The Meteoritic Hypothesis: A Statement of the Results of a Spectroscopic Inquiry Into the Origin of Cosmical Systems

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Macmillan, 1890 - 560 pages
 

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Page 266 - If this matter is self-luminous, it seems more fit to produce a star by its condensation than to depend on the star for its existence.
Page 331 - View, for instance, the 19th cluster of my 6th class, and afterwards cast your eye on this cloudy star, and the result will be no less decisive than that of the naturalist we have alluded to. Our judgement, I may venture to say, will be, that the nebulosity about the star is not of a starry nature.
Page 261 - I was in the situation of a natural philosopher who follows the various species of animals and insects from the height of their perfection down to the lowest ebb of life; when, arriving at the vegetable kingdom, he can scarcely point out to us the precise boundary where the animal ceases and the plant begins; and may even go so far as to suspect them not to be essentially different. But recollecting himself, he compares, for instance, one of the human species to a tree, and all doubt upon the subject...
Page 341 - Rigel, etc., are also white stars, but show no lines : perhaps they contain no mineral substance, or are incandescent without flame.
Page 261 - I arrived at last to spots in which no trace of a star was to be discerned. But then the gradations to these latter were by such well-connected steps as left no room for doubt but that all these phaenomena were equally occasioned by stars, variously dispersed in the immense expanse of the universe.
Page 266 - ... for, as we have already observed, reflected light could never reach us at the great distance we are from such objects. Besides, how impenetrable would be an atmosphere of a sufficient density to reflect so great a quantity of light ! And yet we observe, that the outward parts of the chevelure are nearly as bright as those that are close...
Page 409 - According to Schonfeld it first attracted attention as an apparently new star in 1600, and fluctuated greatly during the seventeenth century, finally becoming a star of the fifth magnitude, and so continuing to the present time. It has recently been repeatedly observed at Harvard College Observatory with the meridian photometer, and does not appear to be undergoing any variation at present.
Page 531 - The brighter lines in spiral nebulae, and in those in which a rotation has been set up, are in all probability due to streams of meteorites with irregular motions out of the main streams, in which the collisions would be almost nil. It has already been suggested by Professor G. Darwin (' Nature,
Page 261 - ... the perfect animal to the perfect vegetable, is wanting to remove the veil from the mind of the astronomer. The object I have mentioned above, is the phaenomenon that was wanting for this purpose.
Page 284 - X 3730, of which he speaks, though I have other lines which he does not appear to have photographed. This may be due to the fact that he had placed his slit on a different region of the nebula...

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