Light and sound.
Lumen.The paradox is only apparent. The laws of sound are essentially different from the laws of light. Sound travels only at the rate of 340 metres a second, and its effects have absolutely nothing in common with those oflight. Nevertheless it is evident that if we were to advance into the air with a velocitysuperiorto that of sound, we should hear inversely the sounds that left the lips of a speaker. If, for instance, some one were to recite an alexandrine, an auditor in moving with the aforesaid velocity, starting at the moment when he heard the last foot of the line, would find successively the eleven other feet which had been uttered before, and would thus hear the alexandrine backwards.
As to the theory itself, it suggests a curious reflection, that nature might have caused sound to travel, not at the rate of 340 metres a second, and that its velocity, which depends on the density and the elasticity of the air, might have been very much less. Why, for instance, might it not have been transmitted at the rate of only a few centimetres a second? Now see what would be the result if this were the case. Men would not be able to speak to one another when walking together. Let two friends be conversing, and suppose one takes a step or two in advance, or goes on, say the distance of a metre; now, if sound were to take many seconds to cross this metre, the consequence would be that, instead of hearing the phrases spoken in their right order by his friend, theforemost walker would hear in an inverse order the sounds conveying the anterior phrases. In that case we could not speak whilst walking, and three-fourths of mankind would not be able to hear one another.
These remarks, my friend, induce me to suggest to you, in this connection, for your consideration, a subject well worthy of attention, and which has hitherto received little notice—that of the adaptation of the human organism to its terrestrial environment. The manner in which man sees, in which he hears; his sensations, his nervous system, his build, his weight, his density, his walk, his functions—in a word, all his actions are regulated and constituted by the condition of your planet. None of your acts are absolutely free and independent. Man is the obedient, though unconscious, creature of the organic forces of the Earth.
The human organism derived from the Earth.
Organic life accords with its habitat on each planet.
Undoubtedly the human soul, not being a function of the brain, and existing by itself, enjoys relative liberty; but this liberty is limited by its faculties, its powers, and its energies; it is determined, according to the causes which decide it, at the moment of the birth of every man. Could one know exactly the faculties of his soul and the circumstanceswhich were to surround his life, one could write beforehand that man's life in all its details. The human organism is the product of the planet. It is not by a Divine fantasy, by a miracle, or by a direct creation that terrestrial man is constituted such as he is. His form, his figure, his weight, his sense, his whole organisation, are derived from the state or condition of your planet, the atmosphere that you breathe, the food that nourishes you, the gravity of the surface of the Earth, the density of terrestrial matter, &c. The human body does not differ anatomically from that of one of the higher mammalia, and if you go back to the origin of species, you will find gradual transformations established by unimpeachable evidence. The whole of terrestrial life, from the mollusc to man, is the development of one single and sole genealogical tree. The human form has its origin in the animal form. Man is the butterfly developed from the chrysalis of the palæontological ages. From this fact the consequence results that on other worlds organic life is different from what it is here, and that their humanities, which, like our own, are the result of forces in activity on each planet, differ absolutely in their forms from that of terrestrialhumanity. For example, on the worlds where they do not eat, the digestive apparatus and the intestines do not exist. On the worlds which are very highly electric, the beings inhabiting them are gifted with an electric sense. On others, sight is adapted for the ultra-violet rays, and the eyes have nothing in common with your eyes; they do not see what you see, and they see what you cannot see. The organs are adapted to the functions they have to fulfil.
Quærens.We are not, then, the absolute type of creation? Creation itself is, it appears, a perpetual development of forces in activity.
The soul and destiny
Lumen.The soul itself is subject to a similar law. There are as many diversities of souls as of bodies. In order that the soul should exist as an independent being having a consciousness of itself, in order that it should preserve the recollection of its identity and be qualified for immortality, it is necessary that even in this life it should know that it really exists. Otherwise it is no more advanced the day after death than the day before death, and falls as an insensible breath into the blind cosmos, neither more nor less than any other centre of unconscious force. Many men on the Earth boast that they do not believe inanything but matter, without knowing what they say, since they do not know what matter is. These last, and those, still more numerous, whodo not think at all, are not immortal, since they have no consciousness of their existence. The spirits who live really the spiritual life are the only ones who are fitted for immortality.
