162 ASTRONOMYANDTHEBIBLE
acommunity;butsincethattime, muchmorerefined
observations have been possible. By means of the
spectroscope, astronomers areableto learnthe very
materialofwhich thestarsare composed; andhere
iswhatafairlyrecentastronomerhastosayconcern-
ingtherevelations ofthespectroscopewithreference
toOrion
:"The starsinOrion (withthenotableexceptionof
Betelgeuse)haveaspecialvarietyofspectrumscarcely
found outside of that constellation. This indicates
thatthesestarshaveasimilarstructure;probablythey
are'chipsoffthesameblock.'"—Howe's''Descriptive
Astronomy,''page^J/.
Thisstatement oftheastronomer, weseeatonce,
ismoredefiniteandconvincingthantheformerone,
andshowsthatassciencehasadvanced,astronomyhas
beenablemoreandmore clearlytoconfirmthe fact
revealedintheBiblemorethan threethousandyears
ago. Itisalongtimetowaitforconfirmation,butit
is one ofthe strongestconceivable evidences ofthe
reliabiHtyof theWord ofGod. Manytexts inthe
Bibleweregiventobeunderstoodintheclosingage—
"theyarewrittenforouradmonition,uponwhomthe
endsoftheworldarecome." iCor.lo:ii.
Anotherwriterpresentsevenmoreclearlyandcon-
clusivelythiswonderfultruthofthebondsofaffinity
whichexistbetween thestarsintheconstellationof
Orion:"We sometimes think that those groups of stars
towhich from allantiquitycertainnames havebeen
assignedhavebondsofaffinity,andthattheirproxim-