70 SCIENCE IN SHORT CHAPTERS. 



tlic known laws of atmospheric distribution, should have 

 remained unchallenged for half a century, and that the con- 

 clusions based upon it should be accepted by the whole scien- 

 tific world, and repeated in standard treatises, such as those of 

 the " Encyclopedia Britannica," etc., etc., is, I think, one of 

 the most remarkable curiosities presented by the history of 

 science. If it were merely a little cobweb in some obscure 

 corner of philosophy, there would be nothing surprising in its 

 escape from the besom of scientific criticism ; but this is so 

 far from being the case, that it has hung, since 1822, like a 

 dark veil obscuring another, a wider, and more interesting 

 view of the universe which the idea of a universal atmosphere 

 opens out. But I must now proceed to the next stage of the 

 argument. 



Starting from the conclusion reached in the previous chap- 

 ters, that the atmosphere of our earth is but a portion of a 

 universal elastic medium which it has attached to itself by its 

 gravitation, and that all the other orbs of space must, in like 

 manner, have obtained their proportion, I take the earth's 

 mass, and its known quantity of atmospheric envelope as 

 units, and calculating, by the simple rule I have laid down in 

 opposition to Wollaston's, I find that the total weight of the 

 sun's atmosphere should be at least 117,681,623 times that of 

 the earth's, and the pressure at its base equal, at least, to 

 15,233 atmospheres. What must be the results of such an 

 atmospheric -accumulation ? 



The experiment of compressing air in the condensing 

 syringe, and thereby lighting a piece of Getman tinder, is 

 familiar to all who have studied even the rudiments of physical 

 science. Taking the formula) of Leslie and Dalton, and apply- 

 ing them to the solar pressure of 15,233 atmospheres, we 

 arrive, according to Leslie, at the inconceivable temperature of 

 380,832 0., or 685,529 F., as that due to this amount of 

 compression, or, according o Dalton, at 761,665 F. What 

 will be the effects of such a degree of heat upon materials simi- 

 lar to those of which our earth is composed ? 



Let us first take the case of water, which, for reasons I have 

 stated, should be regarded as atmospheric, or universally 

 diffused matter. 



This brings us to a subject of the highest and widest philo- 

 sophical and practical importance. I refer to the antagonism 

 between the force of heat and that of chemical combination, 

 to which the French chemists have given the name " dissocia- 



