_J. Ferguson delin._ _J. Mynde Sculp._ ]
14. Since the Fixed Stars are prodigious spheres of fire, like our Sun,
and at inconceivable distances from one another, as well as from us, it
is reasonable to conclude they are made for the same purposes that the
Sun is; each to bestow light, heat, and vegetation on a certain number
of inhabited Planets, kept by gravitation within the sphere of it’s
activity.
[Sidenote: Numberless Suns and Worlds.]
15. What an august! what an amazing conception, if human imagination can
conceive it, does this give of the works of the Creator! Thousands of
thousands of Suns, multiplied without end, and ranged all around us, at
immense distances from each other, attended by ten thousand times ten
thousand Worlds, all in rapid motion, yet calm, regular, and harmonious,
invariably keeping the paths prescribed them; and these Worlds peopled
with myriads of intelligent beings, formed for endless progression in
perfection and felicity.
16. If so much power, wisdom, goodness, and magnificence is displayed in
the material Creation, which is the least considerable part of the
Universe, how great, how wise, how good must HE be, who made and governs
the Whole!