Quærens.Are there many of them?
Lumen.My friend, behold the dawn of morning which invites me anew to return into the depths of space, peopled with things unknown on Earth, that fruitful mine in which spirits find again the wrecks of past existences, the secrets of many mysteries, the ruins of disintegrated worlds, and the genesis of future worlds. And for the rest, it would be superfluous to lengthen out this recital with useless details. My object has been to show you that, in order to have the spectacle of a world and of a system exactly opposite to yours, all that is needed is to recede from the Earth with a velocity greater than that of light. In this flight of the soul towards the inaccessible horizons of the infinite, one retraces the luminous rays reflected by the Earth and by the other planets for millions and myriads of years, andwhile observing the planets at this vastdistance one can be presentin visionat the events of their past history. Thus one ascends the stream of time to its source. Such a faculty ought to illuminate for you the regions of eternity with a new light. If, as I hope, you admit the scientific value of my expositions of these ultra-terrestrial studies, I look forward to unfolding to you before long their metaphysical consequences.
Clouds no impediment to vision.
Quærens.I have listened to you with interest, Lumen, without, I own, being entirely convinced that all you have told me is actually real. Indeed it is difficult to believe that it is possible to see with absolute certainty all the things of which you speak. When, for instance, there are clouds across your field of view, you cannot see clearly what passes on the Earth. The same objection obtains for the interior of houses.
Light a vibration of ether.
Lumen.You are mistaken, my friend. The undulations of ether pass through obstacles that you would believe impenetrable. Clouds are formed of molecules between which rays of light frequently pass. In the contrary case, there are here and there vistas or gaps, across which one can only see obliquely. The case is very rare when nothing can be distinguished. Besides, light is not what it appears to be; it is a vibration of ether, and there are otherways of seeing than by means of the retina and the optic nerve.
The vibrations of ether are perceptible to senses other than those you possess. Therefore, if this be your sole objection, it is, I must say, far from being an insurmountable one.
Quærens.You have a special faculty for resolving all doubts. Perhaps this is one of the gifts granted to spiritual beings. I have been obliged successively to admit, that you have been transported to Capella with a swiftness exceeding that of light; that you reached another world as a spirit; that your soul is liberated from the flesh; that your ultra-earthly perception is able to distinguish from that height all that passes here; that you can advance or recede in space according to your fancy; and lastly, that the clouds themselves are no obstacles to your clearly seeing the surface of our globe. It must be owned that these are grave difficulties indeed.
Lumen.You are very material, my old friend! Should you be very surprised if I undertook to prove to you that all these difficulties exist only in name, and that all the objections which oppose themselves to your conception of phenomena are the effects of ignorance?
What should you think if I affirmed that no one has a single true idea of what takes place upon the Earth, and that man utterly fails to understand nature?
Quærens.In the name of all the indisputable truths of modern science, I should dare to think that you were trying to impose upon me.
The marvels of spectral analysis.
Piercing nature of the soul's sight.
