William Herschel: Quotes about stars

“It is evident that we cannot mean to affirm that the stars of the fifth, sixth, and seventh magnitudes are really smaller than those of the first, second, or third, and that we must ascribe the cause of the difference in the apparent magnitudes of the stars to a difference in their relative distances from us.”

William Herschel

Source: Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works (1880), Ch.4 "Life and Works" from a memoir, published (1817).
Context: It is evident that we cannot mean to affirm that the stars of the fifth, sixth, and seventh magnitudes are really smaller than those of the first, second, or third, and that we must ascribe the cause of the difference in the apparent magnitudes of the stars to a difference in their relative distances from us. On account of the great number of stars in each class, we must also allow that the stars of each succeeding magnitude, beginning with the first, are, one with another, further from us than those of the magnitude immediately preceding.

Star

“The starlike appearance of the following six nebulæ is so considerable that the best description… was to compare them to stars with certain deficiencies.”

William Herschel

Astronomical Observations relating to the Construction of the Heavens... (1811)
Context: The starlike appearance of the following six nebulæ is so considerable that the best description... was to compare them to stars with certain deficiencies.<!-- p. 328

Star , Appearance

“An object may not only contain stars, but also nebulosity not composed of them.”

William Herschel

Astronomical Observations relating to the Construction of the Heavens... (1811), p. 270

Star

“This tends to confirm the hypothesis that all are composed of stars more or less remote.”

William Herschel

Source: Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works (1880), Ch.4 "Life and Works"
Context: Nebulæ can be selected so that an insensible gradation shall take place from a coarse cluster like the Pleiades down to a milky nebulosity like that in Orion, every intermediate step being represented. This tends to confirm the hypothesis that all are composed of stars more or less remote.

Star

“We may conceive that, perhaps in progress of time these nebulæ which are already in such a state of compression, may be still farther condensed so as actually to become stars.”

William Herschel

Astronomical Observations relating to the Construction of the Heavens... (1811), p. 318

Star , Time

“An equal scattering of the stars may be admitted in certain calculations; but when we examine the milky way, or the closely compressed clusters of stars… this supposed equality of scattering must be given up.”

William Herschel

p, 125
Astronomical Observations relating to the Construction of the Heavens... (1811)

Way , Star

“A standard of reference for the arrangement of the stars may be had by comparing their distribution to a certain properly modified equality of scattering. The equality which I propose does not require that the stars should be at equal distances from each other, nor is it necessary that all those of the same nominal magnitude should be equally distant from us.”

William Herschel

Source: Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works (1880), Ch.4 "Life and Works" from a memoir, published (1817).

Star , Distant

“I compared it to H Geminorum and the small star in the quartile between Auriga and Gemini, and finding it so much larger than either of them, suspected it to be a comet.”

William Herschel

His discovery of Uranus. Scientific Papers, vol. 1, page 30 "Account of a Comet".

Star

“Instead of inquiring after the nature of the cause of the condensation of nebulous matter, it would indeed be sufficient for the present purpose to call it merely a condensing principle; but since we are already acquainted with the centripetal force of attraction which gives a globular figure to planets, keeps them from flying out of their orbits in tangents, and makes one star revolve around another, why should we not look up to the universal gravitation of matter as the cause of every condensation, accumulation, compression, and concentration of the nebulous matter?”

William Herschel

p, 125
Astronomical Observations relating to the Construction of the Heavens... (1811)

Star , Nature , Universe , Flying

“We may… have surmised nebulae to be no other than clusters of stars disguised by their very great distance, but a longer experience and better acquaintance with the nature of nebulae, will not allow a general admission of such a principle, although undoubtedly a cluster of stars may assume a nebulous appearance when it is too remote for us to discern the stars of which it is composed.”

William Herschel

p, 125
Astronomical Observations relating to the Construction of the Heavens... (1811)

Star , Nature , Appearance

“These [binary stars] may serve another very important end…. Several stars of the first magnitude have been observed or suspected to have a proper motion; hence we may surmise that our sun, with all its planets and comets, may also have a motion towards some particular point of the heavens…. If this surmise should have any foundation, it will show itself in a series of some years in a kind of systematical parallax, or change due to the motion of the whole solar system.”

William Herschel

Source: Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works (1880), Ch.4 "Life and Works" quote from "Researches on the Motion of the Sun and of the Solar System in Space" (1782), p. 149

Star , Change , Sun

“Here [in Slough], soon after my arrival, I began to lay the foundation upon which by degrees the whole structure was raised as it now stands, and the speculum being highly polished and put into the tube, I had the first view through it on February 19, 1787. …the first speculum, by a mismanagement of the person who cast it, came out thinner on the centre of the back than was intended, and on account of its weakness would not permit a good figure to be given to it. …A second mirror was cast January 26, 1788, but it cracked in cooling. February 16 we recast it, and it proved to be of a proper degree of strength. October 24 it was brought to a pretty good figure and polish, and I observed the planet Saturn with it. But not being satisfied, I continued to work upon it till August 27, 1789, when it was tried upon the fixed stars, and I found it to give a pretty sharp image. Large stars were a little affected with scattered light, owing to many remaining scratches on the mirror. August the 28th, 1789, having brought the telescope to the parallel of Saturn, I discovered a sixth satellite of that planet, and also saw the spots upon Saturn better than I had ever seen them before, so that I may date the finishing of the forty-foot telescope from that time.”

William Herschel

Source: Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works (1880), Ch.4 "Life and Works".

Star , Light , Time , Personality

“I must freely confess that by continuing my sweeps of the heavens my opinion of the arrangement of the stars and their magnitudes, and of some other particulars, has undergone a gradual change…”

William Herschel

p, 125
Astronomical Observations relating to the Construction of the Heavens... (1811)

Star , Change