463 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



Motion 

 Mouud-builder'B 



veloped on the surface of still water when a 

 point has been struck. This is a universal 

 harmony which the physical ear cannot 

 hear, as Pythagoras supposed, but which the 

 Intellectual ear can understand. And is it 

 not music itself which vaguely lulls us on 

 its seraphic wings, and so easily transports 

 our minds into those ethereal regions of the 

 ideal where we forget the fetters of matter? 

 Do not the sonorous modulations of the or- 

 gan, the sweet quiverings of the bow on the 

 violin, the nervous languors of the cithara, 

 or the still more captivating charm of the 

 human voice, unite the raptures of life with 

 the warm colors of harmony? What is it 

 except an undulatory motion of the air con- 

 trived to reach the mind in the depths of the 

 brain and to impress it with emotions of a 

 special order? When the martial tones of 

 the spirited *' Marseillaise " are borne in the 

 heat of the conflict to the excited battalions, 

 or when, under the Gothic vault, the sad 

 " Stabat " pours out its mournful notes, it 

 is the vibration which affects us by speaking 

 a mysterious language. Now, all in Nature 

 is motion, vibration, and harmony. The 

 flowers of the garden sing, and the effect 

 which they produce depends on the number 

 and agreement of their vibrations relatively 

 to those which emanate from surrounding 

 Nature. In violet light the atoms of the 

 ether oscillate with the unheard-of rapidity 

 of 740 billions of vibrations per second; red 

 light, slower, is produced by undulations vi- 

 brating still at the rate of 380 billions per 

 second. The violet color is, in the case of 

 light, what the highest notes are in the case 

 of sound, and the red color represents the 

 lowest tones. As we see an object floating in 

 the water obeying \vith docility the waves 

 which come from different sides, so the 

 atom of the ether undulates under the influ- 

 ence of light and heat, the atom of air undu- 

 lates under the influence of sound, and the 

 planet and satellite circulate under the in- 

 fluence, of gravitation. FLAMMARION Popu- 

 lar Astronomy, bk. iii, ch. 1, p. 221. (A.) 



2269. MOTION WITHIN THE WALLS 

 OF PLANTS Varied and Intense Activity. 

 Without entering on the difficult question of 

 spontaneous motion, or, in other words, on 

 the difference between vegetable and animal 

 life, we would remark that if Nature had 

 endowed us with microscopic powers of 

 \ision, and the integuments of plants had 

 been rendered perfectly transparent to our 

 eyes, the vegetable world would present a 

 very different aspect from the apparent im- 

 mobility and repose in which it is now 

 manifested to our senses. The interior por- 

 tion of the cellular structure of their or- 

 gans is incessantly animated by the most 

 varied currents, . . . rotating, ascending 

 and descending, ramifying, and ever chan- 

 ging their direction. ... If to these 

 manifold currents and gyratory movements 

 we add the phenomena of endosmosis, nutri- 

 tion, and growth, we shall have some idea 

 of those forces which are ever active amid 



the apparent repose of vegetable life. 

 HUMBOLDT Cosmos, vol. i, p. 341. (H., 



1897.) 



2270. MOTIVE AND VOLITION NOT 

 MECHANICALLY CONNECTED Character 

 Determines Decision. The uncertainty of 

 the connection of motive and volition is due, 

 and due only, to the existence of the per- 

 sonal factor. In consequence of this, all mo- 

 tives are seen to be insufficient for the com- 

 plete explanation of a voluntary action; they 

 can never be constraining causes, but re- 

 remain as partial determinants. And the 

 motives of volition are insufficient for its ex- 

 planation, simply because the nature of the 

 personal factor itself and the manner of its 

 cooperation with external factors are wholly 

 unknown. At the same time the fact that 

 an ineffectual motive leaves no trace upon 

 the completed volition points towards the 

 inference that external motive and internal 

 factor do not cooperate as does a plurality 

 of causes in Nature, but that personality is 

 the only immediate cause of action, i. e., 

 that the only direct effect of a motive is ex- 

 erted upon the personality. Properly speak- 

 ing, therefore, we may not talk of a "per- 

 sonal factor," since that expression implies 

 the simultaneous cooperation of other fac- 

 tors. Rather, since all the immediate causes 

 of voluntary action proceed from person- 

 ality, we must look for the origin of volition 

 in the inmost nature of personality in 

 character. WUNDT Human and Animal 

 Psychology, lect. 29, p. 433. (Son. & Co., 

 1896.) 



2271. MOUND-BUILDERS' STRUC- 

 TURES Arti8tic Earthworks The "Animal 

 Mounds." Not the least remarkable of the 

 American antiquities are the so-called " ani- 

 mal mounds," which are principally, tho 

 not exclusively, found in Wisconsin. In this 

 district " thousands of examples occur of 

 gigantic basso-relievos of men, beasts, birds, 

 and reptiles, all wrought with persevering 

 labor on the surface of the soil," while en- 

 closures and works of defense are almost 

 entirely wanting. AVEBUBY Prehistoric 

 Times, ch. 8, p. 253. (A., 1900.) 



2272. 



Silent Evidence of 



Dense Agricultural Population A Race 

 without a Record. No proof of a knowledge 

 of letters, no trace of a burnt brick, have yet 

 been discovered; and so far as we may 

 judge from their arms, ornaments, and pot- 

 tery, the mound-builders closely resembled 

 the more advanced of the recent Indian 

 tribes, and the earthworks agree in form 

 with, if they differ in magnitude from, those 

 still, or until lately, in use. Yet this very 

 magnitude is sufficient to show that, at some 

 early period, the great river valleys of the 

 United States must have been more densely 

 populated than they were when first discov- 

 ered by Europeans. . . . The Newark 

 constructions; the mound near Florence in 

 Alabama, which is forty-five feet in height 

 by four hundred and forty feet in circumfer- 



