IV 

 GRAVISTATIC HEAT 



Were the fact not true, it would seem impossible 

 for science to have missed asking itself the obvious ques- 

 tion whether celestial bodies may not be hot because 

 they are large, instead of stupidly contenting itself 

 with the puerile inference that they are hot because 

 "they have not had time to cool." Yet the reader may 

 read astronomical treatises from A to Z without find- 

 ing anywhere this important query either asked or an- 

 swered ; .and it has been left for me both to ask and to 

 answer it. I venture to reply in the affirmative. 



Let us marshal plain facts and axiomatic principles 

 and see to what conclusions they lead. 



In the first place, since particles of matter by the 

 mere act of coming together can generate heat, would 

 it not be passing strange if they should lose this power 

 the instant they combined? In union there is strength 

 is a saying as true as it is common, yet for some in- 

 explicable reason science has here chosen to deny it. 

 Molecules of matter, as science well knows and is fond 

 of reiterating, are minute and perpetual engines of 

 energy. Hence, say I, the more of them that are clubbed 

 together the bigger the results we have a right to ex- 

 pect. 



57 



