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 Socialism Is
Evil
The Moral Case Against Marx’s
Radical Dream

Justin T. Haskins

www.henrydearborn.org
 Copyright © 2018
Justin Haskins

Published by Justin Haskins and The Henry Dearborn Institute for

Liberty, an association of pro-liberty, free-market professionals and
scholars.
Boston, MA and Arlington Heights, IL

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or

portions thereof in any form.
Opinions expressed are solely those of the author. Nothing in this
book should be construed as reflecting the views of the author’s
employers or as an attempt to influence pending legislation.
Cover design by Donald Kendal. Base cover photos provided by Getty
Images’ iStock. Photo of “Man with Loudspeaker” by puruan. Photo
of clenched fists by Sylverarts. Photo of “Gothenburg City Aerial View
in Sunset” by Iuza studios.
Published in the United States of America.
Kindle e-book version.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1. What Is Socialism?
Chapter 2. Is Socialism Possible?
Chapter 3. Socialism Is Evil
Chapter 4. European-Style Socialism
Chapter 5. Socialists’ Objections Answered
Conclusion
Notes
About the Author
 Acknowledgments
While other children grew up hearing bedtime stories about
monsters and faraway fantasy adventures, as a young boy in rural
New Hampshire, my father would tuck me in at night as he told the
legendary tales of men like John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and
George Washington. Through those stories, I learned to question
everything with boldness, as well as the importance of individual
liberty, servant leadership, and honor. Dad, this book is for you.
 Socialism Is
Evil
The Moral Case Against Marx’s
Radical Dream
Introduction
When most Americans hear the word “socialism,” they usually think,
depending on their political ideology, of one of the following
commonly used descriptions: (1) a Scandinavian paradise full of
happy, smiling, wealthy, and educated families who couldn’t be more
pleased with their well-functioning governments, or (2) a
Venezuelan-style hellscape in which people fight to the death at
grocery stores over the country’s last remaining roll of toilet paper
and kill zoo animals to feed their starving families.
As is often the case, the reality is that most people’s
experiences with socialism rests somewhere between those extreme
points. In fact, most modern “socialist” societies only socialize
certain aspects of their economies and rarely impose the sort of
authoritarianism commonly found in many of the socialist countries
that emerged in the first 70 years or so of the twentieth century.
The debate over the benefits and harms of socialism almost
always devolves to a point in which opposing sides rely almost
exclusively on caricatures to prove their arguments. For many who
support or are sympathetic to socialism, every capitalist is a racist,
white, wealthy, greedy businessperson who spends his Saturdays
laughingly smoking cigars while dumping toxic waste into a river that
feeds groundwater used by a nearby orphanage for special-needs
kids.
Similarly, all socialists have become jackboot-wearing
stormtroopers that dream of instituting an authoritarian society that
looks more like North Korea than it does Sweden.
When data are presented in discussions of socialism, they also
usually focus on extremes and fail to present a fair picture of what’s
really happening. Both sides cherry-pick evidence that best
illustrates their points, and in the end, people genuinely curious
about socialism are left with more questions than answers about
collectivist governments.
As the title of this book clearly shows, I believe socialism is
highly immoral. In fact, I believe it’s one of the evilest economic
systems ever devised. But unlike many who often discuss this topic,
I don’t believe socialism is immoral because it creates poverty. I do
think a society attempting to impose socialism inevitably ends up
with those problems in the long run, but the fear of economic
inefficiencies is not the basis of the primary objection to socialism
presented in this book.
The main reason I oppose socialism is because regardless of the
outcomes a socialized country might experience, I believe a socialist
system requires certain freedoms to be eliminated—freedoms so
essential to humanity that they ought to be considered inalienable
human rights. This view is incredibly important, because if I’m
correct, the economic outcomes of a socialist model should be
considered largely irrelevant in debates over socialistic systems.
I believe the evidence is overwhelming that attempts to
implement socialism, given enough time, do not produce healthier,
safer, happier societies than models that embrace individual liberty
and free markets. But, as this book will show, even if such an ideal
model could be developed, it wouldn’t persuade me one bit, because
such a system would still be immoral and deprive people of their
most important freedoms.
Chapter One of this book examines what socialism is and how it
works and discusses the differences between the socialism of
philosophers like Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and the modern
“socialist” systems commonly found in Europe.
Chapter Two examines whether the advanced socialist system
advocated by Marx and his ideological descendants is possible.
Chapter Three presents the primary argument of this book:
Socialism is highly immoral, regardless of the outcomes socialist
economies provide, and thus it should be rejected in the United
States and everywhere else in the world. It also briefly explains how
to define “evil” in the modern West, which has largely rejected a
traditional understanding of the term.
Chapter Four, titled “European-Style Socialism,” outlines many of
the moral problems found in modern “mixed-socialist” societies,
including Canada and many European countries.
 Chapter Five answers several objections commonly made by
socialists against those who argue socialism is extremely immoral.
Despite socialists’ failures throughout the twentieth century,
millions of Americans have in recent decades bought into the wildly
idealistic fantasy that Marx’s socialism can be effectively
implemented in the United States and that the success of socialistic
policies in Europe can provide Americans with a path toward greater
prosperity and peace. Such notions are dangerous—not only
because socialism has repeatedly been shown to worsen economies
and lead to tyranny, but, most importantly, because socialism is an
inherently evil system that, despite its adherents’ good-hearted
intentions, necessitates immoral acts and destroys individual liberty.
1
What Is Socialism?
Perhaps the best argument socialists make about their political
beliefs is that few people in the modern Western world understand
what socialism is. Although the word is often thrown around in
various political debates, both positively and negatively, many people
in Europe and the United States don’t understand the traditional
Marxist view of socialism.
Most of the confusion over socialism is understandable, as I’ll
explain later in this book, but it has also presented significant
challenges and opportunities for those who have embraced this
ideology. Because people generally don’t understand what socialism
is, socialists, liberals, and progressives have been able to sway many
people into identifying as “socialist” despite having very little in
common with the historical ideas associated with this political
philosophy.
When Westerners think of socialism, even self-described
socialists, they typically imagine specific socialized industries or
authoritarian regimes, but rarely do they contemplate the socialized
societies Marx and others dreamed of making. For instance, many
American socialists support single-payer health care, free college
tuition, and other progressive policy ideas, but very few of these
people openly advocate for the socialization of agriculture or
requiring all industries to be collectively owned.
The primary challenge many socialists face resulting from
people’s lack of understanding about socialism is that they
constantly feel like they must defend their views against what
socialists consider to be caricatures of their system. For example, it’s
become quite common for American libertarians and conservatives
to refer to the collapsing Venezuelan economy as a prime example of
how socialism fails, even though Venezuela hasn’t completely
adopted many Marxist ideas.
 One of the reasons few people understand what socialism would
look like in its fully developed form is both conservatives and liberals
in the United States have used the term as a catch-all for policies
that increase the power of the government, especially the national
government. This is, to some extent, a fair use of the word. A
“socialized” medical system is one in which the government pays for
and/or operates the delivery of all health care services—or at least
pays for all health care services. Such a system is socialistic in that it
emphasizes and empowers the collective over the rights of the
individual citizen and business owner, but it’s a far cry from the
socialism of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, two of the most
influential socialists in history.
Before I outline the essential components of Marx’s socialism,
it’s important to remember that although Marx’s ideas have been
more influential than the ideas of any other socialist, socialism,
similar to other economic and political systems, is a big-tent ideology
that includes numerous ideas and philosophies. Just like there is no
clear definition of “conservative” or “liberal,” with socialism, you’ll
find many politicians, pundits, and parties with very different policy
proposals and political philosophies.
In this book, I’ve chosen to focus on Marx’s socialism, which in
its final stage is called “communism,” and the “European-style
socialism,” sometimes referred to as “democratic socialism,” found
throughout Western Europe, Canada, and the United States. These
two brands of socialism pose the greatest threats for capitalists in
the West and are the most likely to become more popular over the
next century.
The following sections describe socialism as Marx and his
ideological descendants understood it, followed by a brief description
of how these ideas differ with the more moderate European-style
socialism, which may not rise to the level of being considered “evil”
but certainly suffers from many of the same moral issues found in
Marx’s socialism.

