greater than we can assume to have arisen from the inaccuracy of their observations. We have reason to suppose that other examples of a similar phenomenon must occur among the large number of visible stars, because their positions relative to each other could have altered for various reasons. For if we imagine that our own solar system changes its position in celestial space, then after a certain time has gone by, this will give rise to a perceptible change in the angular distance of the fixed stars. And because in such a case this would have a greater effect on the positions of the nearest stars than on the positions of the ones far distant, then their positions would appear to change, although the stars themselves really remain immovable. And if, by contrast, our own planetary system stands still and some stars do, in fact, move, these will similarly change their apparent position, and the apparent movement will be greater the closer the stars are to us or the more the direction of their motion is arranged so that we can perceive it. Now, since the positions of the stars could thus be altered by so many different causes, when we consider the astonishing distances at which some of them are indubitably located, it will take the observations of several human lifetimes to determine the laws for the perceptible alterations of even a single star. Thus, it must be even more difficult to establish laws for all the most remarkable stars.

I cannot precisely determine the boundaries between Mr. Wright's system and my own, nor in what parts I have merely copied his design or developed it further. However, I had very good reasons to expand one aspect of the design considerably. I took into account the species of nebulous stars, which M. de Maupertuis considers in his treatment of the shape of the stars and which display more or less open elliptical shapes, and I easily convinced myself that they could only be an accumulation of many fixed stars. The fact that these shapes, when measured, were always round taught me that here there must be arranged an unimaginably numerous host of stars and, further, that they are around a common mid-point, because, if that were not the case, their free positioning in relation to each other would display wholly irregular shapes, not measurable figures. I also perceived that in the system in which they are brought together they must be for the most part limited to a single plane, because they are not circular but elliptical in shape, and that because of their pale light they are located incredibly far away from us. What I have concluded from these analogies the discussion will itself present for the unprejudiced reader's evaluation.

In the second part, which contains the proposal most germane to this treatise, I endeavour to develop the arrangement of the cosmic structure from the simplest condition of nature merely by mechanical laws. If, for those who are shocked at the daring of this undertaking, I may venture to propose a certain order in the manner with which they honour my ideas by testing them, I would request that they first read through the eighth section, which, I hope, will prepare their judgment for a correct insight. Meanwhile, when I invite the well-disposed reader to examine my opinions, I am justly concerned that, since hypotheses of this sort commonly are considered no better than philosophical dreams, it is a sour pleasure for a reader to resolve to undertake a careful investigation on his own into the histories of nature and patiently to follow the author through all the turns by which he moves around the difficulties which he runs into, so that at the end the reader perhaps laughs at his own credulity, like those who look at the London Market Crier. However, I dare to promise that, if the reader will, as I hope, be convinced by the preparatory chapter placed at the start to undertake such a physical adventure based on such plausible assumptions, he will not meet, as he continues on his way, as many crooked diversions and impassable obstacles as he is perhaps worried about at the beginning.

In fact, I have rejected with the greatest care all arbitrary fictions. After I place the world in the simplest chaos, I have applied to it no forces other than the powers of attraction and repulsion, so as to develop the great order of nature. These two forces are both equally certain, equally simple, and at the same time equally primal and universal. Both are taken from Newtonian philosophy. The first is now an incontestably established law of nature. The second, which Newtonian science perhaps cannot establish with as much clarity as the first, I here assume only in the sense which no one disputes, that is, in connection with the smallest distributed particles of matter, as, for example, in vapours. From such simple grounds as these, I have produced the system which follows in a natural manner, without imagining any consequences other than those which the reader's attentiveness must observe entirely on its own.

Finally, may I be permitted to provide a short explanation concerning the validity and the alleged value of those propositions which will appear in the following theory and according to which I hope to be assessed by reasonable judges. We evaluate an author fairly by the same stamp which he impresses on his own work. Thus, I hope people will demand from the different parts of this treatise no stronger validity for my opinions that what I myself establish for them in the scale of values. Generally, the greatest geometrical precision and mathematical certainty can never be demanded from a treatise of this sort. If the system is based upon analogies and harmonies in accordance with the rules of credibility and a correct way of thinking, then it has met every demand raised by its object. I believe I have reached this level of quality in some parts of this essay, as in the theory of the system of fixed stars, in the hypothesis about the composition of the nebulous stars, in the general design for the mechanical development of the cosmic structure, in the theory of Saturn's ring, and in some others. In some particular parts the treatment will be somewhat less persuasive, as, for example, the determination of the relationships of the eccentricity, the comparison of the masses of the planets, the various deviations of comets, and some others.

