A view of the Milky Way.

 

 

The stars in the heavens retain the same distances and situation with respect to each other. The nearest star is 2 millions of millions of miles from Earth; it would take a cannonball 700,000 years to arrive. The Milky Way is a whitish tract in space of unequal breadth but is formed by an infinite number of small stars. The best view of the Milky Way can be seen during the evenings of February and August [1].

“The whole Body of the fix’d Stars appears to have a flow progressive Motion [parallel to the Ecliptic] towards the East, of about 50 inches yearly, i.e. 1 degree in 70 Years; consequently, they do not complete one Revolution in less than 25,920 Years; after which Time they all return to the same Places again. This long Period was call’d the Great Year, and the antients imagin’d that when it was finish’d all Things would begin anew, and return in the same Order and Manner as before” [2].

It is probable that each star is a sun surrounded with its own system of planets [3].