Excerpt from Other Worlds Than Ours: The Plurality of Worlds, Studied Under the Light of Recent Scientific Researches One is thus invited to discuss anew a subject which but a few years since seemed thoroughly sifted by the inquiries of the two eminent philosophers I have named. We stand in a position much more favorable for the formation of just views than that from which Whewell and Brewster surveyed the plane tary and stellar systems. Never, since men first explored the celestial depths, has a series of more startling discoveries re warded the labors of astronomers and physicists than during the past few years. Unhoped-for revelations have been made on every side. Analogies the most interesting have brought the distant orbs of heaven into close relationship with our own earth, or with the central luminary of the planetary scheme. And a lesson has been taught us which bears even more significantly on our views respecting the existence of other worlds: we have learned to recognize within the solar system, and within the wondrous galaxy of which our sun is a constituent orb, a variety of structure and a complexity of detail, of which but a few years ago astronomers had formed but the most inadequate conceptions. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.