4o8 



SCIENCE. 



minus 18,000,000 of degrees. It seems incredible that 

 scientists who possess the knowledge of these facts can 

 entertain the thought, or attempt to maintain the theory, 

 that heat comes from the sun, as heat, through such a 

 distance, and such a medium. And, if not coming as 

 heat, then the previously existing philosophies of the 

 functions of the sun are fundamentally erroneous . 



Science at the present time admits of four different 

 explanations of the production of sun heat, viz : (i.)com- 

 bustion of cosmical substances falling into the sun ; (2.) 

 arrest of motion of substances thus supposed to fall into 

 the sun ; (3.)contraction of the solar mass ; and (4.) 

 dissociation of compound bodies in the sun's substance. 

 Each of the foregoing hypotheses stands in direct op- 

 position to the inexorable law of conservation of force. 

 Each recogn zes the presence of a vast flood of heat, 

 light, and force incessantly issuing from the great solar 

 mass, and proceeding therefrom with inconceivable 

 velocity to the earth. Yet neither of them makes pro- 

 vision for the retro-acting, or returning current, which 

 under the law of conservation, becomes indispensable. 

 Each assumes the actual and indispensable presence of 

 heat at the sun, as an element in the solar economy. But 

 inasmuch as heat cannot come from the sun as heat, 

 there really exists at the sun no necessity for the enor- 

 mous production there, such as these hypotheses demand. 

 The prodigious destruction of material claimed to be in- 

 volved in the production of heat at the sun, and the ex- 

 penditure of an inconceivable amount of force in pro- 

 jecting the same in all directions, ■ and to inconceivable 

 distances into space, are uncalled for, and therefore ir- 

 rational. Upon the electrical theory, no such extrava- 

 gant and irrational processes are needful. 



A true understanding of the great physical phenomena 

 of our eanh depends upon a correct knowledge of the 

 constitution of its atmosphere. There is a more vital 

 element than clouds, vapors, gases. This constituent is 

 magnetic in its character, and may be designated as 

 static, from its habit in equilibrium, and also in contradis- 

 tinction from the vast active current which rills the space 

 between the sun and the earth. In all scientific formulae 

 of its constitution, this principle as a real entity has been 

 ignored. The fact that the atmosphere is a vast mag- 

 netic reservoir, that it is the most magnetic of all earthly 

 bodies except iron, nickel, and cobalt, is well understood ; 

 yet there appears to have been no suspicion of the grand- 

 eur and importance of its (unctions in the earth's physical 

 economy. As constituted, the atmosphere is peculiarly 

 adapted to co-operate with the sun in this economy. 



In fact it is the medium and instrument of all the sun's 

 terrestrial operations. Prepared by such knowledge 

 of the constitution of the atmosphere, we can better 

 comprehend the philosophy of the action of che great sun- 

 current so incessantly moving earthward. 



By means of the dynamo-electric machine, it is dem- 

 onstrated that motion or magnetism, (or both,) is con- 

 verted into heat and light ; so does not analogy suggest 

 that the grand motions ot the heavenly spheres are by the 

 same principle converted into sunlight, and sun-heat ; 

 thus making unnecessary the measureless and ceaseless 

 destruction of material that is demanded by the present 

 theory ? Our atmosphere supplies the conditions re- 

 presented by the "carbon point," and the " platinum 

 coil," in practical electricity. A current invisible, with- 

 out manifestation, passes through space, as electricity 

 through wires, until, meeting the resistance and favorable 

 conditions of our atmosphere, there occur those wonder- 

 ful and important phenomena, heat, and light. No par- 

 ticle of either heat or light need therefore come as such 

 from the sun to the earth, the current being wholly in- 

 visible and cold in its passage. For a practical demon- 

 stration of such transmission of a current, we are much 

 indebted to experiments made by Prof. Mahlon 

 Loomis, of Washington, D. C. Without any visible 

 means of transmission, he succeeded in sending the mag- 



netic current from one mountain top to another twenty 

 miles distant. 



In the light tenuous atmosphere of the summits of lofty 

 mountains, the human body often experiences the fiercest 

 effects of sun-heat, and the pyrheliometer of Pouillf.t 

 also records such effects for the reason that the body 

 and the instrument become objects of resistance to the 

 current, and a local heat is thus developed, which is far 

 greater than that of the light atmosphere surrounding, 

 which offers no such resistance. It is hardly necessary 

 to add that the greater heat always manifested on the 

 surface of the earth beneath is owing to the fact of a 

 denser medium, and a consequent greater resistance. 



The battery of mundane construction — our best aid and 

 interpreter in the reading of universal phenomena — while 

 it is the developer of heat, light, and power, is itself 

 neither luminous, hot, nor magnetic. To explain the 

 effects of the sun, therefore, there is not the least reason 

 to infer that it is itself luminous, or even warm. Potential 

 action generated in a dark, cold body may produce great 

 heat, light, and attraction, at a distance from the seat of 

 activity, and what is thus wrought artificially, in a small 

 way, may surely be done naturally, and in a tremendous 

 fashion, by the grand forces of the sun. 



SUNLIGHT. 



The same process develops sunlight. If lines be drawn 

 from the sun to the earth, tangent to both, these lines 

 will enclose a tapering space, the sun at the big end, 

 the earth at the small end, and the space between a trunc- 

 ated cone , this space may be designated the solar cone or 

 cone-space. Within this space incessant circulation is 

 going on, and all the phenomena of gravity, heat, light, 

 are produced through their reciprocal activity. The field 

 of encounter between the forces of the sun and earth is 

 our atmosphere, and in the collision light is generated. 

 Being thus conditioned upon the atmosphere, light and 

 heat cannot be found in space beyond the lines of the 

 ' solar cone. 



It is to be observed that light rapidly diminishes in the 

 direction of the sun, even as we have seen to be the case 

 with heat. Beyond the lower portion of the atmospheric 

 mass, there is no dazzle ; and the human eye in looking 

 upon the great orb is not dazed. „ Thus the exceeding 

 brilliancy which characterizes the sun's rays, so far from 

 being a phenomenon located in the sun itself, as is the 

 popular, and even the scientific conception, is actually 

 confined to the lower strata of our atmosphere. 



If light were transmitted to us from the s\in in perfect 

 intensity, the entire vault of heaven must appear as lum- 

 inous as our sun. 



The sun is therefore not the manufacturing place and 

 distributing reservoir of actual light and heat ; it is 

 rather the source from whence the whole solar system is 

 supplied with the invisible, potential light and heat, 

 which become developed where it is required. The 

 great central orb may therefore be regarded as like unto 

 the earth, on its surface, and in its surroundings, viz : a 

 dark, cool, habitable body. 



OTHER RECOGNIZED FORMS OF FORCE. 



All other recognized forms of force have their best ex- 

 planation in the same theory. 



It may be necessary to caution against a natural mis- 

 conception which is fruitful in seeming objections against 

 the theory advanced. Let it be understood then, that 

 man's machinery must always work to disadvantage 

 when made to illustrate the operations of nature. The 

 machine itself is an inert thing, a dead weight interposed, 

 the working of which requires the expenditure of force. 

 In nature's operations, on the contrary, without labor or 

 friction, one form of force under proper conditions trans- 

 mutes itself into another form, there being no loss of 

 force in the change. We must recognize the fact of an 

 unimpaired energy in the universe, the fact that force is 

 1 never lost nor wasted. 



