336 



♦ KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



[Nov. 30, 1883. 



A CHALLENGE FROM THE EARTH- 

 FLATTENING SOCIETY. 



By Richard A. Proctor. 



BECAUSE I have just finished a series of papers giving 

 some illustrations of the earth's rotundity, I have 

 been invited by a Society called the Zetetic Society to 

 discuss with Parallax the question whether the earth is flat 

 or round. The invitation has been gravely presented to 

 me, despite ray oft-repeated statement that there is no such 

 question for me or for any one who, having learned what 

 are the known facts, has average power of reasoning about 

 them. But I have no doubt my declining to accept this 

 invitation, courteously enough advanced, will be described 

 (if not actually regarded) by the Zetetists as evidence of 

 weakness in the theory of the earth's rotundity. I am not 

 greatly concerned on this point. I am amused, how- 

 ever, at the quaint reasoning of Parallax himself on a 

 personal question. It is known that speaking of the 

 book whicli he published somewhere about the year 

 186-1: (it was then at least I first saw it, but it may really 

 be older), I have expressed my doubts whether he is really 

 sincere, however earnest his followers may be, in denying 

 the earth's rotundity. He advances the singularly illogical 

 objection that he has never questioned my sincerity and 

 therefore I have no right to question his. As if, before 

 one challenged what one believes to be false and wilfully 

 false teachiijg, one were bound to wait tUl such a charge 

 had been brought against oneself. Were a charge of in- 

 sincerity brought against me, and based (as of course, to 

 make it worth noticing at all, it must be based) on some 

 acknowledged statements of mine, I should be prepared to 

 answer the charge. That none such has been made by 

 Parallax is primd facie evidence that he knows of nothing I 

 have ever said which could so be challenged. Now my charge 

 of insincerity against him is based on definite passages in 

 his book, and has never been met, except by vague denial 

 of insincerity. Thus he states that with his eye close to 

 the water level (still water) he saw through a telescope the 

 whole structure of a bridge over the water, down to the 

 very water, six miles away : but he has invented a law of 

 perspective (it has no existence in nature, but that is no- 

 thing) explaining (what he knows very well) the fact 

 that one can never see what he described. He states 

 that out of fifty trials in which he fired a gun tied verti- 

 cally, the bullet tvAce came back into the very muzzle of 

 the gun : if a man, shown otherwise to be of unexcep- 

 tionable veracity, told me this, I should feel sure he mis- 

 took a dream for reality : if I seemed to see it myself 

 I should knov it was a dream. He introduces quo- 

 tations which seem to support his doctrine of a flat 

 earth, but in every case a reference to the original shows 

 that he stopped short at the very point where words were 

 coming which would have been made the passage bear quite 

 the other way. He quotes from an old number of the 

 Times a passage in which the North Star is described as 

 seen from a certain ship in latitude i!3", in such a way as 

 to suggest the idea that this was south latitude. On turning 

 to the passage I found that from the date of sailing and 

 arrival of the ship it was clear (and must have been clear 

 to him) that the ship was in north latitude. He refers to 

 the motion of a bottle carried by currents through some 

 240° of longitude in the southern seas in such a way as to 

 convey the idea that the bottle had gone the short way 

 round, though on referring to the passage cited (in Captain 

 Ross's book on the Antarctic Seas) it appears that he could 

 not possibly have mistaken Captain Ross's clear statement 

 that the bottle was carried the long way round. He speaks 



of latitudes in North Zealand in terms implying that they 

 are much the same as latitudes in England, only southern 

 instead of northern, though he cannot but be aware that 

 they are very difl^erent. Lastly (to pass over a dozen or so 

 of kindred cases) he has ever shown himself unwilling to 

 touch on the obviously fatal objections to his theory (two 

 or three of which [ shall presently mention) though ready 

 to discuss at any length those points in which he knew 

 there was no particular difficulty. 



From this evidence I deduced the conclusion that as 

 Parallax is manifestly not wanting in intelligence or even 

 in ability, he advocates a theory which he knows to be 

 erroneous ; for no intelligent person will bolster up a 

 sound theory by false experiments, garbled extracts, and 

 untrue statements, or be unwilling to examine into all 

 such difficulties as even true theories commonly present 



And now, if it will be any comfort to the Zetetic Society 

 or to believers in Parallax's theory of a flat earth or any 

 modification of it yet presented to an amused world, I 

 announce myself as perfectly ready to discuss the matter 

 whensoever any member of the Zetetic school — 



(1.) Has shown why, despite the enormously varying 

 distance of the sun (while yet it is day) according to their 

 theory, the sun does not vary correspondingly in apparent 

 size. 



(2.) Has explained why though according to their 

 theory the sun never passes to such positions aa to lie 

 towards the south of east and west in New Zealand, 

 Victoria, or Tasmania, he is seen, in summer mornings and 

 evenings, far to the south of east and west. 



(3.) Has shown why at the equator in spring and 

 autumn the sun rises due east and sets due west, though 

 according to their chart and account, it is really due north- 

 east and due north-west at six a.m. and six p.m. respec- 

 tively at the equator in spring and autumn. 



And (4.) has assigned any possible positions to, say, the 

 seven chief stars of Orion, consistent w-ith the circum- 

 stance that these stars present pi-eoisely the same con- 

 figuration when seen overhead at the equator, or low down 

 towards the south from high northern latitudes, or low 

 down towards the north from high southern latitudes, the 

 last view showing the giant inverted, but the configuration 

 of the star-group absolutely unaltered. 



In order to ascertain to what extent aniline colours 

 might be injurious to health, notice was, for some years, 

 taken of the health of the emp?oi/es of the aniline colour 

 works at Hochst-on-the-Main, where 672 persons are em- 

 ployed. Reporting the result, the Journal of Gas Light- 

 ing says that it is known that nitro-benzol is poisonous, 

 yet among the 2i men employed at Hochst, in the nitro- 

 benzol house, during the last four years, symptoms 

 of " nitro-benzolismus " appeared in only five cases. 

 Aniline, also, is admittedly poisonous ; and of the 

 29 men employed in the aniline house at Hochst 

 there were 18 cases of specific aniline poisoning, 

 none of which proved fatal. The workmen in the 

 magenta house were always reddened with dye, even 

 to the inside of the mouth, and some of the material must 

 therefore have been swallowed ; yet not a single case of 

 specific ailment has occurred among them for eighteen 

 years. Neither magenta nor its derivatives, when made 

 without arsenic, can be considered in the least degree 

 harmful. Naphthaline is observed to be deleterious only 

 when in the form of hot vapour. On the whole. Dr. 

 Grandhomme finds that the average mortality of the work- 

 people was 4 2 per cent, which is a distinctly favourable 

 result, and should go far to dispel any lingering dread of 

 coal-tar colours, on the ground of their containing poison. 



