THE EARTH FRAME 



211 



evaporation from the sea, that carries inland and 

 descends as rain, filling the lakes and the rivers 

 and finding its way back to the sea, again 

 exemplifies the circle. All the elements 

 fire, water, air show it. Yes, even the 

 planetary system pays allegiance to it ; and as 

 the moon circles the earth, so the earth circles 

 the snn, and the sun itself with all its planets, 

 is following a mightier curve about some 

 greater orb, or is, perhaps, drawn inward by 

 the sweet influences of the Pleiades. 



And is the physical or intellectual life of 

 man any exception to the rule ? Tribes travel 

 from east to west for ten thousand years, fol- 

 lowing the track of the sun, until at last they 

 rediscover the cradle of the race reach the 

 spot from which migration first started ; minds 

 build up thought for ages, advancing, as 

 they suppose, until at last they find they are 

 but rediscovering the truths known to the 

 ancients. They have completed the circle, 

 and the circumference is limited. Out of 

 it and beyond it man cannot go. Once, in 

 an Eastern church, my attention was attracted 

 by a beetle in the dome wheeling and beating 

 against the encircling stones, vainly trying to 

 get out. Around and around that dome, hour 



Human 

 circlet. 



The limited 

 circumfer- 

 ence. 



