Astronomy Quotes - Page 13

• The first question concerning the Celestial Bodies is whether there be a system, that is whether the world or universe compose together one globe, with a center, or whether the particular globes of earth and stars be scattered dispersedly, each on its own roots, without any system or common center.

  Francis Bacon

  Stars, Roots, Together

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• It calls Devotion! genuine growth of night! Devotion! Daughter of Astronomy! An undevout astronomer is mad!

  Edward Young

  Daughter, Night, Mad

  'The Complaint: Night Thoughts' (1742-5) 'Night 9' l. 769

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• People give ear to an upstart astrologer [Copernicus]...this fool wishes
  to reverse the entire science of astronomy

  Martin Luther

  People, Giving, Wish

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• The mathematical thermology created by Fourier may tempt us to hope that, as he has estimated the temperature of the space in which we move, me may in time ascertain the mean temperature of the heavenly bodies: but I regard this order of facts as for ever excluded from our recognition. We can never learn their internal constitution, nor, in regard to some of them, how heat is absorbed by their atmosphere. We may therefore define Astronomy as the science by which we discover the laws of the geometrical and mechanical phenomena presented by the heavenly bodies.

  Auguste Comte

  Moving, Mean, Order

  Auguste Comte (1853). “The Positive Philosophy of Auguste Comte”, p.138

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• Do there exist many worlds, or is there but a single world? This is one of the most noble and exalted questions in the study of Nature.

  Albertus Magnus

  Inspirational, Nature, Science

  "Discovering the cosmos". Book by R.C. Bless, p. 686, 1996.

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• The Bible is the Only Book That Can Make Us Wise unto Salvation. The Bible is not a book to be studied as we study geology and astronomy, merely to find out about the earth's formation and the structure of the universe; but it is a book revealing truth, designed to bring us into living union with God.

  George Frederick Pentecost

  Christian, Wise, Book

  George Frederick Pentecost (1885). “"In the Volume of the Book ": Or, the Profit and Pleasure of Bible Study ... with an Introduction by Revs. Joseph Cook and J.H. Vincent”

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• I do not believe that anything really worthwhile will come out of the exploration of the slag heap that constitutes the surface of the moon...Nobody should imagine that the enormous financial budget of NASA implies that astronomy is now well supported.

  Fred Hoyle

  Believe, Moon, Financial

  "Galaxies, Nuclei, and Quasars". Book by Fred Hoyle, 1965.

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• The fool will upset the whole science of astronomy, but as the Holy Scripture shows, it was the sun and not the earth which Joshua ordered to stand still.

  Martin Luther

  Upset, Earth, Scripture

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• Just as the line of astronomical thinkers from Copernicus to Newton had destroyed the old astronomy, in which the earth was the center, and the Almighty sitting above the firmament the agent in moving the heavenly bodies about it with his own hands, so now a race of biological thinkers had destroyed the old idea of a Creator minutely contriving and fashioning all animals to suit the needs and purposes of man.

  Andrew Dickson White

  Moving, Animal, Men

  Andrew Dickson White (2012). “A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom: From Creation to the Victory of Scientific and Literary Methods”, p.49, Transaction Publishers

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• When Moses was alive, these pyramids were a thousand years old. Here began the history of architecture. Here people learned to measure time by a calendar, to plot the stars by astronomy and chart the earth by geometry. And here they developed that most awesome of all ideas - the idea of eternity.

  Walter Cronkite

  Stars, Years, Ideas

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• It has been the error of the schools to teach astronomy, and all the other sciences, and subjects of natural philosophy, as accomplishments only; whereas they should be taught theologically, or with reference to the Being who is the author of them: for all the principles of science are of divine origin. Man cannot make, or invent, or contrive principles: he can only discover them; and he ought to look through the discovery to the Author.

  Thomas Paine

  Philosophy, School, Men

  Thomas Paine (1859). “The Theological Works ...: The Most Complete Ed. Ever Pub”, p.196

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• Astronomy was born of superstition; eloquence of ambition, hatred, falsehood, and flattery; geometry of avarice; physics of an idle curiosity; and even moral philosophy of human pride. Thus the arts and sciences owe their birth to our vices.

  Jean-Baptiste Rousseau

  Art, Philosophy, Ambition

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• I'm sure the universe is full of intelligent life. It's just been too intelligent to come here.

  Arthur C. Clarke

  Science, Intelligent, Space

  IRC discussion with Gentry Lee at Sci Fi Channel, November 1, 1996.

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• [About Francis Baily] The history of the astronomy of the nineteenth century will be incomplete without a catalogue of his labours. He was one of the founders of the Astronomical Society, and his attention to its affairs was as accurate and minute as if it had been a firm of which he was the chief clerk, with expectation of being taken into partnership.

