chapter XI 



On Cycles. 



THE one faith on which all normal living beings con- 

 sciously or unconsciously act, is that like antecedents 

 will be followed by like consequents. This is the one true 

 and catholic faith, undemonstrable, but except a living 

 being believe which, without doubt it shall perish ever- 

 lastingly. In the assurance of this all action is taken. 



But if this fundamental article is admitted, and it can- 

 not be gainsaid, it follows that if ever a complete cycle 

 were formed, so that the whole universe of one instant 

 were to repeat itself absolutely in a subsequent one, no 

 matter after what interval of time, then the course of the 

 events between these two moments would go on repeating 

 itself for ever and ever afterwards in due order, down to 

 the minutest detail, in an endless series of cycles like a 

 circulating decimal. For the universe comprises every- 

 thing ; there could therefore be no disturbance from with- 

 out. Once a cycle, always a cycle. 



Let us suppose the earth, of given weight, moving with 

 given momentum in a given path, and under given con- 

 ditions in every respect, to find itself at any one time 

 conditioned in all these respects as it was conditioned at 

 some past moment ; then it must move exactly in the 

 same path as the one it took when at the beginning of the 

 cycle it has just completed, and must therefore in the 

 course of time fulfil a second cycle, and therefore a third, 

 and so on for ever and ever, with no more chance of escape 

 than a circulating decimal has, if the circumstances have 

 been reproduced with perfect accuracy. 



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