Class Warfare
Central to every Marxist socialist system is the elimination of societal
“classes,” which virtually all socialists say are to blame for the
alleged “exploitation” they believe naturally results from there being
separate economic groups in society with varying degrees of wealth.
Simply defined, classes are merely groups with different amounts of
wealth, and thus different degrees of economic “power.” They are
often written and spoken about by socialists in broad terms, but
logically, in any society in which there are two or more groups with
varying amounts of wealth, those groups could reasonably be called
“classes.”
Marx spent a substantial amount of his Communist Manifesto,
his most famous work, describing the history of class warfare and
the exploitation of the “working class.” But perhaps his most famous
passage on the topic appears below. (If you’re confused about how
the terms “socialism” and “communism” relate, don’t worry! I
discuss communism and socialism in a later section.):
The history of all hitherto existing
societies is the history of class struggles.
Freeman and slave, patrician and
plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and
journeyman, in a word, oppressor and
oppressed, stood in constant opposition
to one another, carried on an
uninterrupted, now hidden, now open
fight, a fight that each time ended, either
in a revolutionary re-constitution of
society at large, or in the common ruin of
the contending classes. In the earlier
epochs of history, we find almost
everywhere a complicated arrangement
of society into various orders, a manifold
gradation of social rank. In ancient Rome
we have patricians, knights, plebeians,
slaves; in the Middle Ages, feudal lords,
vassals, guild-masters, journeymen,
 apprentices, serfs; in almost all of these
classes, again, subordinate gradations.[1]

Socialism, According to Socialists

Marxist socialists attempt to resolve the world’s “exploitation”
problem by destroying classes entirely. A vital aspect of this effort,
as The Socialist Party of Great Britain explains below, is “common
ownership” of property:
Central to the meaning of socialism is
common ownership. This means the
resources of the world being owned in
common by the entire global population.
But does it really make sense for
everybody to own everything in common?
Of course, some goods tend to be for
personal consumption, rather than to
share—clothes, for example. People
‘owning’ certain personal possessions
does not contradict the principle of a
society based upon common ownership.
In practice, common ownership will mean
everybody having the right to participate
in decisions on how global resources will
be used. It means nobody being able to
take personal control of resources,
beyond their own personal possessions.[2]
Marx advocated strongly for the end of private property
throughout his writings, including in The Communist Manifesto.
According to Marx:
The distinguishing feature of Communism
is not the abolition of property generally,
but the abolition of bourgeois property.
But modern bourgeois private property is
 the final and most complete expression of
the system of producing and
appropriating products, that is based on
class antagonisms, on the exploitation of
the many by the few. In this sense, the
theory of the Communists may be
summed up in the single sentence:
Abolition of private property.[3]
Under many socialist models, in line with Marx’s view, all or
nearly all property is owned collectively. There are no private
businesses. There are few, if any, markets. In fact, many Marxist
socialists say a truly socialist society would be completely free of
money, too. As The Socialist Party of Great Britain notes, socialism
“would entail an end to buying, selling and money. Instead, we
would take freely what we had communally produced. The old
slogan of ‘from each according to ability, to each according to needs’
would apply.”
The Socialist Party USA also emphasizes the importance of
common ownership of property. On its website, this socialist
organization notes, “In a socialist system the people own and control
the means of production and distribution through democratically
controlled public agencies, cooperatives, or other collective groups.
The primary goal of economic activity is to provide the necessities of
life, including food, shelter, health care, education, child care,
cultural opportunities, and social services.”[4]
In a world with few, if any, markets and perhaps no money,
people would get the products and services they need from the
collective (many socialists would reject that this group should be
called a “government”) without having to “pay” for anything.
How exactly would this scheme work? Socialists have come up
with a range of theories, including the use of vouchers. Under a
voucher system, instead of buying groceries each week with money,
you would present a clerk with a grocery voucher entitling you to a
predetermined amount of food products for you and your family. The
same would be true for virtually all other goods and services,
including clothing, consumer electronics, and housing. People would
get what they “need,” but not necessarily what they want, and there
would be protections in place to keep some people from taking more
than others in society or from “exploiting” others through the
accumulation of wealth.

