228 ASTRONOMYANDTHEBIBLE
question, itseemedtohimthatthiscenterofgravity
fortheuniverse,thiscentralsunforthegreatcosmos,
wassomewhereinthe directionofthePleiades; and
he actually chose Alcyone, one of the Pleiades, as
possiblythecentralsun.
Astronomyisas yetinitsinfancy. Inorderthat
thetruthorthe falsehoodofsucha speculationmay
beverified,thepath ofthesun andthatofeach of
thestarsmustbewatchedfor years,untilthecircles
theymakearemanifest;andthen perhapsitwillbe
possibletofindthecenter,thecommoncenter,ifsuch
there is, ofall theirorbits. Astronomyhasnotyet
gone far enough to perform such a gigantic task.
Agesperhapswouldbeneededto dothis.
Butastronomers have demonstrated thatthestars
are inmotion; and iftimewere given them—ages
possibly—they mightdetermine the actualpaths or
orbitsof enoughofthestars to be abletodiscover
thecenterofthemall. Wecannotexpect itinour
time, however. "All that can now be said is that
the solarsystem is movingtowards a pointnearto
thebrightstarAlphaLyraewithavelocityofabout
twelvemilespersecond. It willrequiresomeyears
yet to reach final values. So far as we know, the
solar motion is uniform and in a straight line."
—Holden's"Astronomy,"page406.
Itspathseemstobeastraightlinebecauseitsorbit
issolarge,andbecauseallwemayobserveforyears
issoverysmallapartofthewholethatwecandetect
novariation froma straight direction. But all the
paths ofheavenlybodies sofarmeasured leadusto