Polytechnic Association Proceedings. ggl 



a higher sphere, and to. that we must look for the attracting force 

 that will fulfill the necessity of the case. I shall here be found 

 trespassing slightly on some of those creations of astronomical 

 science which imagination has built on too slight foundations of 

 truth, and which time will, I think, sweep away by discoveries in 

 revolution as simple as that which swept away the ancient systems 

 of astronomy from the faith of mankind. The simple turning of 

 the earth on her axis was found to perform all those wonders, 

 and account for all the phenomena, which men's minds had for 

 centuries supposed employed the might of Heaven to move the 

 whole universe around us for the accommodation of light to our 

 comparatively little Avorld. 



The earth, we know, is balanced within a planetary system, revol- 

 ving about the sun in perpetual order. We must then admit one 

 of two things, to wit: That either the sun, with his system, revolves 

 about another and a higher system, which is beyond our power of 

 immediate observation; or, that the suji is fixed in the center, and 

 that his system embraces the whole visible and invisible heavens — 

 which we have good evidence that it does not. The supposition 

 is contrary to reason, and contrary to the order of revolution. We 

 therefore assert, as a necessity, that the sun, with his system, revolves 

 about another and a higher system, carrying the earth with him in 

 the same manner as the earth revolves about the sun, carrying the 

 moon with her. This is not a disputed proposition, and I only 

 state it in this form to connect the thread of my argument. 



The fact being admitted, it is reasonable to conclude that this is 

 the highest revolution or source of magnetic attraction to which 

 the earth — separately considered — is immediately related. First, 

 because the attraction will necessarily be from system to system; 

 and, secondly, because the earth being situated in the midst of the . 

 solar system, a part of it, and only a point in it, the line of attraction 

 would be always nearly the same; or if afl:ected at all by any other 

 revolution, in a planet of the earth's magnitude relatively to these 

 great systems, the effect would be a scarcely perceptible vibration.* 



* I have not time or room here to attempt the demonstration of the truth, but I havo "" 

 no doubt whatever that, although the higher revolution is the governing cause of all, there 

 is yet a daily and a yearly revolution which it would not be difficult to trace. Dr. Bow- 

 ditch mentions a daily vibration (which is no doubt a revolution"), amounting to some 

 minutes of a degree, and I recollect that a few years since the same thing was observed 

 by M. Leverrier, director of the Observatory at Paris, which for want of another, reason, 

 he ascribed to expansion by the sun's heat; but although magnetism is more or less intense 

 in a high or low temperature, I cannot accept this as a sufficient cause for a change of raria- 