The Will of the People

A key feature of virtually every modern socialist movement is its
commitment to democracy. For those of you who, like myself, spend
a substantial amount of time listening to or reading conservative
thinkers, you might be surprised to hear of the important role
democracy plays in modern socialist thought, but there’s no question
whatsoever that for many socialists, a fully formed socialist system
must be controlled democratically. This isn’t to say that there haven’t
been people who sought to create collectivist societies using
authoritarian means; the history of Marxism is full of such people.
However, in modern socialism, very few are calling for authoritarian
control of the means of production, and Marx’s view of how
socialism ought to work precluded any notion of a ruling class
governing the rest of society.
The Socialist Party of Great Britain explains, “Democratic control
is … essential to the meaning of socialism. Socialism will be a society
in which everybody will have the right to participate in the social
decisions that affect them. These decisions could be on a wide range
of issues—one of the most important kinds of decision, for example,
would be how to organise the production of goods and services.”[5]
The Socialist Party USA claims, “Socialism and democracy are
one and indivisible,” and defines democratic socialism as “a political
and economic system with freedom and equality for all, so that
people may develop to their fullest potential in harmony with
others.”[6]
The Democratic Socialists of America say “the essence of the
socialist vision” is “that people can freely and democratically control
their community and society …” This notion is “central to the
movement for radical democracy.”[7]
Another random document with
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chiefly upon their nearness to us, and evidently, as the few only are
near, and the many are far off, stars of the first magnitude are few in
number, and as they diminish in apparent size the number embraced
in the successive classes increases. Thus we find but eighteen stars
of the first magnitude; but of the third there are one hundred and
seventy, of the fourth five hundred, and thus on.
When we look upward in a starry winter night we fancy we can see
millions of stars. In truth with the unaided eye we can see only six
thousand at most, and it needs very strong eyes to see more than
four thousand. But when we turn a telescope upon the sky we begin
to count stars by millions.
All the stars are in apparent motion; they have their rising and their
setting as does the sun; the constellations appear above the horizon,
and move swiftly down the sky. Only one star is, as viewed from our
world, immovable, remaining forever fixed in its place; we call it the
North Star, or the Pole Star, because to us of the Northern
hemisphere it seems to be always watching above the Northern Pole.
But, while unalterable as regards us, the Pole Star is not released
from the general law of motion which rules the stars.
When we begin to trace out constellations, we usually take the Pole
Star as our starting-point. The Pole Star is in the tail of the
constellation of the Little Bear, and we find it by imagining a straight
line drawn from the two upper stars in the square of the Great
Dipper. The Great Dipper we shall easily find, as it is composed of
seven large, bright stars, four of which form an irregular four-sided
figure and from one corner of this square three others extend in a
slightly curved line. This constellation, seen from any place north of
New Orleans, La., never sets, but slowly turns around the fixed Pole
Star. In ancient times the Great Dipper was sometimes called the
Chariot, or David’s Chariot, and among English country people it is
known as Charles’s Wain, a wain being an old English name for a
wagon. The Chinese name the Great Dipper “The God of the North”;
the Mohammedans often call it “The Hand of God.” It is also called
the Great Bear.
Of all the stars the one nearest us is in the southern constellation of
the Centaur; but that is so far off that its distance is beyond our
comprehension, being over two hundred and eleven thousand times
as far distant as the sun. If we could take a ray of light for our steed
we must ride three years and six months to reach this sun that is
nearest to our sun in the starry hosts.
But is light for a steed all that is wanted for such a trip among the
stars? No; for a very little way from our earth we should be in want
of an atmosphere, or air to breathe, and also in want of light and
heat. Light, heat, and air are probably alike lacking in starry space.
Before we consider the orbs which compose our own solar system,
their motions and relationships, which we shall do in another
chapter, let us consider for a little the theory of the origin of
systems, taking our own for a sample of the rest. Tennyson the poet,
puts the story of system-building thus:—

“This world was once a fluid haze of light

Till toward the centre set the starry tides,
And eddied into suns that wheeling cast
The planets.”

We saw in a previous lesson that our world was once a vast ball of
fiery vapor. The great astronomer Laplace, after many years of
study, published a theory about system-making, called the “Nebular
Hypothesis,” which, as simply as we can put it, is this: First, there is
a great cloud of glowing vapor, the various particles of which are by
the law of gravitation drawn toward a single centre. As the particles
press equally to the centre from all sides, it is evident that the first
result will be a ball of constantly increasing solidity. This nebulous
mass possesses also a motion of rotation, or turning over on its own
axis. As the ball grows smaller and more dense, it will spin round
faster and faster.
The gaseous matter of the sphere having become fluid or partly
fluid, the ball still whirls on, and we must now notice a second
motion, called centrifugal or tangental, which has become more
apparent as the rotation increases in velocity. While by the force of
gravity all atoms seek the centre, by this centrifugal force atoms are
driven from the centre. This tangental motion is familiarly seen in
the case of mud on a wheel-tire, the mud being flung off from the
wheel by a motion created by rotation. So from the spinning globe a
ring of matter will be detached and fly off into space.
If this ring were equally hard and thick in all its parts, and exactly
poised about the globe from which it sprung, it might keep the ring
shape. But in nearly all cases the ring when flung off would be
