GASOLENE AS A WORLD POWER 

 BY EDWIN E. SLOSSON, PH.D. 



Director of Science Service, Washington 



THE work of the world is done by sun power. 

 Whether it be done by the muscular labour of 

 horses or human beings, by the whirling of wind- 

 mills or water wheels, by the burning of wood, coal, or 

 oil, or by the swift and silent electric current, the energy 

 comes directly or indirectly from the solar reservoir. 

 "Give us this day our daily bread" is the same as saying 

 "Give us this day our daily sunshine." But the sun 

 does not shine every day and it cannot shine on all 

 sides of the earth at once and it favours different zones 

 at different times of the year. 



So man in order to avoid the darkness of night and 

 the cold of winter invented a way of using the sunshine 

 of the past for present needs. According to the Greeks 

 fire was a gift of that foresighted Titan Prometheus 

 who stole fire from heaven and brought it down to man 

 in a hollow reed. For this crime he was chained to the 

 Caucasus and from his torn liver flowed a stream of 

 black petroleum. The Greek mythologists differ as to 

 whether Prometheus was ever released from his chains 

 or not, and we cannot count Shelley as an authority, but 

 the streams of petroleum have continued to flow in the 

 Caucasus to this day. The Zoroastrians came to wor- 



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