Therefore, when in the seventh section I pursue the consequences of this theory as far as possible, attracted by the fecundity of the system and the pleasing nature of the greatest and most awesome subject imaginable, always guided by analogy and a reasonable credibility, although with a certain boldness, and when I propose to the power of imagination the infinite nature of the entire creation, the development of new worlds and the destruction of old ones, and the unlimited space of chaos, I hope that people will be sufficiently indulgent to the attractive charm of the subject and the pleasure which one has in witnessing the harmony in one theory pushed to its furthest limit not to judge it according to the strictest geometrical precision, which, in any case, does not occur in a theory of this sort. I await exactly the same fairness with respect to the third part. There people will constantly come across something more than merely arbitrary, although always something less than certain.

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Part One

Outline of a Systematic Arrangement of the Fixed Stars
and
of the Vast Number of Such Systems of Fixed Stars

Short Outline of the Necessary Fundamental Principles of Newtonian Philosophy Required for an Understanding of the following Theory

Six planets, including three with accompanying satellites, Mercury, Venus, Earth with its moon, Mars, Jupiter with four satellites, and Saturn with five, describe orbits around the sun as the mid-point and, together with the comets, which do the same thing from all sides in very long orbits, make up a system which we call the Solar System or the planetary world structure. The fact that the movement of all these bodies takes the form of a circle and returns back on itself presupposes two forces which are equally necessary for any sort of theory, namely, a projectile force, by which at every point of their curved linear movement the bodies would continue on a straight line and disappear into the infinite distance, unless another force, whatever it may be, constantly required them to leave this path and move on a curved track around the mid-point of the sun. This second force, as geometry itself has established with certainty, always aims at the sun and is therefore called the sinking force, the centripetal force, or gravity.

If the orbits of the celestial bodies were exact circles, then the very simplest breakdown of the compounded curved movements would reveal that a continuous impulse towards the central point would be required for the arrangement. However, although the movements of all planets and comets are ellipses in which the sun is located at a common focal point, higher geometry with the help of Kepler's model (according to which the radius vector or the line drawn from the planet to the sun always cuts out on its elliptical path areas proportional to the times) similarly establishes with unequivocal certainty that a force must constantly draw the planet throughout its entire orbital path towards the mid point of the sun. This sinking force, which governs throughout the whole space of the planetary system and directs itself to the sun, is thus an accepted natural phenomenon. Equally clearly demonstrated is the law according to which this force extends from the mid-point of the sun into the far distances. It always decreases inversely as the square roots of the distances from the centre increase. This rule is derived in an equally infallible way from the time which the planets need at different distances to complete their orbits. These times are always in a ratio to the square root of the cubes of their average distance from the sun. From this we deduce that the force which pulls these cosmic bodies to the mid-point of their orbits must decrease inversely as the square of the distance.

This very same law which governs among the planets in their movements around the sun occurs also in connection with small systems, namely, with those which are made up of moons moving about their main planet. Their orbital times are in exactly the same way proportional to the distances and establish a relationship of the force which causes sinking towards the planet, which is exactly the same as the one by which the planet is pulled towards the sun. All this, derived from the most infallible geometry and uncontested observations, has been placed forever beyond contradiction. From this arises now the idea that this sinking force may be exactly the same impetus which is called heaviness on the surface of the planet and which gradually diminishes with the distances from the surface according to the above-mentioned law. We see this from the comparison of the quantity of heaviness on the surface of the earth with the force which pulls the moon to the mid-point of its orbit. These stand in relation to each other just as the force of attraction in the entire planetary system, namely, in inverse proportion to the square of the distances. Hence people also call this frequently reported central force gravity.

Moreover, because there is the highest degree of probability that if an effect occurs only in the presence of and in proportion to the distance to a certain body and if the direction of this effect is related as precisely as possible to this body, then it is credible that this body is the cause of the effect, however it occurs. Therefore, we have sufficient reason to think that this universal downward movement of the planets towards the sun can be attributed to the power of attraction of the sun and to ascribe the capacity for the power of attraction in general to all the celestial bodies.