irregular, and would consequently break up. As it broke, the largest
fragments, keeping the wheeling motion and made spherical by
gravity, would draw into themselves the smaller near fragments.
Then, after a while, following the example of the globe from which
they spun off, these new globes would cast off rings of matter which
would contract and harden into globes, and become their satellites
or attendants, as they, held by the force of gravity, remain
attendants upon the first great globe.
This is the nebular theory of system-building. We see that in it three
things are pre-supposed, or taken for granted; first, matter in a state
of slowly rotating glowing vapor; second, a law of gravitation; third,
a law of tangental motion. In the one hundred years since this
hypothesis was first developed by Laplace, no one has ever seen the
glowing vapor consolidating to suns. These processes are far too
long to have been within any human observation, but long and
careful study has enabled man to learn some of the wonderful laws
by which the universe is governed.
Let us see if this explanation of Laplace fits anything which we find
in our solar system. Has any great globe rings wheeling about it?
Yes; the huge planet Saturn has a triple ring. Besides this ring,
Saturn has eight moons, as if some other ring had broken up, and its
parts had come together into satellites. The planet Jupiter has four
satellites, Mars has two, Uranus has four, Neptune one, and our
earth has one, called the moon. There are also in our system a
number of very small planets, closely grouped, called asteroids. In
the nebular hypothesis these asteroids might represent matter cast
off at first in rings, breaking and finally condensing into spheres.
Here we find in our solar system between the larger planets Mars
and Jupiter a splendid zone of minor planets.
Comets are also explained by this theory, as large masses of
material, too evenly balanced among the planets to yield to the
attraction of any one of them, but owning the attraction of the sun,
the centre of gravity of our entire system, and wheeling about it in
vast elliptical orbits. Finally it is supposed by some that the general
speed of our entire system is slackening. This “slowing up” of the
system is supposed to be due to the friction of ether which pervades
all space, and also to a great depth of hot and expanded material
more thin than air, which extends about the sun, wrapping it in a
vast, fine mantle of gas, as our atmosphere surrounds our globe.
But if it is true that the motion of our system is growing slower, it
will be many millions of years before the change will be great
enough to notice; just as, granting that the sun is losing its heat, it
will be many millions of years before it ceases to shine upon and
warm our globe.
In fact the lessening of speed in the solar system, and the lessening
of sun heat, are as yet only theories and not proved facts. The sun
will shine on, and the worlds will whirl around it, through time which
no human mind can calculate.
Attraction, the attraction of the sun over the planets, and the planets
for each other, has been several times mentioned. What is this
attraction? Attraction is a “drawing to.” If a magnet be held near
steel filings it attracts the particles of steel, and they adhere to the
magnet; this attractive power is magnetic attraction. The attraction
or pulling power which bodies have for each other, is called the
attraction of gravity or of gravitation.
All bodies have this attraction for each other, but in small bodies we
do not observe it. Its force is due to the weight or mass of the
bodies, and diminishes as their distance from each other increases.
It is by this force, or attraction of gravitation, that whatever is
thrown into the air falls towards the earth. If you throw up a ball it
moves upward, obeying the force you put into your throw, but soon
that force is used up, and the earth pulls the ball back. You jump,
and you rise from the earth by the force expended by your legs in
the act of jumping, but that force is used up soon, and the earth
pulls you down. You jump from a tree or roof, and down you come
to the earth, pulled by the force or attraction of gravitation.
This force or attraction, exerted by the great strong sun over our
earth and all other planets, keeps them travelling in nearly round
paths about the sun. This attraction, exerted by the earth over the
moon, keeps the moon travelling in a nearly circular path about the
earth. And does not the moon then attract the earth? Oh, yes, all
bodies attract each other; but the moon is of much less weight or
mass than the earth, and her pull is weak in comparison; she cannot
pull the earth out of her orbit. She does pull something however, and
what do you suppose she pulls? She pulls the water that is on the
earth, heaping it up in the tides! The tide is simply the ocean
obeying the attraction of the moon.
It seems a pity that in a few simple lessons on the solar system, we
should use any terms that are hard to be understood. But some few
such terms we have been obliged to use. “Attraction of gravitation”
is one of these which we have tried to make a little plainer.
“Inclination of plane to orbit” is another. What does that mean? Can
we make it clear?
Let us set a lamp on the table, and call it the sun. Now take an
orange and call it the world. Call the stem-place, and the spot
opposite, the poles of this world. Next run a knitting-needle through
the orange, from pole to pole, to represent the axis on which the
earth turns. As we spin our earth-orange around on its axis, let us
move our needle around the lamp, in a lemon-shaped path. This
shape is called an ellipse. Thus we represent the earth turning
around on its axis, or over and over, and at the same time travelling
around the sun.
Now it is clear that we can hold our knitting-needle straight out,
horizontally, or we can hold it straight up and down, perpendicularly,
as it moves around the sun-lamp. But neither of these straight
positions would represent the direction of the axis of the earth; we
must tip the needle a little, so as to hold it in a slanting position.
Now if we held the needle exactly up and down, or exactly straight
out, the sun-lamp would shine on just half of the orange, as divided
from pole to pole. But when we tip the needle you see we bring our
orange-world in such a position that, as it passes around the sun-
lamp, the light falls now more around one pole, now more around
the other; this tipped position is “inclination to the plane of orbit.”
 LESSON VIII.
PLAN AND PROGRESSION.

