35 
always parallel to itself. This plane passes through 
the stars which have 0 and 12 hours right ascension. This 
movement of the earth produces no apparent change in the 
seasons, or in the length of the year, until the summer 
position of the earth lies in this plane. Then the tropics 
will extend north and south. The year will increase, and all 
the changes will be apparent. 
This third movement has been called a motion of the axis 
round the poles of the ecliptic, — a theory which recorded 
observations contradict, which explains nothing in the past, 
which therefore had better be discarded by all those who 
prefer truth to a blind following of old Aristotelian theories. 
The cause of this third movement is the cause of the 
expansion of the crust of the earth, the geological evidence 
of which has been given by Mr. Thorp ; also of a planet's 
daily rotation on its axis, a fact, which although it is 
popularly believed that everything has been discovered, yet 
remains without a cause. 
It is true that theorists go as far as to explain matters up 
to when the earth was first launched in space ; but how this 
launching was effected is not stated. Great difference of 
opinion exists whether the earth was rubbed off the sun by a 
comet, or whether it was flung into its present position by 
Divine energy, (sic !) 
If either fact be granted we are not much nearer our 
mark, for we may then ask where the sun was rubbed off, and 
what flung the comet at the sun ? 
The Hindoo Priests explain the movements of the earth in 
a not very dissimilar manner. They state that the earth rests 
upon the back of an elephant, that the elephant stands upon 
a tortoise, but they do not explain what the tortoise stands 
upon ; but they suppose it was placed " there /" by Mahomet. 
If we are content to take such arguments as sound and 
logical, we may depend that, wise as we suppose we are, the 
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