THE LAW or EQUILIBRIUM 133 



tions across the field of equilibrism before attaining the 

 state of relative rest that belongs to perfect balance. 



THE PATH OF THE SUN 



Sir William Herschel (1738-1822), the illustrious dis- 

 coverer of the planet Uranus, was the first to indicate the 

 proximate point in the heavens toward which the sun is 

 tending. That point astronomers refer to as the apex of 

 the sun's way and now (erroneously) declare it to be "in 

 the direction of the constellation Hercules, about 10 

 southwest of the star Vega" not many degrees, indeed, 

 from where Herschel himself located it. Since Herschel's 

 day, numerous astronomers have adopted this particular 

 field of research as their life-work, and hundreds of 

 thousands of dollars have been expended in one form and 

 another in this quest. Every labor of great magnitude 

 such as this is should have behind it an adequate motive. 

 Has this inquiry such a motive I 



It is a lamentable thing to have to say, but the truth 

 should out, that from the first day to the last that this 

 search has lasted, scientists have had no motive other 

 than merely to ascertain the bare isolated fact, entertain- 

 ing neither plan, expectation, or hope that the knowledge 

 will, or by any possibility ever can, prove structurally 

 useful. Herschel has been dead for nearly a century, yet 

 in all these years, for all the efforts made to reduce to ex- 

 actness what he only adumbrated, there does not appear 

 to have been a single illuminating suggestion put forward 

 as to how the knowledge might one day be made helpful 

 in the upbuilding of the science, be that knowledge as ex- 

 act as ever it may. 



Newtonians rely on the fundamental sophism that 

 the motions of cosmic bodies are self -existent ; that they 

 are no more susceptible of explanation than matter's ex- 

 istence. Of our sun they say, simply, that he moves. 

 They do not ask why he moves, for that riddle they gave 

 up from the start, supinely supposing it beyond the reach 

 of human penetration. All they dare to ask, or tolerate 

 others asking is, ' ' How fast and in what direction is he 



