Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 13.djvu/590

572 held by many astronomers, was controverted by others who maintained that the light, supposed to come from primitive fire-mist or nebulous matter, was in reality emitted by extensive sidereal groups, or vast universes too distant to show their individual stars. But, after some time, the round and the oval forms of many of these faint objects were looked upon as marks of a concentration around a centre, and the rare matter seemed to be emerging from its original chaotic state. It was thus that Kant, guided chiefly by the observations of Maupertuis, obtained a basis for his nebular hypothesis, which he published in 1755, and which, in essential features, differs little from that which has been held during the present century. Yet the subject excited little attention until many years afterward, when Sir William Herschel made his extensive and careful observations on planetary nebulæ, and pronounced them incipient solar systems, while he looked on irregular nebulosity as indicative of the presence of distant collections of stars.

As the doctrine founded on these observations was generalized by Laplace and supported by him with additional evidence, it obtained for a while much currency in astronomical circles; but it was seriously shaken in 1845, when many of the supposed embryonic systems of Herschel were resolved into stars by the powerful telescope of Lord Rosse. Yet, after a decline for a few years, the nebular hypothesis was revived on this side of the Atlantic by the announcement of Kirkwood's analogy; and some time afterward it obtained more decided support from the authority of Kirchhoff, as, on the discovery of spectrum analysis, it seemed to furnish a good explanation of solar phenomena. When Huggins obtained positive proof of the gaseous constitution of many of the irresolvable nebulae, the tide of scientific opinion set more strongly in favor of the views of Herschel and Laplace; but it was soon checked when it was found that all the true nebulous objects had a uniformity of composition, and consisted entirely of hydrogen, nitrogen, and an unknown gas. It seems impossible that the vast diversity of material objects in future families of worlds could be afforded by the agency of three elements, one of which is noted for its reluctance to take part in chemical combinations. In addition to this difficulty, the periodical and the permanent changes, detected in certain nebulous objects by Hind and Holden, differ widely from a slow transition into a planetary system; and they are fatal to the idea that these cosmical clouds were in past ages impassive to physical influences and departed little from their primitive condition. But facts still more difficult of explanation, in regard to these celestial objects, have been made known by the recent observations on Nova Cygni; and the apparent metamorphosis which was witnessed, of a temporary star into a nebula, was so little expected that theory seems much at fault; and it is evident that many of the views on this obscure department of astronomy must be either considerably modified or entirely abandoned.

According to the crude opinions prevailing during the infancy of