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SUN FORCE AND EARTH FORCE. 
BY DR RICHARDSON. 
W HEN one of oar most philosophical of poets spoke of 
the sun as the “ soul of surrounding worlds/* he made 
use of an expression which a modern physicist would be only 
too pleased to originate as a solemn truth of science. When, 
over the last that is mortal, the priest utters the sad ee Earth 
to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust/* he too makes use of an 
expression which a modern physicist would be only too pleased 
to originate as a solemn truth of science. The sun and the 
earth are the two great representatives, in fact, of life and of 
death. Did I say the representatives of life and death ? I 
was wrong : they are the veritable life and death of the 
universe as it is known to us. But for our simple purpose it 
is at this moment sufficient that we speak of the sun and 
earth as each representing force ; the sun active, originating, 
radiating, imparting ; the earth passive, receiving, absorbing, 
retaining, re-yielding. 
That which we call motion is all derived from the action of 
these two forces. Sun force lifts up, carries, propels ; earth 
force draws down, resists, regulates, steadies, fixes, releases. 
All our measures for producing or, rather, developing* 
motion, are derived from one or other of these natural forces. 
When we move machinery by steam, we call into requisition 
force which the sun has at some previous time supplied to the 
earth, and which we now simply liberate : indirect sun force. 
When we take advantage of the wind to move machinery, as in 
the windmill, we again indirectly use sun force. When we 
move machinery by water power, as by the mill-stream, we use 
the force of the earth ; we resist the force by which the earth 
draws the water towards itself. 
The animal body, also, is made to manifest the phenomena 
of life or of death by the influence of these forces. Every 
animal, every plant, is a compound of sun and earth. The 