Hence, if a body is left free to the influence of this impulse which drives it to sink toward the sun or some other planet, then it will fall towards it with a constantly accelerating motion and soon will be united with that same mass. However, if it gets a push directing it to the side, then, if that push is not powerful enough to achieve an exact equilibrium with the sinking force, the body will sink down to the central mass with a curved movement. And if, before the sinking body touches the outer surface of the central mass, the impulse impressed on it has grown at least strong enough to shift it from the vertical line about half the thickness of the body at the mid-point, then it will not touch this surface but, after it has swung closely around it, will, thanks to the velocity achieved in its fall, be raised up high again just as far as it fell, so as to continue its path in a constant circular movement.

Thus, the difference between the orbital paths of the comets and the planets consists in the sideways deviation in opposition to the force which drives them to fall. The more these two forces approach an equilibrium, the more the orbit will become circular in shape; the more unequal they are, the weaker the projectile force in relation to the force pulling to the centre, then the longer the orbit, or, as we say, the more eccentric the orbit is, because the celestial body in one part of its path comes far closer to the sun than in another.

Because nothing in all nature is exactly balanced, no planet has an entirely circular motion. However, the comets deviate the most from a circular orbit, because at their first distance from the sun the impetus which was impressed on them towards the side was the least proportional to the force pulling them to the centre.

In this treatise I will very often use the expression a systematic arrangement of the cosmic structure. So that people will have no difficulty clearly imagining what this term is to mean, I will explain it briefly. Strictly speaking, all the planets and comets which belong to our cosmic structure already form a system by the fact that they rotate around a common central body. However, I take this term in an even narrower sense, because I consider the more precise relationships which have united them with each other in a regular and uniform way. The orbits of the planets are, in relation to each other, as nearly as possible on a common plane, namely, on the extended equatorial plane of the sun. The deviations from this rule occur only in connection with the outermost borders of the system, where all movements gradually cease. When therefore a certain number of cosmic bodies, ordered around a common mid-point and moving around it are at the same time restricted to a certain plane, so that they have minimal freedom to deviate on both sides of this plane, and when the deviation occurs gradually only with those which are furthest distant from the mid-point and participate less in the interconnections than the others, then I say that these bodies are bound together in a systematic arrangement.

On the Systematic Arrangement of the Fixed Stars

The theory of the general arrangement of the cosmic structure has not achieved any remarkable progress since the time of Huygens. At this point we still know no more than we already knew then, namely, that six planets with ten companions, all of which have the circle of their orbit set almost on a single plane, and the eternal spheres of the comets, which run riot on all sides, make up a single system, whose mid-point is the sun, towards which everything sinks, around which their movements run, and from which they all are illuminated, warmed, and kept alive, and finally that the fixed stars are just so many suns, the mid-points of similar systems, in which everything may be set up in just as large and orderly a way as in our system and that infinite space teems with cosmic systems, whose number and excellence have a relationship to the infinite nature of their Creator.

The systematic arrangement which took place in the union of the planets which move around the sun disappeared in the crowd of fixed stars, and it seemed as if the rule-governed relationship encountered in miniature does not hold sway on a large scale among the links of all the worlds. The fixed stars were subject to no law, by which their positions were confined relative to each other, and we saw all heaven and the heaven of all heavens filled without order and without design. Since human curiosity limited itself in this way, we did nothing further, other than to infer from this state the immensity of the One who had revealed Himself in such inconceivably huge works and to admire Him.

It was reserved for Mr. Wright, an Englishman from Durham, to take a happy step to an observation which he himself does not seem to have developed into anything insightful and whose useful application he did not sufficiently note. He looked at the fixed stars not as a disorganized and scattered swarm without purpose but found a systematic arrangement in their totality and a general relationship of these stars with respect to a major plane of the space which they occupy.

We wish to improve the idea which he presented and to redirect it, so that it can generate important consequences. The complete confirmation of these is something we leave for future ages.

Anyone who gazes at the starry heavens on a clear night will notice that bright band which presents a steady light through the crowd of stars which have accumulated there more than elsewhere and which perceptibly lose themselves in the huge expanse. People have called this band the Milky Way. Because of the structure of this recognizably distinct area in the sky, it is remarkable that observers of the heavens were not long ago prompted to derive from it strange conclusions about the locations of the fixed stars. For we see that the band has an immense circular orientation and, indeed, in a continuous arrangement taking up the entire heavens. These two factors possess such a precise determination and characteristics so recognizably different from uncertain approximations, that from them keen astronomers should long ago naturally have been motivated attentively to investigate the explanation for such a phenomenon.