“They rise in joy, the starry myriads burning—

The shepherd greets them from his mountains free;
And from the silvery sea
To them the sailor’s wakeful eye is turning—
Unchanged they rise—”

—Hemans.
We have now found that our earth is one among several planets
revolving around a great central star which we name the sun. The
sun and his attendant planets and their satellites form what is called
the solar system. We have also found that the heavens are filled
with such systems, and that these are gathered together in nebulæ
or clusters. Prominent among these clusters is the Milky Way, near
the centre of which our system is placed.
The bodies which in our system revolve about the sun, are called
planets. With respect to the sun and other great stars the planets
are small, but considered in themselves they are enormous bodies.
They are all dark spheres,[17] having no light in themselves. Is it
true that the moon with her silvery radiance and Venus and Mars
with their steadfast beams, are dull and dark as burnt-out cinders?
This is indeed true; the planets receive their light and heat from the
sun, and it is as they reflect back this light that they shine so
brilliantly. As an example of such reflection take a new tin plate; it
has no light in itself; shut it in a dark room, it gives out no light; but
hold it where a broad ray of sunshine strikes it, and at once the light
is reflected back from the tin with such burning splendor that the
eyes can scarcely look upon it. So we have observed windows struck
by the light of the setting sun, and at once blazing forth like fires.
The planet nearest to the sun is named Mercury. It is distant from
the sun about thirty-five millions of miles,[18] and is the smallest of
the eight major planets. Mercury is so close to the sun that it is
nearly always lost in the sun’s light, and can be seen by the naked
eye only occasionally, immediately after a clear sunset, or before a
clear sunrise. The telescope shows us that Mercury has phases as
the moon has; possesses, as far as known, no satellites, and its path
is not so nearly in a circle as that of other planets. To the naked eye
it appears as a small star, with a white light faintly tinted with red.
Lying so near to the sun it receives much more light and heat than
we do. Its day is twenty-four hours long; its year has but eighty-
eight days, and each of its seasons is but twenty-two days long. The
shortness of the year and of the seasons is the result of the
nearness of the planet to the sun, which so shortens its path that it
can be traversed in less than three of our months.
The next planet in order of distance from the sun is Venus, the most
beautiful of what we popularly call stars. But Venus is a planet, not a
star. Venus is visible nearly all the year, and is often the first star to
shine forth in the evening or the last one to fade away in the
morning. It has even been seen shining at noon-day. This dazzling
light of Venus is supposed to be caused by a dense layer of cloud,
which wraps the planet about, and proves an admirable reflector of
the sun’s rays. The day of Venus is about half an hour shorter than
our own;[19] its year is two hundred and twenty-four days. The
French astronomer, Flammarion, tells us that mountains, much
higher than any on our earth, have been measured on the planet
Venus. The changes of temperature on Venus are much more
sudden than on our earth; but it has no ice at the poles, for its
winter does not last long enough for ice to accumulate as it does at
the earth’s poles.
As the orbit of Venus is between the earth and the sun, it happens
that at certain times Venus lies between the sun and the earth, and
so shows us its dark side. Again, when it is to the right or left of the
sun, we see only a crescent formed by its quarter,[20] and it is at this
phase that its mountains have been measured.
Venus is sixty-six millions of miles from the sun, and when nearest
us about twenty-six million miles from the earth, being, with the
exception of the moon, our nearest neighbor in the skies.
The third planet from the sun is our earth, ninety-two million miles
from the source of its light and heat. Circling around the earth, and
moving with it in its orbit, goes the moon. The earth rotates on its
axis once in about twenty-four hours, giving us day and night in that
period of time, according as, during its revolution, a part of the
surface is turned to or from the sun. As the earth rolls over upon
itself, it also rolls along its orbit, or sky-path. The path of the earth
about the sun is travelled over in three hundred and sixty-five and a
quarter days, giving us our change of seasons by the inclination of
the earth’s axis to the plane of its orbit.
Next removed beyond the earth from the sun, is the splendid planet
Mars, which is easily distinguishable by its red light. It is in some
parts of its path only seven millions of miles further from the earth
than Venus. Mars has a day of about the same length as ours, and
its seasons are of nearly the same intensity; but while a season is
three months long with us, on Mars it is very nearly six months, for
Mars takes almost two of our years to travel round the sun. Mars has
a snow or ice-cap at each pole; it has also an atmosphere, as with a
telescope we can observe clouds drifting across its sky, the clouds
being formed as clouds here, by the evaporation of water from the
surface of the globe, which moisture, being carried up in invisible
vapor, is condensed by colder currents of air and forms clouds.
The red light of Mars is supposed to be produced by the color of its
surface, and by some it is considered that the vegetation on Mars
may be red, as ours is green, and that to an observer on Mars, our
planet would shine with a green light, as to us Mars shines in red.
The poles of Mars are always white. Next after the moon Mars is the
planet best known to us, because sometimes, as our globe and Mars
pursue their paths through space, they come upon the same side of
their path at the same time, which shortens the distance between
them, and enables close observations to be taken.
Between Mars and the next planet Jupiter there is a very great
space, so great that astronomers considered that it could not be
empty, but must have in it planets too small for easy observation.
They therefore resolved to search that part of the sky constantly and
carefully with telescopes. On the first day of this century a small
planet was seen in this space, and was named Ceres. This was the
first-found asteroid. From their small size these planets are called
asteroids or starlets. Others were found, slowly at first, and then
more and more; in April, 1891, the 309th was discovered by Dr.
Palisa.
Ceres, the first-found asteroid, is so small that one hundred and
twenty-five thousand little worlds of its size could be made out of
our own world. Fifty little globes like Ceres, set side by side, would
form a line as long as the diameter of our world. As the mass of
Ceres is so much less than that of our world, the attraction of gravity
is less—anything is fifty times as heavy on our world as it would be
on Ceres. So if a boy could live on Ceres, and have as much
muscular force as he has here, he could play easily with a ball that
here weighs a quarter of a ton. A baby on Ceres could tumble about
a cannon-ball as easily as a baby here plays with a rubber ball. If a
house fell over on a man, he could set it up as easily as here he
could set up a fallen peach-basket. Of course it is only a play of
fancy that there are men, boys, or babies on Ceres. Perhaps there is
no living thing there. If there are living creatures, all their habits and
ways of life must be very different from ours. But if people from our
earth could go to Ceres, why would they find such wonderful
differences there in weights, and in the effect of an output of
strength? We have seen that Ceres is very much smaller than our
earth; its mass is greatly less, and just in proportion to the smallness
of its mass is the force of the pull it exerts over objects, or the
attraction of gravitation; this attraction is dependent upon the mass
of the body exercising it, and upon the distance of the body
attracted. When the distance between two bodies is great the
attraction is weaker, and when a body is small its attracting power is
less in proportion. Ceres is such a small planet that its pull over
objects is small. Similarly, we might say of the planet Mars that its
mass is so small, as compared with that of the earth, that a body
which on the earth would weigh one hundred pounds would weigh
much less on Mars; and where you could jump up five feet here, you
could rise many feet there.
The best athlete who can make a jump here, can rise only a few feet
into the air; then down he comes, pulled by the force of gravity, the
attraction of the earth. But on Ceres attraction is so small an affair
that a man could jump over a dome as high as St. Peter’s or St.
Paul’s without creating any excitement. In fact, on Ceres a man
would weigh only one-fiftieth part what he weighs here, and the
same output of muscular activity as is used here would have a fifty-
fold value. Much the same conditions exist on the other asteroids.
When first discovered it was supposed that the asteroids were
fragments of some very large planet which had gone to pieces. That
theory has been disproved, and now the nebular hypothesis of
Laplace is generally admitted to account satisfactorily for these little
planets.
After passing the asteroids in our system, we come to Jupiter, the
largest of the planets. Jupiter often shines more brightly than Venus.
It is more than one thousand times larger than the earth, and is
seen during most of the year. The year of Jupiter; that is, the time
which is required for its journey around the sun, is almost twelve of
our years. Day and night are equal, and of about five hours each,
and there is probably no change of seasons. But Jupiter seems to be
to-day a still highly heated body, as our earth was very many ages
ago, and its surface is disturbed by terrific storms.
Jupiter is accompanied by four moons, and its globe is surrounded
by several dark belts, which seem variable in number, but apparently
belong to its surface. The belts somewhat resemble sun-spots, and
indeed the whole planet is considered by astronomers to be much
more like the sun than like our earth. The reason that Jupiter does
not have changes of season is that the inclination of the planet to its
orbit is very slight. When we consider that Jupiter turns on its axis in
less than half the time that our earth requires for a rotation, and is
also so very much greater in diameter than our earth, we will realize
how marvellously rapid its daily motion must be.
Next to Jupiter in place, and next also in size, is Saturn, the sixth
planet from the sun. Ancient astronomers supposed that with Saturn
our solar system ended. Saturn has eight moons placed at different
distances, and is further distinguished by a very beautiful triple ring
surrounding the entire planet on its equatorial line. Within this
glowing triple ring the planet turns, and the rings themselves are
carried round the planet in a circular movement of still greater
swiftness. These rings are not always visible, as they, like their
planet, shine by the reflection of sunlight, and so are seen only
when the sun and earth are both on the same side of the planet.
In 1781 Sir William Herschel, the English astronomer, who had made
for himself a very fine telescope, discovered another planet. At first
he supposed this was not a planet but a comet. Finally it was
received into the family of the planets and named Uranus. Uranus is
much smaller than Saturn, but many times larger than the earth. A
year on Uranus is eighty-four of our years; that is, it takes Uranus
eighty-four years to make its circuit of the sun.
With the discovery of Uranus astronomers began to hope that yet
other bodies belonged to our solar system. They saw that the
motion of Uranus was often disturbed, as if some other planet near
it exercised over it some attracting force. Searching carefully, a
planet was finally found, about one hundred times larger than the
earth, and so far from the sun that to an observer placed upon it the
sun must appear like a large star; even the planet’s day would be no
brighter than twilight. This new-found planet was named Neptune,
and is thus far the last known planet of our sun system. Its place
was determined in 1846. Neptune is the only great planet that has
been discovered by a set search in the heavens for it, based on
reasoning that such a planet ought to exist. A Frenchman and an
Englishman discovered Neptune almost simultaneously. The planet
has one moon. Uranus and Neptune are so exceedingly distant from
our earth, and from the sun, that the study of them has afforded
very little of interest.

