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Life and Works
aged. Though we cannot see any individual nebula pass through all its stages of life, we can select particular ones in each peculiar stage." (1789.)
There is something almost grandiose and majestic in his statement of the ultimate destiny of the Galaxy:
"To him the fates were known
Of orbs dim hovering on the skirts of space."
"—Since the stars of the Milky Way are permanently exposed to the action of a power whereby they are irresistibly drawn into groups, we may be certain that from mere clustering stars they will be gradually compressed, through successive stages of accumulation, till they come up to what may be called the ripening period of the globular form, and total insulation; from which it is evident that the Milky Way must be finally broken up and cease to be a stratum of scattered stars.
"The state into which the incessant action of the clustering power has brought it at present, is a kind of chronometer that may be used to measure the time of its past and future existence; and although we do not know the rate of going of this mysterious chronometer, it is nevertheless certain that since the breaking up of the Milky Way affords a proof that it cannot last forever, it equally bears witness that its past duration cannot be admitted to be infinite." (1814.)