The stars are not placed on the apparently hollow sphere of the heavens, but from our point of view stand at some distance from each other, some further than others, disappearing into the depths of the heavens. From this phenomenon it follows that, at those distances where they are located one behind the other in relation to us, they do not occur in an equal scattering in every direction, but must be arranged in particular relation to a certain plane which goes through our viewpoint and to which their locations are fixed as closely as possible.

This relationship is such an unambiguous phenomenon that even the remaining stars, which are not included in the white band of the Milky Way, are themselves observed to be that much closer together and more dense, the nearer they are located to the circle of the Milky Way, so that of the 2000 stars which the naked eye perceives in the sky, we find the largest number in a relatively narrow area, the middle of which is taken up by the Milky Way.

Now, if we imagine a plane drawn through the starry heavens and extending an unlimited distance and assume that all the fixed stars and all the solar systems have a common spatial relationship to this plane, so that they are closer to it than to any other areas, then the eye which is located on this common plane, as it looks out into this field of stars, into the hollow spherical surface of the firmament, will see the thickest accumulation of stars in the direction of the drawn plane, in the form of an area illuminated with more lights. This band of light will sweep out in the direction of a huge circle, because the onlooker's viewpoint is on the plane itself. This area will be swarming with stars. Because of the undifferentiated smallness of bright points, a single one of which escapes the eye, and because of the apparent density of a uniform white gleam, it will look, in a word, like a Milky Way. The rest of the heavenly host, whose relationship with the drawn plane becomes less and less apparent or which are also located closer to the observer's position, will be seen as more scattered, although their accumulation will be related to this same plane. From this, finally, it follows that, because from our solar system we see this arrangement of fixed stars in the orientation of a very large circle, our solar system is located in precisely the same large plane and makes one system with the others.

In order that much better to penetrate the composition of the common interrelationship governing this cosmic structure, we wish to try to discover the cause which has arranged the locations of the fixed stars, relating them to a single common plane.

The Sun does not limit the extent of its powers of attraction to the narrow region of the planetary system. According to all appearance, this power extends an infinite distance. The comets which go very far above Saturn's orbit are forced by the sun's powers of attraction to turn back again and to move in orbits. Whether it is more likely for the nature of a force apparently incorporated into the essence of matter to act without limits and whether, in addition, it will be really recognized as such by those who assume Newton's principles, we wish only to have it conceded that this power of attraction of the sun extends approximately to the nearest fixed star and that the fixed stars act on each other as just so many suns to the same extent. Thus, it follows that the entire host of fixed stars strives to come closer together through this power of attraction, so that all the world systems are in a situation where sooner or later they fall into one clump, through this reciprocal moving closer together, which is continuous and unhindered, unless these systems are saved from this disaster by forces which pull away from the central point, as with the spheres in our planetary system. These forces bend the heavenly bodies away from falling in a straight line and, working together with the forces of attraction, bring about the timeless orbits. Thus the structure of creation is preserved from collapse and has been skilfully created to last eternally.

Hence, all the suns in the firmament have orbiting motions, either around one common central point or around many. But with them, we can everywhere apply the analogy of what we observe about the orbital paths of our solar system, namely, that just as that very cause which has imparted to the planets a force moving them away from the centre, through which they maintain their orbits, has directed their orbital paths so that they are all related to a single plane, so also the cause, whatever it might be, which has given the suns of the higher world as well as so many wandering stars of the higher world structure the force of their orbit has at the same time brought their orbits as much as possible into one plane and has worked to limit deviation from this plane.

According to this conception, we can picture the system of fixed stars to a certain extent by means of the planetary system, if we magnify the latter infinitely. For if instead of six planets with their ten satellites we assume many thousands of similar bodies, and instead of the twenty-eight or thirty comets which we have observed, we assume a hundred or a thousand times more of them, and if we think of these particular bodies as generating their own light, then to the eye of the observer who looks out at them from the Earth there would appear exactly the same light as appears from the fixed stars of the Milky Way. For the planets we have imagined, because of their close relationship to the same common plane in which we find ourselves with our Earth, would display a densely lit area made up of countless stars, whose direction went in a very large circle. This band of light would have a sufficient number of stars everywhere, although, according to this hypothesis, as moving stars, they are not fixed to a single spot. For, because of their movement, there would always be enough stars on anyone side, even though other stars had moved from that location.

