There happens to be a band of twelve constellations forming a broad
circle of the heavens.
Is that what is called the Signs of the Zodiac?
The same. Can you repeat them?
Yes, father. Aries the Ram, Taurus the Bull, Gemini the Twins, Cancer
the Crab, Leo the Lion, Virgo the Virgin, Libra the Scales, Scorpio the
Scorpion, Sagittarius the Archer, Capricornus the Goat, Aquarius the
Water-bearer, Pisces the Fishes.
Over there to the eastward is one of these that rose as the sun
was setting. The sun is seen opposite one or other of the twelve
constellations in each month of the year. It is observed, for instance,
to rise each morning for a month in the constellation of the Ram, and
for the next month in the Bull.
How can it be among those stars when you say they are so much farther
off?
By saying it is in such a constellation, I mean that it is in a line
between us and that cluster of stars.
Why, then, the sun appears to go a journey between the stars and us for
a whole year. Then it will rise in the Ram twelve months after it had
been seen opposite that constellation. I wonder how this can be. Did
you not say, father, that neither the stars nor the sun really moved?