NATURE IN MOTION. 29 



ii. 



n 



"We sleep and wake and sleep, but all things move; 

 The sun flies forward to his brother sun; 

 The dark earth follows wheeled in her ellipse; 

 And human things returning in themselves 

 Move onward, leading up the golden year." TKNNYSOX. 



~j\TO vulgar error has perhaps longer prevailed among 

 men, than that of the permanency and immutability 

 of our globe. The world is not at rest. The peace in 

 which our mother earth seems to slumber, is but an 

 illusion : in all nature nothing is ever inactive. The 

 moon around the earth, the earth around the sun, that 

 sun around another great centre, and all the heavenly 

 bodies in one unbroken circle around the throne of the 



Almighty all are in restless motion, treading their path 



i 

 in the great world of the Lord and praising his name 



in never-ceasing anthems. 



But even at home, our own great mother earth is not, 

 as many still believe, at rest, and her very foundations 

 are every now and then giving signs of the mysterious 



