110 FROM NEBULA TO NEBULA 



any given object at the equator by only 1-289 of its 

 weight, so that a mountain weighing, say, 289,000 tons 

 may be provisionally construed to be self-sustaining by 

 virtue of its "persistent" momentum to the extent of 

 1000 of its tons, but as to the remaining 288,000 tons it 

 must be regarded as a burden imposed upon some carry- 

 ing agency underneath it. . The bed of rock on which the 

 mountain reposes is, in turn, along with its load, a still 

 weightier burden on the next stratum beneath, and so on 

 down to the center of the earth. But the earth's center 

 is only a mathematical point! Nowhere do we come 

 across any sign of a motive power. There are only two 

 ways of dealing with this mystery. One is by appealing 

 to the miraculous, alias "celestial mechanics, " as the 

 Newtonians do ; the other by placing the finger on the 

 substantial cause. That cause, I hope to convince the 

 reader is none other than the tides themselves. 