  Augustus De Morgan

  Taken, Science, Expectations

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• It has never been in my power to study anything, mathematics, ethics, metaphysics, gravitation, thermodynamics, optics, chemistry, comparative anatomy, astronomy, psychology, phonetics, economics, the history of science, whist, men and women, wine, metrology, except as a study of semeiotic .

  Charles Sanders Peirce

  Wine, Men, Psychology

  Charles Sanders Peirce (1958). “Selected Writings (Values in a Universe of Chance)”, p.408, Courier Corporation

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• A great man, who was convinced that the truths of political and moral science are capable of the same certainty as those that form the system of physical science, even in those branches like astronomy that seem to approximate mathematical certainty. He cherished this belief, for it led to the consoling hope that humanity would inevitably make progress toward a state of happiness and improved character even as it has already done in its knowledge of the truth.

  Nicolas de Caritat, marquis de Condorcet

  Character, Science, Men

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• A human life, I think, should be well rooted in some spot of a native land, where it may get the love of tender kinship for the face of earth, for the labors men go forth to, for the sounds and accents that haunt it, for whatever will give that early home a familiar, unmistakable difference amidst the future widening of knowledge.

  George Eliot

  Stars, Home, Men

  "Daniel Deronda".

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• Philosophy, astronomy, and politics were marked at zero, I remember. Botany variable, geology profound as regards the mud stains from any region within fifty miles of town, chemistry eccentric, anatomy unsystematic, sensational literature and crime records unique, violin player, boxer, swordsman, lawyer, and self-poisoner by cocaine and tobacco.

  Arthur Conan Doyle

  Education, Zero, Philosophy

  Arthur Conan Doyle, Scott McKowen (2004). “The Adventures and the Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes”, p.117, Sterling Publishing Company, Inc.

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• It is interesting to transport one's self back to the times when Astronomy began; to observe how discoveries were connected together, how errors have got mixed up with truth, have delayed the knowledge of it, and retarded its progress; and, after having followed the various epochs and traversed every climate, finally to contemplate the edifice founded on the labours of successive centuries and of various nations.

  Jean Sylvain Bailly

  Science, Errors, Discovery

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• Religionists are clinging to little, positive, verbal, formal versions of the moral law... while the laws of the Law, the great circling truths whose only adequate symbol is the material laws, the astronomy etc. are all unobserved, and sneered at when spoken of.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Thinking, Law, Adequate

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2014). “The Heart of Emerson's Journals”, p.79, Courier Corporation

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• Mark Tobey fills his canvases with elliptical, calligraphic lines, beautiful whirls that seem at first glance to be completely abstract and to come from nowhere at all except his own subjective musing. But I shall never forget how struck I was, on visiting Tobey's studio one day, to see strewn around books on astronomy and photographs of the Milky Way. I knew then that Tobey experiences the movement of the stars and solar constellations as the external pole of his encounter.

  Rollo May

  Beautiful, Stars, Book

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• Had I been present at the Creation, I would have given some useful hints for the better ordering of the universe. Remarking on the complexity of Ptolemaic model of the universe after it was explained to him. Footnote: Carlyle says, in his History of Frederick the Great, book ii. chap. vii. that this saying of Alphonso about Ptolemy's astronomy, 'that it seemed a crank machine; that it was pity the Creator had not taken advice,' is still remembered by mankind, - this and no other of his many sayings.

  Alfonso X of Castile

  Book, Taken, Science

  Said after studying the Ptolemaic system (attributed)

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• I never said it. Honest. Oh, I said there are maybe 100 billion galaxies and 10 billion trillion stars. It's hard to talk about the Cosmos without using big numbers. I said "billion" many times on the Cosmos television series, which was seen by a great many people. But I never said "billions and billions." For one thing, it's too imprecise. How many billions are "billions and billions"? A few billion? Twenty billion? A hundred billion? "Billions and billions" is pretty vague. When we reconfigured and updated the series, I checked-and sure enough, I never said it.

  Carl Sagan

  Stars, Numbers, People

  "Billions and Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium". Book by Carl Sagan, 1997.

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• From the standpoint of our spiritual development, it might be important for us to realize that we came from an unknown somewhere; we brought with us an attained state of consciousness; and while we are here, we are expanding that consciousness. From some perspectives, it may seem that we are making giant strides, but from the greater overview, our quantity of spiritual knowledge is smaller than Ptolemy's knowledge of astronomy!

  John Templeton

  Spiritual, Perspective, Important

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• I was raised a Southern Baptist, and my whole family were Christians. However, my Dad was really into science and astronomy, so I felt very balanced. I still had respect for faith.

  Craig Brewer

  Christian, Dad, Southern

  "Footloose's Craig Brewer, Julianne Hough, and Kenny Wormald". Interview with Nathan Rabin, film.avclub.com. October 13, 2011.

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