tion. As everything in the animal and vegetable kingdom ends in dissolution, so doubtless will the substances of the mineral kingdom and suns and worlds in their natural course. There may be some truth in the statement, but I cannot fully accept it. I consider that the life of worlds as well as suns is so enduring as to seem unending and eternal; that there are no forces of repulsion or disintegration that can dissolve or destroy a world. The law of electric attraction and cohesion will for ages, and perhaps forever, prevent any world dissolution. Yet it is well to hear all theories and weigh all the evidence.

He holds that there are two forces acting alternately under natural law. Worlds are formed very gradually and quietly, by accumulation of atoms under the law of gravitation, while they may be dissolved as gradually and quietly by dispersion of atoms under the law of repulsion. These two forces work together locally, though actually in opposition to each other. The explanation of the anomaly is in the form of matter. When solid, it is under the law of gravity; when gaseous, it is under the law of repulsion. It is not difficult to conceive a development within a world of the means for its disintegration.

It would be gratifying, he says, to be able to conceive a natural development in the regions of space, whereby primordial matter held under the power of repulsion should be brought under the law of gravitation. This is an admission that gravitation does not explain one-half the laws of the universe, and not even the beginning of them. But no analogies appear to be available, he says, for solving the mystery of the transformation. It is well to have con

spicuous failures in some important processes of nature, as men are prone to conceit and pride of achievement, and would fail to recognize the supreme Ruler of the universe. Even now, there are creatures of His bounty, he says, who prefer to consider themselves descendants of monkeys, rather than confess their direct origin from Deity. They admit there are many missing links in the evidence, but they are so intent in proving their pedigree they trust the evidence may be made complete. The motive of their ambition, doubtless, is to be free from subjection to a higher power, under whom their wills and passions might be subject to unwelcome restraint.

The recognition of the recurrence of successive generations of worlds may give new interest to astronomy. And the appearance of the new and the disappearance of old stars will have a new interest and constitute a continuous history. It is true that all of our astronomers assume that the suns are burning up and shrinking away, and that the earth and planets can exist but for a few millions of years, and thus assert that there are living and dead generations of worlds; and many dead generations of suns and worlds floating in space.

Bennett, therefore, thinks it is necessary to have the old suns and worlds removed, and that they are dissolved into atoms to prevent an accumulation of them, and their atoms added to new worlds, which would avoid all danger of them moving at random, and causing disastrous collisions. In order to have in our mind a complete view of the universe, our astronomers require us to imagine innumerable dark and dead suns and worlds floating in limitless space, having lived their generation of usefulness, and been

the home of millions of intelligent creatures; that suns with their systems of worlds are now dark floating sepultures of departed and embalmed organic life. This is a sad and distressing picture.

Herbert Spencer says: "Integration must continue until the conditions which bring about disintegration are reached; and then there must ensue a diffusion which undoes the preceding concentration. This indeed is the conclusion that presents itself as a deduction from the persistence of force. If stars, concentrating to a common centre of gravity, eventually reach it, then the quantities of motion they have acquired must suffice to carry them away again to those remote regions whence they started. And since by the conditions they cannot return to those remote regions in the shape of concrete masses, they must return in the shape of diffused masses. Action and reaction being opposite and equal, the momentum of dispersion must be as great as the momentum of aggregation, and must cause equivalent distribution through space whatever be the form of the matter."

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Thus Herbert Spencer holds that to preserve an equilibrium of matter, force, and motion the pri mordial matter from which worlds are evolved must, after having served its purpose in world-forms, return again to its primitive state. He suggests it may do so as the result of worlds being precipitated together, and by collision converted into a gaseous condition, and diffused through the space it originally occupied. He thinks the time will come when the now living worlds will be dissolved into their original elements.

The first precipitation, of course, would be that of the planets one by one upon the sun, when they, 20

including the earth, would be entirely absorbed by it, and greatly enlarged. Then the centre of gravity of stars concentrating to such a centre from other systems might create a giant sun of a volume that could not be volatilized and dispersed by collision with a star of medium size, but have a capacity at intervals to absorb the surrounding stars. Then would occur what, I contend, would have resulted long ago if the law of gravitation existed in the universe. All worlds and suns would long ago have been precipitated into one vast globe. Therefore I demand of these learned astronomers to show why this has not occurred long ago under their doctrine of gravity, rather than picture the dismal destruction of the far future. But let us hear their "tale of woe."

Mr. A. Winchell, in "The Machinery of the Heavens Running Down," says: "Are we not compelled to recognize the fact that every sun in our firmament, as it journeys round and round in its circuit of millions of years, is slowly but surely approaching the centre of its orbit? And in that most distant future, the contemplation of which must paralyze our powers of thought, is it not certain that all the suns must be piled together in a cold and lifeless mass?" This contemplation would be most paralyzing did I not recognize three most potent facts: First, the law of magnetic cohesion to hold worlds and suns in globular forms; second, the law of electric repulsion to prevent suns and worlds coming together; and third, the directing and upholding wisdom and power of Deity. This fear of the collisions of suns, as a great and final catastrophe, ignores the existence of a beneficent, omnipotent, controlling Deity; it ignores the law of electric repulsion

in sun and world form, for which I contend; and everything is accounted for by the natural laws of gravital motion, or Herbert Spencer's "persistent force and matter," under the law of gravitation. In the case suggested of stars concentrating to a common point, the centre of gravity might be unoccupied, and each star encountering no resistance would pass on in a flight of perhaps thousands of years, and, meeting no resistance, continue to oscillate until scores of stars had entered in the hazardous strife, and the chance of colliding would not be one in a thousand flights. Even if they were dissolved into gases their substance could not be disseminated in space, in the condition of original primordial matter. No colliding force could so disperse substances of worlds that they would fail to settle again in a body of more or less consistency. Further, I contend there is no warrant for believing in a dissolution of worlds, or in a readjustment of them, by means of any collision likely to occur to suns or worlds in the limitless fields of space. But it is well to consider all possibilities, and recognize the omnipotent care of a controlling Deity.

Our astronomers claim there are over one hundred millions of suns and planets, and they say there may be twice that many, one-half of which, fifty millions, have been listed. If there are a hundred millions of suns and planets, one-half of which are inhabited, say the fifty millions classified by astronomy, can there be a more sublime thought than the conception of this vast procession of suns and worlds, freighted with living souls and lofty intellects, rolling majestically along on the wide bosom of time, space, and eternity? Where can you find a more glorious conception of the wisdom and omnipotence of Deity, than