domain of cosmological
theory." [423] We wish the eloquent professor all success. It was not
the spirit of primitive Christianity, but the spirit of priestly
ignorance, intolerance, and despotism, which invaded the territory
of natural science; and if those who are its rightful lords can recover
the soil, we bid them heartily, God speed! We have been driven to
these remarks by a twofold impulse. First, we can never forget the
injury that has been inflicted on science by the oppositions of a
headless religion; any more than we can forget the injury which has
been inflicted on religion by the oppositions of a heartless science.
Secondly, we have seen this very question of the inhabitation of the
planets and satellites rendered a topic of ridicule for Thomas Paine,
and an inviting theme for raillery to others of sophistical spirit, by
the way in which it has been foolishly mixed up with sacred or
spiritual concerns. Surely, the object of God in the creation of our
terrestrial race, or the benefits of the death of Jesus Christ, can have
no more to do with the habitability of the moon, than the doctrine of
the Trinity has to do with the multiplication table and the rule of
three, or the hypostatical union with the chemical composition of
water and light. Having said thus much of compulsion, we return,
not as ministers in the temple of religion so much as students in the
school of science, to consider with docility the question in dispute,
_Is the moon inhabited_?

Three avenues, more or less umbrageous, are open to us; all of
which have been entered. They may be named _observation_,
_induction_, and _analogy_. The first, if we could pursue it, would
explicate the enigma at once. The second, if clear, would satisfy our
reason, which, in such a matter, might be equivalent to sight. And
the third might conduct us to a shadow which would "prove the
substance true." We begin by dealing briefly with the argument
from _observation_. Here our data are small and our difficulties
great. One considerable inconvenience in the inquiry is, of course,
the moon's distance. Though she is our next-door neighbour in the
many-mansioned universe, two hundred and thirty-seven thousand
miles are no mere step heavenward. Transit across the intervenient
space being at present impracticable, we have to derive our most
enlarged views of this "spotty globe" from the "optic glass." But this
admirable appliance, much as it has revealed, is thus far who