FOOTNOTES:
[17] Professor Newcomb considers Jupiter partly self-luminous.
[18] Sir B. Ball says 36 millions; others 35 millions; Newcomb
makes mean distance 40 millions.
[19] Sir R. S. Ball. Story of the Heavens, p. 161.
[20] These phases can be observed only through a telescope.
 LESSON IX.
THE KING OF THE DAY.

“In them hath he set a Tabernacle for the sun,

Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
And rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race,
There is nothing hid from the heat thereof.”

—Psalm XIX.
If it should happen that the sun were blotted out, our earth would at
once cease to be habitable. Within forty-eight hours the globe would
be covered with a deluge of rain, and buried in piles of snow, owing
to the condensation of all the moisture in our suddenly chilled
atmosphere, while more than Arctic cold would freeze the oceans to
their depths. In this reign of cold and darkness all animal and
vegetable life would perish. All the planets of our system would
share the same fate, and as the light with which they shine is
reflected from the sun, they would become invisible, rolling on
through space in total darkness.
How far from us is this sun, so important to us as the centre of light,
heat, and attraction? Ninety-two millions of miles. But how far is
that? An engine running thirty miles an hour, without once slacking
speed, could go around our globe in thirty-five days. Start it off for a
trip to the moon, and with the same speed it would reach there in
eleven months. And then send it from the earth to the sun, at an
equal rate of travel: year after year it must rush on, until three
hundred and fifty-one years were passed before it could reach the
sun. But so much faster does light travel than a railroad train, that
light comes to us from the sun in eight minutes and nineteen
seconds!
The sun is the centre of our planetary system,
and holds all the planets in their proper orbits
by the force of his attraction. We have seen in
our glance at the asteroid Ceres, that the
attraction of gravity depends upon the
distance and the weight or mass of the body
exercising it. If our earth should suddenly
grow lighter it could not hold the moon in its
present orbit; if its attractive power over the
moon ceased, the moon would go tumbling off
into space. The sun exercises immense
attractive force by virtue of its enormous
mass. If all the planets were put into one pan
of a pair of scales, the sun in the other would
outweigh them seven hundred times over.
Three hundred and fifty thousand such globes
as we live upon would be needed to balance
the sun.
This gives us some idea of the mass or weight
of the sun. What is its size? Our world is “THE LIGHT AND
nearly eight thousand miles in diameter at the THE NIGHT.”
equator; over two hundred and forty thousand
miles distant from the earth the moon
revolves around it; but if a circle as large as the sun could be drawn,
the earth might be placed in the centre, the moon rolled in her
proper path around it, and beyond this orbit to the line representing
the circumference of the sun would be a distance of nearly two
hundred thousand miles more.
This vast orb shines with no borrowed ray. It is a great fountain of
burning light which shines now as it shone long before the building
of our world began. No light is so powerful and intense as sunlight.
A flash of lightning is scarcely seen across a sunny sky; the light of
lamps is not visible in strong sunshine; no invented light can
approach sunshine in brilliancy. Twenty millions of the brightest stars
would not shed upon the earth the radiance poured out by the sun.
According to the nebular hypothesis of Laplace, the sun not only
provides the planets with light and heat, but is the source and
parent from which they sprung into space. Thus the most distant
planets, as Neptune and Uranus, were the ones first thrown off, and
the earth, as only in the third remove from its source, is one of the
latest of the sun children.
We know that in the far-off ages, when the earth was being built
into a habitable globe, the sun shone just as it does to-day. We
know this from the eyes of fossil animals, which show that they were
formed to receive sunlight just as eyes do to-day. Also the petrified
rain-marks, of which we spoke in a former chapter, tell the same
story; for without the sun there would have been no rain, nor would
imprints have dried or baked so rapidly.
The heat and light of the sun are indispensable to the production
and growth of all vegetation. Age after age the genial rays of the
sun nourished on this earth an improving and enlarging vegetable
growth, which on its decay left added soil for generations of plants
to come. Thus the sun was not only the parent but the cherishing
nurse of our little globe. We have seen that in the coal period of
earth-building, the atmosphere of the world was heavily charged
with carbonic acid gas, but under the stimulating effects of sunshine,
vegetation continually increased, used up most of the carbonic acid
gas, and the atmosphere became constantly richer in oxygen,[21]
and more and more fitted for the use of animals. Thus we see the
sun, as a prudent householder, storing up in the world supplies of
coal, and purifying at the same time the air. Meanwhile, by the
action of sun rays on the salt, shallow seas, vast salt beds were
produced and buried, providing a mineral especially needful to man.
Our dependence upon the sun awakens a desire to know something
about the orb itself; but how can a body so intensely bright be
studied? Smoked and colored glass plates are used, through which
the sun can be observed with comfort, and there are certain
occasions when the study of this vast, glowing, and distant body can
be favorably pursued. These especial occasions favorable to sun-
study are during an eclipse, and when the planets Mercury and
Venus cross the sun’s disk. Such a crossing is called a transit.
It was once supposed that the sun was no larger than the moon is,
and as near to the earth as that planet is; both sun and moon were
believed to be much smaller than the earth, and very near to it, and
revolving in an orbit about it. To us the sun appears to rise above
the horizon, move across the heavens, and sink beneath the horizon,
and return after a few hours’ absence to pursue the same path.
Meanwhile, the earth does not appear to us to move. This is not the
only case in which our eyes deceive us until we call reason to their
aid.
When we are on a swiftly moving train of cars, it seems to us that
trees, posts, telegraph-poles, go rushing by us, while we remain at
rest. Although no one now questions that the earth moves, and that
with regard to the earth the sun remains fixed in one place, we still
use the language that fits appearances rather than facts, and we
say, “the sun rises, the sun sets,” when in truth the earth is merely
turning over and over, and so constantly bringing a different part of
its surface under the sun’s rays.
As the various planets move about the sun, in paths which we may
call concentric circles, or rings set one inside the other, it is evident
that there may be occasions when the different planets will come
between the sun and some planet with an orbit beyond their own.
For instance, Mercury is a planet travelling in a circle around the sun,
but a circle smaller than that in which the earth travels. Mercury may
then sometimes pass across the face of the sun at a time when the
earth is on the same side of the sun, and in that case we can
observe Mercury moving like a little black ball across the glowing
front of the King of the Day. To see such an occurrence we must use
smoked or darkened glasses, else Mercury would simply be lost in
the unshaded splendor of the sunlight. Why is not such a transit of
Mercury seen every year? Every year Mercury must cross the disk of
the sun, and the reason we do not see a transit yearly is that the
orbits of Mercury and the earth differ in plane, and long periods will
elapse between the occasions when the sun, Mercury, and the earth
come into line thus:

As Venus overtakes the earth in its journey around the sun once
every nineteen months, shall we have the benefit of a transit at each
time of passing? No; because Venus is usually either above or below
the line of the earth’s orbit. But when at long intervals such an event
as a transit of Venus does occur, no astronomical incident can be
more valuable, because it gives us the best means of measuring the
distance between the earth and the sun.
A grand opportunity for studying the sun is afforded by an eclipse.
An eclipse of the sun is occasioned by the moon’s passing between
the earth and the sun. Children are frequently warned that it is
discourteous to pass between a person and the fire or light; our
child, the moon, happily for us, often passes between us and our
fire, the sun, and on the fortunate occasions when this can be
observed out come the glasses for sun-study. As the moon revolves
about the earth, she sometimes stands between the sun and the
earth. When the moon passes between us and the sun on a clear
day, between sunrise and sunset, the day grows dark, a twilight
comes over the world, and continues until the moon has crossed the
disk of the sun.
How can so small a body as the moon obscure so great a body as
the sun, and how can the moon pass in seven minutes across a disk
nearly a million of miles in extent? All this can be explained by the
nearness of the moon to our globe, and consequently the moon’s
great distance from the sun. Any one of us can hide the sun from us
by a dinner-plate, or even a dime, if we hold it close enough to our
eyes. So we can move a dinner-plate across the disk of the sun, by
one sweep of the arm. All depends upon the nearness to ourselves
of the screen used. Now as the moon is so near us in time of
eclipse, she hides the sun from us; the eclipse may last for an hour,
but will be total only for a few moments.
Every year there must be more than one eclipse of the sun. The
greatest number possible in a year is five, the least two; but these
will not all be visible from the same part of the globe.
Astronomers call an eclipse partial when the moon passes over one
or the other side of the sun’s disk. An annular or ring eclipse is one
where the moon is at such a distance from the earth, that she hides
only the central part of the sun’s disk, while around the dark shadow
thus cast appears a ring of splendid light. A total eclipse of the sun is
where the moon is so near us that she hides the entire face of the
sun. This can happen only at long intervals for any given locality.
Thus, when there is a total eclipse of the sun visible from New York
City, it may be hundreds of years before such an eclipse is again
seen from there.
When the sun is in total eclipse a glorious halo of clear light called a
corona, or crown, rays out on all sides behind the black body of the
moon. Horns, cones, and streamers of violet, scarlet, orange, and
pink light rise up from this crown, and seem to toss and whirl like
clouds in a storm.
In the careful study of the sun with telescopes, it has been found
that there are spots on its surface, which look as if the outer portion
of the sun were torn. Now by watching these spots a very wonderful
fact has been discovered. What do you think that is? Why, that the
sun turns over on its axis, as the earth does. But while the earth
rotates once in twenty-four hours, it takes the huge sun about
twenty-five days to turn around once.
Not only is the sun turning over on its axis, but it has a great path
along which it travels in space, and as it goes on it draws with it all
the planets and satellites of our system, each held in its proper path
by the great force of the sun’s attraction. Thus we have learned that
from the sun these great globes, the planets, were thrown off into
space, by tangental force, and lest they should go too far away they
are held in their paths by his strong attractive force.

