TEE LI GET OF TEE STABS 3°i 



the absorption is a gradual one, the actual duration of luminous propa- 

 gation may have to be reckoned in thousands of millions of years. 

 Now the radiant energy of the ether represents its temporary mass. 

 If we knew the relation between mass energy and radiant energy, we 

 could give the ratio between the permanent energy of mass of the stars 

 and the luminous energy of the ether. For example, if the mass energy 

 of a star is on the average (10) 12 times its radiant energy, then the 

 total energy of the universe is always equally divided between ether and 

 matter, because the same radiation comes forth from unit volume of 

 matter, and is distributed to (10) 12 units of ether. Or, if mass energy 

 bears a larger ratio to radiant energy than this, energy may remain 

 longer in its material than in its ethereal form, only a small fraction 

 of the total energy residing in the ether. 



To conjoin stellar centers and ethereal expanses, an intermediate 

 order of existence is needed: An order which faces both ways, having 

 relations with the ether and with the stars. Viewed from the side of 

 ether, we begin to dimly apprehend an electric substance, not yet matter, 

 although possessing many of its properties, seeming to be both a sub- 

 stance and a force, mobile, energetic, viscid enough to be localized and 

 to take on intricate forms, a world-plasm, waiting to be incorporated. 



Meteorites circulating around a galactic center remain for enormous 

 periods in the neighborhood of their apogalacteum, and moving with 

 extreme slowness, they have time to gather to themselves the scattered 

 atoms of space, even though the attracting masses may average only a 

 few grams. A meteoritic mass of 1 gram which, if quiescent, will at- 

 tract to itself the particles within a radius of 1 meter in about 2 months, 

 may be expected to leave a clean-swept track of considerable width 

 through that part of its revolution which occurs in intergalactic space. 

 Possibly the meteoritic chondri have thus grown by accretion in the 

 depths of space, even if, as some suppose, their nuclei may have orig- 

 inated by condensation from masses of heated mineral vapor. Such a 

 slow growth is not incompatible with various vicissitudes, and an even- 

 tual consolidation of many such masses into compound chondritic com- 

 plexes, after the manner of the formation of large hail stones. 



Particles which are thrown off from luminous stars, or from fine 

 cosmic material near the stars, being driven away by the pressure of 

 light, are not necessarily of dimensions much larger than molecular, 

 and although the swiftness and small mass of such light-repelled par- 

 ticles must prevent them from acquiring additions by attracting the 

 atoms near which they pass, some increase of size is to be anticipated 

 by chance collisions with atoms, the particles being slowed down and 

 reabsorbed by massive attracting bodies. But these are the last steps 

 of an intergalactic process. We must go farther back to reach its in- 

 ception. 



If we attribute the absorption of light in space to the ether itself, 



