396 SKETCHES OF CREATION. 



All the material forces, therefore, of the universe, both 

 mechanical and physiological, with their actions and reac- 

 tions, their equilibria and perturbations, are tending grad- 

 ually toward a general and permanent rest. The threads 

 of their mutual connection may be closely interwoven, but 

 somewhere there is a beginning and an end. Within the 

 grand cycle of their active lifetime apparent circles may 

 be described, but, like the eddies of a river stream, they are 

 lost in the general current, or, like the gyrations of a disk 

 descending through the sea, they are only apparent, and 

 wend their way toward ultimate rest. The same exact 

 conditions are never reproduced. [See Appendix, Note 

 IX.] 



