138 THE UNIVERSE 



But since they have seen an electric battery and an 

 arc light, they should be ashamed to ever declare 

 "the sun is hotter than any terrestrial furnace," or 

 that it is hot at all. The arc and incandescent 

 lights are object lessons they ought to study, for 

 they will see almost an exact representation of how 

 all light, heat and vital force are created on suns 

 and planets. 



They will see two wires, one positive and the 

 other negative, brought together or so near together 

 that in order to complete their electric circuit they 

 must pass through a little space of resisting air, 

 which is a non-conductor, and then they burst 

 into light and moderate heat. In the same manner 

 the positive and negative currents of electricity of 

 the sun and earth, without wires, come together in 

 our atmosphere, which is near the earth's surface 

 a dense resisting non-conductor, and in order to 

 complete the circuit they burst into light, heat and 

 vital force and give life and energy to all animal 

 and vegetable organisms. But the heat must be and 

 is generally moderate, as no vegetable or animal life 

 can exist in excessive heat. And as excessive heat 

 means ruin and decay, therefore no burning sun 

 can furnish light or give life and growth to any 

 planet. 



Prof. Simon Newcomb, the learned astronomer, 

 says: "The sun is -not a solid body, but must be 

 liquid or gaseous, at least at its surface." He 

 gives this singular reason, therefore, that "the sun's 

 rotation at the equator is completed in less time 

 than at a distance on each side of the equator." 



I question both the fact and the sufficiency of his 

 reasoning on this point. According to his own 



