Sunspots Astronomers describe the spots appearing upon the photosphere of the sun as irregularly ring-shaped penumbra enclosing a darker central umbra. Although the umbra looks black in comparison with the bright surrounding photosphere, it is actually quite brilliant. The spots have no permanence, either in time or shape: they often arise from combinations of contiguous smaller spots, or from no apparent cause on the sun's face, within a short period (often about a day). Bridges may form across a spot and thus give shape to two spots. All spots are carried across the sun's body by the sun's rotation, very few being found near the equator nor at 45 or more degrees from the equator.
In theosophy the spots are due to the diastolic and systolic movements of the sun -- which is the heart as well as the brain of the solar system -- in its rhythmic pulsations, by which the life forces of the system are circulated in a period roughly ranging from ten to twelve years, and usually given as being eleven years -- the sunspot cycle of astronomy. "Thus, there is a regular circulation of the vital fluid throughout our system, of which the Sun is the heart -- the same as the circulation of the blood in the human body -- during the manvantaric solar period, or life; the Sun contracting as rhythmically at every return of it, as the human heart does. Only, instead of performing the round in a second or so, it takes the solar blood ten of its years, and a whole year to pass through its
auricles and
ventricles before it washes the
lungs and passes thence to the great veins and arteries of the system.
to be continue "
Sunspots2 "
