456 OF SUN-BEAMS AND STAR - BEAMS. ceeds further in its progress, and gains upon the void space : The world would be for ever growing and increasing in extent with- out end. And what is said here concerning one star, may be as- sertedconcerning our sun and every star, and the greatest part of the rays they send forth. And if light move so swiftly, as to pass through one hun- dred and fourscore thousand miles in the second of a minute, as modern philosophy asserts, with what a prodigious speed must this world increase its extent, and be for ever increasing it ? Now if these star-beams have been moving through the infinite void with such an astonishing swiftness, ever since the world has been created, i. e. at the rate of one hundred and four- score thousand miles in the second of a minute, what prodigious expansion has the universe arrived at, if according to Moses, we count the beginning of all things to have been but six thousand years ago ? But if the Mosaic history of the creation has regard only to our earth, or to the planetary system of our sun, then, for ought weknow, the universe might be created sixty thousand or six hundred thousand years ago ; and how amazingly must it be dilated by such a supposition, yet continually enlarging its bounds, and gaining upon the boundless void ? As the universe upon thissupposition will be for ever enlarg- ing its limits, so it will be for ever diminishing its solid substance, till in time the lucid bodies ace in a great measure wasted away, or at least till the luminous atoms are all fled away and gone : And then, not only the planets, but whatsoevermore of solid matter remains in the stars, also will be buried in eternal dark- ness : And if the world had been eternal, as some persons have imagined it, it must have been long ago reduced by this means to universal midnight and desolation. I can think but of one objection to be raised against this way of reasoning, and that is, that gravitation toward the stars or their planets would withhold these atoms of light, these luminous rays, from such a prodigious and eternal excursion into the infinite void. Butmay it not be answered, that since gravitation could not so restrain the motion of these bright atoms, these star-beams when they were much nearer to the star and its planetary worlds, but that light when it was omitted from the star, fled with such a prodigious swiftness, even to so vast a distance, can it be sup- posed, that gravitation will have so much influence as to stop its motion, when it is arrived at this vast distance from the star, and all its planets ? Yet after all, I know it may be replied again, that gravita- tion is a power which is not limited in its agency by any conceiva- ble distances whatsoever ; and therefore when these star-beams
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