"
Looked at in this way, our earth is but one of a group of eight stars,
which have been called planets, or wanderers, because, while other worlds,
which are called fixed stars, keep constantly in the same position with
regard to each other, these planets are always moving. They have two
movements; I think you know that our earth turns round upon itself, as your
top does when it spins, and that in this way the changes of day and night
come to us; the other movement is that by which it, along with the other
planets, travels round the sun.
This yearly journey round the sun which the earth takes is a long one, but
so swiftly does it move that it may be said rather to fly than to wander.
Shut your eyes and count "One," "two," "three," "four," "five"; in this
little moment of time the earth will have got over a hundred miles of its
journey. You see it flies along faster than any bird; and what a noiseless
flight it is! How is it that we do not feel it moving? Ah, you must
remember that the earth carries _you_ along with it; you know nothing about
the rapid journey, and yet you are a traveller in spite of yourself--a
traveller round the sun.
All the planets, like our earth, move round the sun, and are kept in their
places by means of a wonderful power which we cannot see, but which is one
of those "laws of nature," as the rules which God has made for His great
universe are sometimes called, about which I told you that they never
alter.
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