THE MILKY WAY

This is, in a sense, one vast nebula running right round the heavens in the form of a belt, or ring; its familiar resemblance to spilt milk being the origin of its popular name. To the naked eye, it appears merely a hazy band of light, but the telescope shows that it is made up of an enormous number of stars, millions of miles apart, but which can only be distinguished from one another by telescopic aid. It constitutes the so-called “Galaxy.” It seems to be spread out in the form of a vast disk, whose diameter is many times its thickness. Our solar system appears to be near the center of this vast system, and, as we penetrate further and further into space, it becomes apparent that fewer and fewer stars, and fewer and fewer nebulæ, seem to exist. Hence the limitation of the material Universe. The Milky Way is made up of thousands of millions of suns; yet their enormous distances make them appear to constitute one vast, luminous belt encircling our globe!