The width of this illuminated zone, which projects a sort of zodiac, will be set by the different levels of deviation of designated erratic stars from their reference plane and by the inclination of their orbits in relation to this same plane. Since most of them are near this plane, their number will appear more scattered in relation to the extent they are distant from it. However, the comets, which occupy all regions without distinction, will cover the field of the heavens on both sides.

The shape of the heaven of fixed stars thus has no cause other than the same systematic arrangement on a grand scale as the cosmic structure of the planetary system on a small scale, since all the suns make up one system, whose common interconnecting plane is the Milky Way. Those which are the least related to this plane will be seen to the side; for that very reason, however, they are less dense, more widely scattered, and less frequent. They are, so to speak, comets among the suns.

This new theory, however, attributes a forward motion to the suns, and yet everyone acknowledges that they are motionless and that they have been fixed in their positions from the start. The name which the fixed stars have acquired from this seems confirmed and unambiguous because of all the centuries of observation. This difficulty, if soundly based, would destroy the proposed theory. But this lack of movement, according to all appearances, is only something apparent. It is either merely an exceeding slowness, caused by the enormous distance of their orbits from the common mid-point or the impossibility of perceiving them brought about by the distant location of the observer. Let us estimate the plausibility of this notion by calculating the movement which one of the fixed stars located close to our sun would have, assuming that our sun is the mid-point of its orbit. If, following Huygens, we assume that the distance of this star is more than 21000 times greater than the distance of the sun from the Earth, it then follows from the established law of the time of orbiting bodies, which is proportional to the square root of the cube of the distances from the mid-point, that the time which this star must take to complete its circle once around the sun would be more than one and a half million years and that in 4000 years this would have established a shift in its position of only about one degree. Now, because perhaps only a very few fixed stars are as close to the sun as Huygens assumed for Sirius, and because the distance of the rest of the heavenly host perhaps exceeds by far the distance of Sirius, therefore they would require a far longer time for such periodic orbits. Moreover, it is also more probable that the motion of the suns in the celestial stars goes around a common mid-point whose distance away is extraordinarily far, and the forward motion of the stars can hence be exceedingly slow. Consequently, we can probably assume from this that all the time since human beings have been keeping records of celestial observations has perhaps still not been sufficient for them to notice the change which has taken place in these stellar positions. We must meanwhile not yet give up hope that we will discover this change in time. To achieve that will require subtle and careful observers, together with a comparison of observations far distant from each other. We must direct these observations especially at the stars of the Milky Way, the main plane of all movement. Mr. Bradley has observed the almost imperceptible movement of the stars. The ancients marked stars in particular places in the sky, and we see new ones in other places. Who knows that these are not the latter which have merely changed position? The excellence of the instruments and the perfecting of our knowledge of the stars give us ground to hope for the discovery of such remarkable and important observations. The plausibility of the matter itself, based on nature and analogy, supports this hope so well, that it can stimulate the attentive work of scientists to bring it to completion.

The Milky Way is, so to speak, also the zodiac of new stars, alternately appearing and disappearing in this region in a way hardly matched in any other celestial region. If this alteration in their visibility proceeds from their periodic moving further away and closer to us, it seems clear from the proposed systematic arrangement of the stars that such a phenomenon must mainly be seen only in the region of the Milky Way. For there are stars in that location moving in very elongated orbits around other fixed stars, as satellites move around their main planets. Thus, the analogy with our planetary system, in which only heavenly bodies near the common plane of movement have a companion moving around them, requires that only the stars in the Milky Way will have suns orbiting around them.

I am coming to that part of the proposed theory which makes it most particularly attractive because of the sublime picture it presents of creation's plan. The series of ideas which has led me to it is short and natural. It consists of the following. If a system of fixed stars, all spatially related to a common plane, just as we have sketched out the Milky Way, is so far distant from us that all perception of individual stars making up the system is no longer possible, even with a telescope, if the distance of this system has exactly the same relationship to the distance of the stars in the Milky Way as the latter have to the distance of the sun from us, in short, if such a world of fixed stars is seen at such an immeasurable distance from the eye of the observer located outside this world, then this world will appear in a small angle as a tiny and weakly lit area, with a circular shape if its plane is oriented directly in the line of sight and elliptical if it is viewed from the side. The weakness of the light, the shape, and the recognizable extent of its diameter will clearly distinguish such a phenomenon, when present, from all the stars which are seen individually.