FOOTNOTES:
[21] Nature Reader, No. 3, pp. 40-42.
 LESSON X.
THE QUEEN OF THE NIGHT.

“That orbèd maiden, with white fire laden,

Whom mortals call the moon,
Glides glimmering o’er my fleece-like flow,
By the midnight breezes strewn.”

—Shelley, The Cloud.

No orb in the sky has attracted more attention than the moon.
Beautiful names have been given to this lesser light that rules the
night, and poets have sung some of their sweetest songs, and artists
have painted some of their finest pictures, to depict the wonderful
charm of moonlight. The moon is in our minds associated with
peace, silence, rest; the silver radiance causes no pain to the eyes,
and like charity, while revealing objects, it adds to their beauty, and
subdues defects. Much that by the light of day seems harsh and ugly
appears picturesque and fascinating in the delicate splendor of the
moonlight. Of moonlight rather than sunset might the poet sing:—

“The splendor falls on castle walls

And snowy summits old in story,
The long light shakes across the lakes,
And the wild cataract leaps in glory.”

Those nations who have worshipped the sun as god of the day, have
paid similar worship to the moon as goddess of the night. The
ancient myths spoke of the moon as a pure and lonely maiden, fond
of silence, hunting, and the forest shades. Increasing knowledge has
shown us the moon as neither goddess nor maiden, but as a satellite
of the earth, from which many ages ago it was cast off into space,
and by the attraction of which it is held as by invisible and
unbreakable chains.
Being so much nearer to us than any other heavenly body, the moon
was one of the earliest and best understood, and to it, about two
hundred and fifty years ago, the first telescopes were turned with
eager expectations of wonderful discoveries. The moon, at the
nearest point in its orbit, is distant from us about two hundred and
twenty-five thousand miles, only about twenty-eight times the
diameter of the earth. Those travellers, who have again and again
made the circuit of the earth, have in the aggregate passed over a
greater distance than lies between us and the moon. Steam could
take us there in less than a year; but if the man in the moon should
begin to pelt stones at the earth, they would hit their mark in a little
less than three days and two hours.
Shining large and fair in the heavens, the moon seems, as a queen,
to lead forth the hosts of the stars, but if we watch its course each
of the twenty-seven days which it requires for its journey around the
earth, we shall see that it continually falls behind the progress of the
shining hosts, and possesses a motion entirely independent of them.
The moon, like the earth, shines by the reflected light of the sun,
and this causes the lunar or moon phases. Thus sometimes we see
the full moon; then by slowly lessening degrees, which we call
waning, we see the half, and the quarter, and the little crescent, or
octant. Then we lose sight of the moon, and again it becomes visible
as a slim crescent, the hornèd moon it is called, and so waxes to the
full. In the circle which the moon describes about our earth, the
moon passes between us and the sun once in about thirty days, and
so presents us a dark side, which is called the new moon. In fifteen
days more it is on the opposite side of the earth from the sun, and
shows us its entire disk illuminated, which we call full moon; passing
still about us, in fifteen days after full moon, having changed from
full to gibbous, and to the third quarter, half, and second quarter,
once more we are presented with the slim octant of the hornèd
moon.
Generally the moon in its orbit passes a little above or below the disk
of the sun, but sometimes it moves exactly across the face of the
sun, and so occasions an eclipse of the sun. Again, sometimes the
moon, as it passes behind the earth, comes within the cone of
shadow cast by the earth, and so an eclipse of the moon, either total
or partial, is caused.
There are many nights when we say “there is no moon.” We should
not understand by this that the moon is not in the sky; the simple
fact is that in the progression of its rising, the moon has come to a
time when she moves during the day through the part of the
heavens that is visible to us. So sometimes toward sunset, we see
the moon high in the sky, and during part of the day, when the
nights are moonless, we see the moon when not obscured by the
greater light of the sun.
In all these various changes of its life, if we study the moon with
telescopes, we shall find it to be a globe, opaque, lit up by the sun,
having mountains and valleys on its surface. Those dark lines and
spots which with the naked eye we see on the full moon, are ranges
of volcanic mountains. The surface of the moon has been mapped
out by astronomers, who have given names to the various
eminences and depressions, and from a study of the moon much
has been learned of planets in general. For, while the moon is so
small a body and has its orbit around the earth, which is its centre of
attraction, it is not to be considered as a mere satellite, but is to be
respectfully ranked among the planets.
There have been many foolish myths about the moon: its ray has
been considered poisonous to sleepers; the full moon has been
regarded as a source of disease and madness, and has been
supposed to affect the growth of plants, the medicinal properties of
herbs, and the fortunes of human lives. The moon owes all these
slanders to its nearness to us.
In size the moon is about one-fourth the diameter of the earth, and
its volume is but one-fiftieth that of our planet. The days and nights
of the moon are not twelve hours long, but three hundred and sixty
hours, equal, therefore, to fifteen of our twenty-four hour days. Only
a little more than one side, or face, of the moon is ever seen by us.
There have been many romantic fancies about what may be on the
other side of the moon, but probably the side we do not see is very
similar to the side which we do see.
What is the past history of the moon? The first condition of any
planet is that of burning vapor or gas, which must slowly cool and
form a nucleus of solid or half-fluid matter. It is evident that the
smaller the planet the more rapidly it will cool and become solid, and
the greater the planet the longer it will remain in a partly fluid state.
Thus Jupiter and Saturn will require much longer time to cool than
Mercury or Venus. The sun, being by far the largest body in our
system, will be gaseous or semi-fluid long after all the planets which
he cast into space have cooled and hardened; while the moon, being
one of the smallest planets, hardened long before the great planets,
and before the earth. Thus the sun is still in the early stages of its
existence, and the moon has run the course of its changes and is a
burnt-out and aged world.
No doubt the stages of moon-building were very like those of earth-
building, with variations due to the much smaller size of the sphere.
The nucleus would partially solidify, there would be a hardened crust
which at intervals would crush in from the withdrawal of interior
molten matter, or would be suddenly torn and flung up by the
pressure of boiling lava from within. The condensing atmosphere no
doubt sent down water upon the moon, but by long degrees the
heated volcanic surface has parted with its seas, and we find the
map of the moon now presenting us not with oceans, but empty
sea-beds, volcano craters, and strange and arid depressions.
The moon has no atmosphere; no rain falls on her barren surface;
no clouds move above her; no tempests howl in her caverns; no
snows crown her volcanic peaks; no sunsets shine in gorgeous
colors; there are no violet and crimson skies at dawn. The moon is
the kingdom of eternal calm, and sleep, and stillness. If any blow
disturbs the lunar surface, it is from the fall of meteors rained upon
it through space. It is to our atmosphere we owe the glories of the
clouds, the beneficence of waters, the magic of frost changes, the
rush of storms, the balmy breezes, the sky.
As it has no seas and no air, it follows that the moon has no sky. The
lovely blue we see above us, is merely caused by many miles of air,
but from the moon one would merely look away into immensity; and
day, and night, sun, moon, stars, comets, and meteors could not be
seen, while instead of the lovely blue dome above us, where stars
innumerable shine and tremble, space, as seen from the moon, is a
perpetual, limitless, black abyss.
We have found the moon destitute of both air and water; it is
evident that it is also destitute of all vegetation; in fact of all life. As
there is darkness above, so there is silence below. The moon is a
desert land where no foliage rustles, where no flowers bloom, where
no bird builds or sings. No feet climb the lofty mountains, or explore
the gaping craters of moon-land. No voice causes an echo in the
vast yawning caves that penetrate moon-mountains.
A curious fact about these mountains in the moon is that they are
annular or ring-shaped. They are skeleton mountains, burnt-out
craters, mighty hollow cones thrust up, so that if one might climb to
the top of a moon-mountain, he could walk around the rim, as a fly
walks around the edge of a cup; or he could go down, down, down,
on the inside to the level of the plain from which he began his
ascent.
The surface of the moon changes, not by the motions of life and
growth, but by a slow decay; for changes in the moon’s face are
occasioned by the crumbling of mountains and the falling down of
lands. Thus we see the moon to be a dumb, dead, deserted planet,
wheeling on in its orbit around the earth, and carried with the earth
in its greater orbit around the sun. Silvery sweet and fair, this queen
of the night is a planet that long, long ago passed its childhood and
its prime, and fell, in its old age, a prey to fire.
 LESSON XI.
VANISHED FAUNA.

