Title: GREAT ASTRONOMERS
Author: SIR ROBERT S. BALL
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Chapter III - Introduction
INTRODUCTION.
Of all the natural sciences there is not one which offers such
sublime objects to the attention of the inquirer as does the science
of astronomy. From the earliest ages the study of the stars has
exercised the same fascination as it possesses at the present day.
Among the most primitive peoples, the movements of the sun, the moon,
and the stars commanded attention from their supposed influence on
human affairs.
The practical utilities of astronomy were also obvious in primeval
times. Maxims of extreme antiquity show how the avocations of the
husbandman are to be guided by the movements of the heavenly bodies.
The positions of the stars indicated the time to plough, and the time
to sow. To the mariner who was seeking a way across the trackless
ocean, the heavenly bodies offered the only reliable marks by which
his path could be guided. There was, accordingly, a stimulus both
from intellectual curiosity and from practical necessity to follow
the movements of the stars. Thus began a search for the causes of
the ever-varying phenomena which the heavens display.
Many of the earliest discoveries are indeed prehistoric. The great
diurnal movement of the heavens, and the annual revolution of the
sun, seem to have been known in times far more ancient than those to
which any human monuments can be referred. The acuteness of the
early observers enabled them to single out the more important of the
wanderers which we now call planets. They saw that the star-like
objects, Jupiter, Saturn, and Mars, with the more conspicuous Venus,
constituted a class of bodies wholly distinct from the fixed stars
among which their movements lay, and to which they bear such a
superficial resemblance. But the penetration of the early
astronomers went even further, for they recognized that Mercury also
belongs to the same group, though this particular object is seen so
rarely. It would seem that eclipses and other phenomena were
observed at Babylon from a very remote period, while the most ancient
records of celestial observations that we possess are to be found in
the Chinese annals.
The study of astronomy, in the sense in which we understand the word,
may be said to have commenced under the reign of the Ptolemies at
Alexandria. The most famous name in the science of this period is
that of Hipparchus who lived and worked at Rhodes about the year
160BC. It was his splendid investigations that first wrought the
observed facts into a coherent branch of knowledge. He recognized
the primary obligation which lies on the student of the heavens to
compile as complete an inventory as possible of the objects which are
there to be found. Hipparchus accordingly commenced by undertaking,
on a small scale, a task exactly similar to that on which modern
astronomers, with all available appliances of meridian circles, and
photographic telescopes, are constantly engaged at the present day.
He compiled a catalogue of the principal fixed stars, which is of
special value to astronomers, as being the earliest work of its kind
which has been handed down. He also studied the movements of the sun
and the moon, and framed theories to account for the incessant
changes which he saw in progress. He found a much more difficult
problem in his attempt to interpret satisfactorily the complicated
movements of the planets. With the view of constructing a theory
which should give some coherent account of the subject, he made many
observations of the places of these wandering stars. How great were
the advances which Hipparchus accomplished may be appreciated if we
reflect that, as a preliminary task to his more purely astronomical
labours, he had to invent that branch of mathematical science by
which alone the problems he proposed could be solved. It was for
this purpose that he devised the indispensable method of calculation
which we now know so well as trigonometry. Without the aid rendered
by this beautiful art it would have been impossible for any really
important advance in astronomical calculation to have been effected.
But the discovery which shows, beyond all others, that Hipparchus
possessed one of the master-minds of all time was the detection of
that remarkable celestial movement known as the precession of the
equinoxes. The inquiry which conducted to this discovery involved a
most profound investigation, especially when it is remembered that in
the days of Hipparchus the means of observation of the heavenly
bodies were only of the rudest description, and the available
observations of earlier dates were extremely scanty. We can but look
with astonishment on the genius of the man who, in spite of such
difficulties, was able to detect such a phenomenon as the precession,
and to exhibit its actual magnitude. I shall endeavour to explain
the nature of this singular celestial movement, for it may be said to
offer the first instance in the history of science in which we find
that combination of accurate observation with skilful interpretation,
of which, in the subsequent development of astronomy, we have so many
splendid examples.
The word equinox implies the condition that the night is equal to the
day. To a resident on the equator the night is no doubt equal to the
day at all times in the year, but to one who lives on any other part
of the earth, in either hemisphere, the night and the day are not
generally equal. There is, however, one occasion in spring, and
another in autumn, on which the day and the night are each twelve
hours at all places on the earth. When the night and day are equal
in spring, the point which the sun occupies on the heavens is termed
the vernal equinox. There is similarly another point in which the
sun is situated at the time of the autumnal equinox. In any
investigation of the celestial movements the positions of these two
equinoxes on the heavens are of primary importance, and Hipparchus,
with the instinct of genius, perceived their significance, and
commenced to study them. It will be understood that we can always
define the position of a point on the sky with reference to the
surrounding stars. No doubt we do not see the stars near the sun
when the sun is shining, but they are there nevertheless. The
ingenuity of Hipparchus enabled him to determine the positions of
each of the two equinoxes relatively to the stars which lie in its
immediate vicinity. After examination of the celestial places of
these points at different periods, he was led to the conclusion that
each equinox was moving relatively to the stars, though that movement
was so slow that twenty five thousand years would necessarily elapse
before a complete circuit of the heavens was accomplished. Hipparchus
traced out this phenomenon, and established it on an impregnable
basis, so that all astronomers have ever since recognised the
precession of the equinoxes as one of the fundamental facts of
astronomy. Not until nearly two thousand years after Hipparchus had
made this splendid discovery was the explanation of its cause given
by Newton.
From the days of Hipparchus down to the present hour the science of
astronomy has steadily grown. One great observer after another has
appeared from time to time, to reveal some new phenomenon with regard
to the celestial bodies or their movements, while from time to time
one commanding intellect after another has arisen to explain the true
import of the facts of observations. The history of astronomy thus
becomes inseparable from the history of the great men to whose
labours its development is due.
In the ensuing chapters we have endeavoured to sketch the lives and
the work of the great philosophers, by whose labours the science of
astronomy has been created. We shall commence with Ptolemy, who,
after the foundations of the science had been laid by Hipparchus,
gave to astronomy the form in which it was taught throughout the
Middle Ages. We shall next see the mighty revolution in our
conceptions of the universe which are associated with the name of
Copernicus. We then pass to those periods illumined by the genius of
Galileo and Newton, and afterwards we shall trace the careers of
other more recent discoverers, by whose industry and genius the
boundaries of human knowledge have been so greatly extended. Our
history will be brought down late enough to include some of the
illustrious astronomers who laboured in the generation which has just
passed away.
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