The Cause of Life and Motion 31 



changing with the vibratory action of the forces, 

 and new atoms are ever entering into the compo- 

 sition of the elements. 



There are certain elements which fail in find- 

 ing any positions of rest about the earth or its 

 vicinity, and these are either carried off into 

 indefinite space, or else to other worlds. Among 

 the elements thus carried off, are those of light 

 and heat. These elements only manifest their 

 properties under particular crystalline forms, 

 which they lose in leaving the earth's atmos- 

 phere; but they regain them on ' entering the 

 atmosphere of another world. 



With due allowance for the passive interfer- 

 ence of the sun, moon and the planets, it may be 

 said, that all the principal accumulations and 

 displacements of the material elements, in and 

 about the earth, are caused by the regular action 

 of the forces on its physical disorder; thus the 

 forces at work in some sealed cavern below the 

 earth's surface, gradually decomposing the ele- 

 ments of matter will finally generate such a force 

 .as to rent asunder the whole superincumbent 

 mass, and the elements will be forced upwards 

 \with great violence, developing the phenomenon 

 called a volcano. 



LIGHT. 



One of the most evident manifestations of the 

 .existence of the Celestial forces is derived from 



