Sir James Hopwood Jeans (1877-1946) was born an eminent scientist and a writer with a remarkable gift for bringing his specialized knowledge within the reach of the common reader. Ivor Thomas once described him as a rich imagination working through a flexible pen. Thanks to his gift for communicating scientific concept to the non-scientist, a large public has gained an intelligent insight into the findings of modern astronomy and mathematical physics. His distinguished achievements in science brought him many honours-knighthood, Fellowship of the Royal Society (of which he was secretary for some years) and membership of the highly exclusive Order of Merit.
The public knows him by such books as The Universe Around Us (1920). The Mysterious Universe (1930) and physics and Philosophy (1942). The passage which follows - the opening of the Mysterious Universe - is a splendid demonstration of his power to communicate a scientist's vision of the universe with Lucidity and vividness.
A few stars are known which are hardly bigger then the earth, but the majority are so large that hundreds of thousands of earths could be packed inside each and leave room to spare; here and there we come upon a giant star large enough to contain millions and millions of earths, And the number of stars in the universe probably something like the total number of giant of sand of all the seashores of the world. Such in the littleness of our home in space when measured up against the total substance of the universe.
