Venus: A Quest

..what began as a personal quest, has become as vast as the universe, and as tiny as the DNA that makes us what we are.

– Dylan Horrocks

Perhaps one of the biggest questions humans can ask is are we alone? Are we the only intelligent life in the universe? Is there life on other planets around other stars? That starts with the technique that Jeremiah Horrocks invented — the Transit of Venus.

– Professor Donald Kurtz, from the Jeremiah Horrocks Institute at University of Central Lancashire, England

It was utterly remarkable in my opinion that a young and isolated person was able to beat everyone else in Europe to this great observation.

– British astrophysicist Martin Rees, Lord Rees of Ludlow, on Jeremiah Horrocks being the first person to observe the Transit of Venus in 1639