“Should there really be suns in the whole infinite space, they can be at approximately the same distance from one another, or distributed over galaxies, hence would be in infinite quantities, and consequently the whole sky should be as bright as the sun. Clearly, each line which can conceivably be drawn from our eye will necessarily end on one of the stars and each point on the sky would send us starlight, that is, sunlight.”

— Heinrich Wilhelm Matthäus Olbers

Sind wirklich im ganzen unendlichen Raum Sonnen vorhanden, sie mögen nun in ungefähr gleichen Abständen von einander, oder in Milchstrassen-Systeme vertheilt sein, so wird ihre Menge unendlich, und da müsste der ganze Himmel ebenso hell sein, wie die Sonne. Denn jede Linie, die ich mir von unserm Auge gezogen denken kann, wird nothwendig auf irgend einen Fixstern treffen, und also müßte uns jeder Punkt am Himmel Fixsternlicht, also Sonnenlicht zusenden.
Olbers' paradox, expressed in [Ueber die Durchsichtigkeit des Weltraums, Astronomisches Jahrbuch für das Jahr 1826, J. Bode. Berlin, Späthen 1823, 110-121]

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Heinrich Wilhelm Matthäus Olbers 1

German physician and astronomer 1758–1840

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“It seems to me, that if the matter of our sun and planets and all the matter of the universe, were evenly scattered throughout all the heavens, and every particle had an innate gravity towards all the rest, and the whole of space throughout which this matter was scattered was but finite, the matter on [toward] the outside of this space would, by its gravity, tend towards all the matter on the inside, and, by consequence, fall down into the middle of the whole space, and there compose one great spherical mass. But if the matter was evenly disposed throughout an infinite space it could never convene into one mass; but some of it would convene into one mass and some into another, so as to make an infinite number of great masses, scattered at great distances from one another throughout all that infinite space.”

Isaac Newton (1643–1727) British physicist and mathematician and founder of modern classical physics

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“The stars were only sparks of the fire which devoured us. Should that fire die out one day, there would be nothing left in the sky but dead stars, dead eyes.”

Elie Wiesel book Night

Source: Night

“Our own galaxy system is only one of a great many, and observations made from any of the others would show exactly the same thing: all systems are receding, not from any particular centre, but from each other: the whole system of galaxies is expanding.”

Willem de Sitter (1872–1934) Dutch cosmologist

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“Among all the luminaries shining in the sky, the sun is the chief, and in the Brahma-samhita the sun is accepted as the glowing eye of the Supreme Lord. There are fifty varieties of wind blowing in space, and of these winds the controlling deity, Marici, represents Krishna. Among the stars, the Moon is the most prominent at night, and thus the Moon represents Krishna. It appears from this verse that the Moon is one of the stars; therefore the stars that twinkle in the sky also reflect the light of the sun. The theory that there are many suns within the universe is not accepted by Vedic literature. The sun is one, and as by the reflection of the sun the Moon illuminates, so also do the stars. Since Bhagavad-gita indicates herein that the Moon is one of the stars, the twinkling stars are not suns but are similar to the Moon.”

A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (1896–1977) Indian guru

Bhagavad-Gita As It Is, Bhaktivedanta Book Trust, 1972. Chapter 10, verse 21, purport. Vedabase http://www.vedabase.com/en/bg/10/21
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“Suns are extinguished or become corrupted, planets perish and scatter across the wastes of the sky; other suns are kindled, new planets formed to make their revolutions or describe new orbits, and man, an infinitely minute part of a globe which itself is only an imperceptible point in the immense whole, believes that the universe is made for himself.”

Baron d'Holbach (1723–1789) French-German author, philosopher, encyclopedist

La Système de la nature; quoted by Norman Hampson, The Enlightenment p. 220 (paperback edition)

“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 (1738–1822) German-born British astronomer, technical expert, and composer

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

“There is a Power, a Power that controls the moon, the stars and the sun. It is a Power that can burn all other powers. It is the Power that pervades each atom, all that is finite, all that is infinite, a Power that no one can see…It has no assistance. It is completely alone. Original.”

Bawa Muhaiyaddeen (1900–1986) Sri Lankan Sufi leader

The Point Where God and Man Meet (2006)

“Parallel lines have a common end point at an infinite distance.”

Girard Desargues (1591–1661) French mathematician and engineer

Brouillion project (1639) as quoted by Harold Scott MacDonald Coxeter, Projective Geometry (1987)

“The whole landscape lies behind the transparent gauze of the fog that now rises, drawn upwards by the sun, and as it rises, reveals the silver-spangled river, the fields, the cottages, the further scene. At last one can discern all that one could only guess at before... The sun is up! There is a peasant at the end of the field, with his wagon drawn by a yoke of oxen... Everything is bursting into life, sparkling in the full light – light, which as yet is still soft and golden. The background, simple in line and harmonious in colour, melts into the infinite expanse of sky, through the bluish, misty atmosphere. The flowers raise their heads the birds flutter hither and thither... The little rounded willows on the bank of the stream look like birds spreading their tails. It's adorable! And one paints! And paints!”

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796–1875) French landscape painter and printmaker in etching

Corot's description of a morning in Switzerland, Château de Gruyères, 1857, as quoted in Letters of the great artists – from Blake to Pollock, Richard Friedenthal, Thames and Hudson, London, 1963
1850s

“From prescription, in the case of hypaethral edifices, open to the sky, in honor of Jupiter Lightning, the Heaven, the Sun, or the Moon: for these are gods whose semblances and manifestations we behold before our very eyes in the sky when it is cloudless and bright.”

Vitruvius book De architectura

Source: De architectura (The Ten Books On Architecture) (~ 15BC), Book I, Chapter II, Sec. 5

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