“I said: ‘When first the world began

Young Nature through five cycles ran,
And on the sixth, she moulded—man.’”

—Tennyson, The Two Voices.

The old fairy tales inform us of genii, and gnomes, and brownies
that live underground, and in rocks and caves, guarding treasures of
gold and of gems. Let us fancy that there are truly genii and gnomes
that have lived from the time when life began until now.
In every passing age each country has had its peculiar forms of
animal life: these are called its fauna. The plant-life of an age or
country is called its flora. As each age of earth-building came, it
brought its especial fauna and flora. As the age passed away, this
plant and animal life went away with it, and returned no more.
But from every age some form or type has lingered until now. The
pretty little lamp shells of the China seas come from the far-off
second period of world-building. Some of these forms that have lived
through all the ages have changed much to suit the conditions of
new times; others have scarcely changed at all.
And from all these periods, hidden in rocks and earth-beds, are frail
remains of things that lived and perished long ago. Let us fancy that
gnomes and genii keep these wonderful treasures.
 THE LOST BEASTS.
In the distribution of the plants and animals of past ages we read
much of the earth’s history. For instance, when we find buried under
the later soil of England, the bones of elephants and hyenas, and
the leaves and fruits of palms or other tropical plants, we decide, on
reasonable grounds, that at some period the climate of England has
been warmer than it is to-day. Similarly, when in layers above these
tropical specimens we find the relics of an Arctic vegetation, and the
skeletons of elk and bears that belong only to polar or subpolar
regions, we conclude that the days of tropical warmth in England
were succeeded by days of polar cold. Again, when we find under
the warm plains of South France the remains of animals and
vegetables now belonging to Siberia, we say, “In former ages France
had a reign of Siberian weather, for a period sufficiently long to
permit the growth of Siberian plants and animals.”
When we trace in regular succession the remains of such organisms
back to the edge of the Polar circle, we say, “This northern cold,
which once dominated all the hemisphere, slowly retreated to its
present limits, and with it went its appropriate flora and fauna.” In all
these instances the animals afford better indications than the plants,
for plants have less capability than animals of adjusting themselves
to new and untoward circumstances. If exposed to unusual cold or
heat the plants die out, but many of the animals take thinner or
thicker coats, to suit their new environment.
Very nearly all the species of plants and animals belonging to the
five cycles of earth-building preceding our own have perished. No
doubt there were many of the early living organisms which
disappeared and left no trace; the first ages may have been far more
abundant in varieties than we imagine them to have been. Many
hundred of different families have been found, and perhaps as many
more flourished and utterly disappeared. We observe, concerning all
these old-world families, that when once they perished they are, as
we say, “gone for good”; a type does not disappear and reappear.
As one description of animals became extinct, another was ready to
take its place. This constant succession of animal types represents a
constant approach to those creatures best fitted to occupy the earth
with man. We have now on the earth large and destructive animals,
as the rhinoceros, the hippopotamus, the lion, tiger, alligator, boa-
constrictor, and others, but all of these “are tamed, or have been
tamed, of mankind,” and constantly recede before the advancing
demands of the human race for territory.
But many of the earlier forms of life were so enormous and so
destructive, that man could by no possibility have debated with them
the empire of the globe. The battle would have gone the wrong way
for man. It is well that various changes removed these creatures
before man appeared.
Another consideration is here of great interest; the forms of life
which survived their respective cycles, and came down nearly
unchanged to our day, were not the strongest and largest creatures,
apparently best able to fight their battle and live; but many of the
feebler and smaller creatures, which, if we had been spectators of
those ancient times, we should have expected to see perish under
the encroachments of monsters and dragons of their day. As, for
instance, the large, strong, numerous, armor-plated trilobites[22] of
the second earth-age perished ages ago, while the little lamp shells
live on until now. Far back in the reptile time, little mammal
quadrupeds, scarcely larger than rats, ran in the woods, and these
types have been continued with various adaptations in the marsupial
or pouched animals, like the opossum of our own day, while the vast
scale-dressed giants have only left a few of their scattered bones to
tell their story. The dragon-fly survives, very like his ancestors of the
Triassic period, while the mighty pterodactyles,[23] a kind of reptile
bat that pursued the dragon-flies as part of its prey, have gone
never to return. The flying reptile has left us only his enormous
lithograph upon the ancient rocks, while still each year the jewel-like
dragon-fly, once the big beast’s defenceless prey, bursts his brown
case, and comes forth informed with light and life.[24] As the poet
tells his story:—

“To-day I saw the dragon-fly

Come from the wells where he did lie,—

An inner impulse rent the veil,

Of his old husk; from head to tail
Came out clear plates of sapphire mail.

He dried his wings, like gauze they grew;

Thro’ copse and pastures wet with dew,
A living flash of light he flew.”

We should not forget that each one of the earth-building ages had
some particular form of animal life which seemed in that age to be
king, and conquer the other animals. Also in its own age each of
these forms reached its greatest strength and perfection. Then in