"FATED TO BE FREE" 



sensation of falling? Could one have any sensation 

 of motion at all in absolutely vacant space — no 

 matter at what speed with reference to the stars one 

 might be moving? To have a sense of motion must 

 we not have also a sense of something not in mo- 

 tion? In your boat on the river, carried by the tide 

 or the current, you have no sense of motion till you 

 look shoreward. With your eye upon the water all 

 is at rest. The balloonist floats in an absolute calm. 

 The wind does not buffet him because he goes with 

 it. But he looks down and sees objects beneath 

 him, and he looks up and sees clouds or stars above 

 him. Fancy him continuing his journey on into 

 space till he leaves the earth behind him — on and on 

 till the earth appears like another moon. Would 

 he look up or down to see it? Would he have a 

 sense of rising or of falling? If he threw out ballast, 

 would it drop or soar, or would it refuse to leave 

 him? 



Such speculations show how relative our sense 

 standards are, how the law of the sphere upon which 

 we live dominates and stamps our mental concepts. 

 Away from the earth, in free space, and we are lost; 

 we cannot find ourselves; we are stripped of every- 

 thing but ourselves; we are stripped of night and 

 day, of up and down, of east and west, of north and 

 south, of time and space, of motion and rest, of 

 weight and direction. Just what our predicament 

 would be, who can fancy? 



149 



