736 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION I. 
In Genesis we learn that the earth was “‘ waste and void ”’ 
until light broke through the darkness. Geology agrees 
with Genesis that until light came there was no hfe. How 
life originated is not known, but, when light fell on the 
earth, its crust or surface soon became a living mass; and 
all this living mass, from the Saprophytic bacteria which 
exist in untold millions, to the huge forest trees, are all 
built up and vivified by the sun, and if the sun ceased to 
shine upon the earth it would quickly again become waste 
and void like the moon. 
Sunlight, or light coming direct from the sun, is a com- 
pound wave-motion, which, acting on the eye, produces a 
sensation of light, acting on the body produces the sensation 
of heat, acting on, say, water, it lifts it up to form 
clouds ; thus it produces energy, and this energy is indirectly 
convertible into electricity. 
If the motion comes in fairly long waves we feel heat, 
if shorter waves we see light, and if shorter still, energy is 
produced. Thus it comes about that when apparently dead 
matter is put in*the sun’s rays it becomes warm,’and in a’ 
short time begins to move, and we say that it is alive. 
The tiny microbes which dart about in a drop of water, are 
simply a gelatinous atom without organs; still they are 
endowed with the same living principle as dwells in us; in 
short, the sun has warmed and put energy into this tiny 
atom, and it lives. Put more of these microbes together, 
and we get a larger animal—muliiply cells of a similar 
character to a sufficient size, and we get man. 
The tiny black seed appears to be quite dead, but put it 
in the earth, where the sun’s heat and light can reach it, 
and its cells will begin to multiply until a tiny shoot 
appears above the ground—and now, as heat and light and 
energy get to work within, its cells multiply, water is 
attracted, matter is built up, until by-and-by we find our 
tiny gum-seed has grown into a huge tree, which contains 
say a hundred tons of matter built up in its structure, all 
put together by the sun’s rays, and every day requiring more 
energy to carry on its wonderful internal works than 
could be produced by ten men working upon it. Every 
day some 2000 gallons of water have to be lifted to_the 
top, say 300 feet high. Solid matter for adding to its 
structure has daily to be carried up. Thus light, Nature’s 
great master-builder supplies the energy for all Creation ; 
and, undisturbed, Nature arranges that these things which 
are made up by light should remain in the light, and if 
