ON GEOLOGICAL TIME. 51 



between masses falling together to form his body. 

 The strongest reason which compelled me to give 

 up the former hypothesis was, that the amount of 

 bodies circulating round the sun within a short 

 distance of his surface, which would be required 

 to give even two or three thousand years of heat, 

 must be so great, that a comet shooting in to near 

 the sun's surface and coming away again, would 

 inevitably show signs of resistance to a degree 

 that no comet has shown. In fact, we have strong 

 reason to believe that there is not circulating round 

 the sun, at present, enough of meteors to constitute 

 a few thousand years of future sun-heat. If, then, 

 we are obliged to give up every source of supply 

 from without and I say it advisedly, because 

 there is no sub-marine wire, no " underground 

 railway," leading into the sun we see all round 

 the sun, and we know that there is no other access 

 of energy into the sun than meteors, if, then, we 

 have strong reason to believe that there is no 

 continual supply of energy to the sun, we are 

 driven to the conclusion that it is losing energy. 

 Now, let us take any reasonable view we can. 



E 2 