We do not need to search a long time for this phenomenon among the observations of the astronomers. It has been clearly confirmed by different observers. People have wondered about its strangeness, have made assumptions, and have subscribed sometimes to odd imaginary images and sometimes to plausible ideas, which, however, just like the former, had no basis. We are talking about the nebulous stars or, rather, a type of them, which M. de Maupertuis wrote about as follows: There are small places whose light is somewhat more than the darkness of empty celestial space, which all are alike in the fact that they display more or less open ellipses, but their light is much weaker than any other that we are aware of in the heavens. The author of the Astrotheology imagined that these were openings in the firmament through which he believed he saw heavenly fire. A philosopher of illuminating insights, the above-mentioned M. de Maupertuis, in thinking about the shape and the recognizable diameter of these stars, considers that they are astonishingly large celestial bodies which display an elliptical shape because of the large flattening caused by the impetus of their rotation, when viewed from the side.

It is easy to be convinced that this last explanation also cannot hold. Because this kind of nebulous stars must undoubtedly be at least as far away from us as the other fixed stars, not only would their size be astonishing (for in this respect they would have to exceed by a factor of many thousands even the largest stars), but the strangest point of all would be that with this extraordinary size, made up of self-illuminating bodies and suns, these stars should display the dimmest and weakest light.

Much more natural and comprehensible is the idea that there are no such individual huge stars but systems of many stars, whose distance makes them appear in such a narrow space, that the light, which cannot be seen for each individual star, because of the countless crowd of them, comes out in a uniform pale glow. The analogy with the system of stars in which we find ourselves, their shape, which is exactly as it must be according to our theory, the weakness of the light, which this previously mentioned infinite distance requires, all these endorse perfectly the idea that these elliptical figures should be taken as exactly the same world systems and, so to speak, as Milky Ways, whose structure we have just gone through. And if suppositions in which analogy and observation are in full agreement and support each other have precisely the same value as formal proofs, then we must take the certainty of this system as demonstrated.

Now the attentiveness of those who observe the heavens has sufficient motivation to concern itself with this undertaking. The fixed stars, as we know, are all connected to a common plane and thus create a coordinated totality, a world of worlds. We see that in the immeasurable distances there are more such star systems and that creation in the entirely of its infinite extent is everywhere systematic and mutually interconnected.

We could further suppose that these particular higher world orders are not unconnected to each other and through this mutual relationship establish once again an even more immeasurably great system. In fact, we see that the elliptical shapes of these sorts of nebulous stars, which M. de Maupertuis mentions, have a very close relationship to the plane of the Milky Way. Here a wide field stands open to discoveries, for which observation must provide the key. The properly named nebulous stars and those about which there is a dispute whether we should call them nebulous must be investigated and tested according to the guidelines of this theory. If we view the parts of nature according to a design and a plan we have discovered, then certain characteristics reveal themselves which are otherwise overlooked and remain hidden, when observation squanders its time on all objects without any guidance.

The theory which we have proposed opens up for us a view of the infinite field of creation and offers an idea of the work of God appropriate to the infinite nature of the Great Master Builder. If the size of a planetary system in which the Earth is hardly seen as a grain of sand fills the understanding with astonishment, how delightfully astounded we will be when we examine the infinite crowd of worlds and systems which fill the totality of the Milky Way. But how much greater this wonder when we know that all these immeasurable arrangements of stars once again create a numbered unity, whose end we do not know and which is perhaps, like the previous one, inconceivably large and yet, once again, only a unit in a new numbered system. We see the first links of a progressive relationship of worlds and systems, and the first part of this unending progression already allows us to recognize what we are to assume about the totality. Here there is no end, but an abyss of a true infinity, in which all capacity of human thought sinks, even when it is uplifted with the help of mathematics. The wisdom, goodness, and power which has revealed itself is limitless and, to exactly the same extent, fruitful and busy. The plan of its revelation must, therefore, be, just like it, infinite and without borders.