from it, therefore they compose the Solar System; by which is meant the sun, and the planets which revolve around it as their centre. There are eleven primary planets, Mer'cu-ry,

1

Ve'nus, the Earth, Mars, Ves'ta, Ju'no, Pal'las, Ce'res, Ju'pi-ter, Sat'urn, and Her'schel, which is also known by the name of U-ra'nus, or the Geor'gi-um Sidus. Of these planets the following have satellites which attend them:The Earth has one, Jupiter has four, Herschel has six, and Saturn has seven. All these bodies are continually changing their places in the firmament. At one time, Jupiter may be seen in one part of the heaven; a few weeks after, it will be seen in another part; and the same may be said of all the other bodies belonging to the system; therefore, they are called planets or wandering stars. They all revolve round the sun, from west to east, in great circles, called their paths or orbits. Some of them are nearer the sun than others. The nearest is Mercury, which is thirty-seven millions of miles; and the farthest off is

This intermediate space is so well husbanded and managed, that there is scarcely a degree of perception which does not appear in some one part of the world of life. Whether is the goodness, or the wisdom of the Divine Being, more manifested in this his proceeding?

There is a consequence, besides those I have already mentioned, which seems very naturally deducible from the foregoing considerations. If the scale of being rises by so regular a progress so high as man, we may, by parity of reason, suppose that it still proceeds gradually through those beings which are of a superior nature to him; since there is infinitely greater space and room for different degrees of perfection, between the Supreme Being and man, than between man and the most despicable insect.

In this great system of being, there is no creature so wonderful in its nature, and which so much deserves our particular attention, as man; who fills up the middle space between the animal and the intellectual nature, the visible and the invisible world; and who is that link in the chain of being, which forms the connexion between both. So that he who, in one respect, is associated with angels and archangels, and may look upon a Being of infinite perfection as his father, and the highest order of spirits as his brethren, may, in another respect, say to "corruption, thou art my father, and to the worm thou art my mother and my sister. Addison.

Sat'el-lites, moons; di-ur'nal, daily; el-lip'ti-cal, oval; veloc'i-ty, swiftness; as-sumed', supposed; vig'or-ous, strong; in-sig-nif'i-cant, worthless.

THE Sun is sometimes called Sol, and what belongs to the sun is therefore called Solar. The rays of light that come from the sun, are called solar rays. The planets, with their satellites or moons, revolve around the sun, and never depart

from it, therefore they compose the Solar System; by which is meant the sun, and the planets which revolve around it as their centre. There are eleven primary planets,

Mer'cu-ry,

1

Ve'nus, the Earth, Mars, Ves'ta, Ju'no, Pal'las, Ce'res, Ju'pi-ter, Sat'urn, and Her'schel, which is also known by the name of U-ra'nus, or the Geor'gi-um Sidus. Of these planets the following have satellites which attend them:The Earth has one, Jupiter has four, Herschel has six, and Saturn has seven. All these bodies are continually changing their places in the firmament. At one time, Jupiter may be seen in one part of the heaven; a few weeks after, it will be seen in another part; and the same may be said of all the other bodies belonging to the system; therefore, they are called planets or wandering stars. They all revolve round the sun, from west to east, in great circles, called their paths or orbits. Some of them are nearer the sun than others. The nearest is Mercury, which is thirty-seven millions of miles; and the farthest off is

Herschel, which is 18 hundred millions of miles from the sun. The planets are of various magnitudes. The smallest is Mercury, which is much smaller than the earth; the largest is Jupiter, which is at least one thousand two hundred times as large as the earth. All of them, so far as known, turn round on their axis, or perform their diurnal revolutions, in different spaces of time. Jupiter turns round in little less than ten hours, which is the shortest time. Mars turns round in twenty-five hours, which is the longest time in which any planet performs its diurnal revolution. Thus, Jupiter has the shortest, and Mars the longest days and nights, of any of the planets. It appears that the largest planets turn round in the shortest time. As planets move at different distances from the sun, the orbits or circles in which they move are of different lengths. Consequently, they move around the sun in different periods of time. The shortest period is that of Mercury, which is about three months. The longest period is that of Uranus, which is about eightyfour years. The orbits or paths in which the planets move, are not perfect circles, but, on the contrary, they are all elliptical; that is, they are a little longer one way than the other. All the planets are round, or nearly round, or spherical. The earth is about twenty-five miles further through, at the equator, than at the poles; and is not, therefore, a perfect sphere or globe. It is called a sphe-roid', by which is meant a globe or sphere-like figure, but not a perfect sphere or globe, and it is supposed that the other planets also are spheroids.

The planets move in their orbits with different degrees of veloci Ꭹ ; those nearest the sun move swiftest. Mercury moves at the rate of one hundred thousand miles an hour, or one thousand six hundred and sixty-six miles in a minute. Venus moves at the rate of seventy-six thousand miles an hour; the Earth at the rate of sixty-four thousand, and Mars at the rate of fifty-five thousand miles an hour. The planets being at different distances from the sun, receive different degrees of light and heat. At Mercury, the heat and light are supposed seven times as great as upon the earth, and if any of our animals or plants could be carried to Mercury, they would immediately perish from the excessive heat. If lf

there are such creatures there, they must be imagined of dif.. ferent natures from those of the Earth. The degrees of light and heat at Uranus are assumed as three hundred and sixty times less than upon the Earth. Even during the day, that is, where the sun is shining upon this distant planet, the light, as it must seem to us probable, is very dim, like our twilight. The cold must be greater than we can conceive, and any of the plants or animals of our world would be instantly frozen to death there. There can be no water there; for in such a degree of cold it would be instantly converted to ice, as solid as our rocks.

I have now told you of the eleven primary planets, with their eighteen moons, which are continually moving through the heaven, as they perform their several revolutions round the sun. Let us stop and reflect upon this subject for a moment. How immense is the bulk of one of these worlds! Let us once more consider our own. It would require a rope twenty-five thousand miles long to reach round it, and a stick eight thousand miles long to reach through it, and it would take a man five hundred days, at the rate of fifty miles a day, to travel round it!

What a prodigious mass of earth, and mountains, and seas does it contain! Yet this mighty bulk, bearing along with it five great seas, two immense continents, thousands of islands, eight or nine hundred millions of men, with countless multitudes of plants, and trees, and animals upon it, is borne along, as I have already mentioned, through the heavens, or through space, at the rate of eleven hundred miles a minute! How great and powerful must be that Being who sits in heaven, and bids a world like this to make its journey at such a rate, and lo! it obeys him. A vigorous man, if he will do his best, may go six or even eight miles in an hour; but God sends a vast world along its path at the rate of sixty-four thousand miles in an hour! And not one world only, but I have told you of twenty-nine worlds that revolve round the sun, all of which, for thousands of years, have been speeding forward, in their appointed courses, with untiring swiftness. How great a Being is God! how comparatively weak and insignificant is man!

Parley's Tales of the Sun, &c.