Читать книгу Urania - Camille Flammarion - Страница 7

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WHAT was that? Could it be true? Another universe was coming down to us! Millions and millions of suns grouped together were floating about like a celestial archipelago, and as we flew toward them they spread themselves out like a limitless cloud of stars. I looked about me on all sides, trying to pierce the depths of boundless space, and saw similar clusters of twinkling stars scattered about in all directions, at various distances.

The new universe which we were entering was made up principally of red, ruby, and garnet suns. Many of them were absolutely blood-red.

It was like going through a magnificent display of lightning. We sped swiftly from sun to sun; but incessant electrical commotions like the flashes of an aurora-borealis assailed us on all sides. What strange abiding-places worlds lighted solely by red suns must be! Then, too, we saw in one section of this universe a secondary group, composed of great numbers of rose-colored and blue stars. Suddenly an enormous comet, whose head was like some monster's open jaws, rushed upon and enveloped us. I clung terror-stricken to my goddess's side, who was for a moment hidden from me by a luminous haze. We were soon in a dark desert again, for the second universe, like the first, was now far away.

*****

"Creation," she said, "comprises an infinite number of distinct worlds, separated from each other by abysses of vacancy."

"An infinite number?"

"A mathematical objection," she answered. "Doubtless, no matter how great a number may be, it cannot be actually infinite, since by thought one can always increase by a unit, or even double, treble, centuple it. But remember that the present is but a door through which the future rushes to the past. Eternity is endless, and the number of the worlds will be like it, without end."

"Look! You still see, always and on all sides, new celestial archipelagoes,—new worlds everywhere."

"It seems to me, O Urania! that we have been ascending toward the boundless heavens for a long time, and at very great speed."

"We could rise like this forever," she answered, "and never reach a definite limit.

"We could be wafted about yonder to right, to left; forward, backward; above, below,—in no matter what direction, but never anywhere should we find any confines.

"Never, never any end!

"Do you know where we are? Do you know how we reached here?

"We are—on the threshold of the infinite, as we were when on the Earth. We have not advanced one step!"