In orbiting the sun, the earth departs from a straight line by one-ninth of an inch every eighteen miles – a very straight line in human terms. If the orbit changed by one-tenth of an inch every eighteen miles, our orbit would be vastly larger and we would all freeze to death. One-eighth of an inch? We would all be incinerated.
   — From Science Digest

For the world is not painted or adorned, but is from the beginning beautiful; and God has not made some beautiful things, but Beauty is the creator of the universe.
   — Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Laws of Nature

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