[From _The Astronomy of the Bible_ (New York, 1863)]
If we extend our researches beyond the limits of the solar system, and, passing across the mighty gulf which separates us from the starry heavens, inspect minutely the organizations which are there displayed, we find the dominion of these same laws extending to these remote regions, and holding an imperious sway over revolving suns. Thus we perceive, that in one most important particular, the objects which compose the mighty universe are obviously alike, and seem to have sprung from a common origin. We are, moreover, compelled to admit a sun in every visible star; and if a sun, then attendant planets; and if revolving planets, then, likewise, some scheme of sentient existence, possibly remotely analogous to that which is displayed with such wonderful minuteness in our globe. Thus if the being of a God can be argued from the admirable adaptations which surround man in this nether world, every star that glitters in the vast concave of heaven proclaims, with equal power, this mighty truth. If we rise still higher, and from the contemplation of individual stars, examine their distribution, their clusterings, their aggregations into immense systems, the fact of their mutual influences, their restless and eternal activity, their amazing periods of revolution, their countless millions, and their ever-during organizations, the mind, whelmed with the display of grandeur, exclaims involuntarily, "This is the empire of a God!"
And now, how is the knowledge of this vast surrounding universe revealed to the mind of man? Here is, perhaps, the crowning wonder. Through the agency of light, a subtle, intangible, imponderable something, originating, apparently, in the stars and suns, darting with incredible velocity from one quarter of the universe to the other, whether in absolute particles of matter shot off from luminous bodies, or by traces of an ethereal fluid, who shall tell? This incomprehensible fluid falls upon an instrument of most insignificant dimensions, yet of most wonderful construction, the human eye, and, lo! to the mind what wonders start into being. Pictures of the most extravagant beauty cover the earth; clouds dipped in the hues of heaven fill the atmosphere; the sun, the moon, the planets, come up from out of the depths of space, and far more amazing still, the distant orbs of heaven, in their relative magnitudes, distances and motions, are revealed to the bewildered mind. We have only to proceed one step further, and bringing to the aid of the human eye, the auxiliary power of the optic glass, the mind is brought into physical association with objects which inhabit the confines of penetrable space. We take cognizance of objects so remote, that even the flashing element of light itself, by which they are revealed, flies on its errand ten times ten thousand years to accomplish its stupendous journey.