Lumen.God forbid! Listen to me, my friend. The marvellous discoveries of contemporary science ought to enlarge the sphere of your conceptions. You have just discovered spectral analysis! By this methodic examination of a simple ray of light shot from a far-off star, you learn what are the elements which compose this inaccessible star and feed its brilliancy. This knowledge, my brother, is of more value than all the conquests of Alexander, of Cæsar, and of Napoleon, than all the discoveries of Ptolemy, of Columbus, of Gutenberg, than all the books of Moses and of Confucius. Only think, trillions of leagues span the abyss which separates us from Sirius, from Arcturus, from Vega, from Capella, from Castor and Pollux, and it is now possible to analyse the substances which constitute these suns, just as accurately as if you could take them in your hand and submit them to the crucible of the laboratory! How then can you refuse to admit that, byprocesses which are unknown to you, the soul's sight can be sufficiently piercing to see clearly a bright far-off world, and to distinguish even its smallest details? Does not the telegraph carry in an inappreciable moment your thought from Europe to America through the depths of the ocean? Cannot two people converse in a low voice at a distance of thousands of leagues, and still you hesitate to admit the truth of my narrations, because you do not altogether comprehend them? But can you explain how the telegraphic message is transmitted? No, you cannot. Cease then to retain doubts which have not even the merit of being scientific.
Quærens.My objections, learned master, have not any other end in view than to elicit fresh light upon the subject. I am far from denying the truth of all you tell me, and I but seek to form a rational and exact idea of it.
The inadequacy of the earthly senses.
Lumen.Be assured, my friend, I do not take any offence at your objections. My only desire is to develop and enlarge the sphere of your conceptions. I can at this very instant open your eyes to see the utter inadequacy of your terrestrial faculties, and the fatal poverty of positive science itself, by inviting you to reflect that the causes of your impressions are solely modes of motion, and that what is proudlytermedscienceis only a verylimited organic perception.
The limitations of the senses.
Light by which your eyes see—sound by which your ears hear—are different forms of motion by which you are impressed; odours, flavours, &c., are emanations which strike upon your olfactory nerve or touch your palate; these are solely vibratory motions which are transmitted to your brain. You can only appreciate a few of these movements through the senses you possess, principally those of sight and hearing. You, in your simplicity, believe that you see and hear nature? Nothing of the kind. All you do is to receive some of the movements in activity upon your sublunary atom. That is all. Beyond the impressions you receive there are an infinitely greater number unperceived by you.
Quærens.Pardon, master, but this new aspect of nature is not sufficiently clear for me to understand it. Would you. . . .
The extent of the gamutrevibrations of sound.
The extent of the vibrations of light.
Lumen.This aspect is indeed new to you, but attentive reflection will enable you to grasp it. Sound is formed by vibrations in the air which strike upon the membrane of the tympanum and give you the impression of various tones. Man does not hear all sounds. When the vibrations are too slow(below forty a second), the sound is too low; your ear cannot catch it. When the vibrations are too rapid (above 36,000 a second), the sound is too sharp; your ear cannot receive it. Above and below these two limits, therefore, human beings do not perceive them. These vibrations exist, however, and are perceived by creatures of other kinds, as, for example, certain insects. The same rules apply to light. The different aspects of light, the shades and colours of objects, are equally due to the vibrations which strike upon the optic nerve and give you the impression of the different degrees of intensity in light. Man does not by any means see all that is visible. When the vibrations are too slow (under 458 billions a second), light is too feeble; your eye sees nothing. When the vibrations are too rapid (over 727 billions a second), light outruns your organic faculty of perception and is invisible to you. Above and below these two limits the vibrations of ether still exist, and are perceived by other beings. You do not know therefore, nor can you receive, any impressions except those that can be made to vibrate upon the two chords of your organic lyre, called respectively the optic nerve and the auditory nerve.
Imagine for one instant the extent of all the sights and sounds which are not perceptible to you. All the undulatory movements that exist in the universe between the figures of 36,000 and those represented by 458,000,000,000,000 in the same unity of time, can neither be heard nor be seen by you, and remain utterly unknown to you.
Man deaf to the concert of universal harmonies by reason of his limitations.
Try to measure that distance! Contemporary science is beginning to penetrate a little into this invisible world, and you know that it has just calculated the vibrations below 458 billions (these are the caloric invisible rays) and the vibrations above 727 billions (these are the chemical rays, also equally invisible to the human eye). Scientific methods can enlarge the sphere of the perceptions but a little; you remain isolated in the midst of infinitude. Moreover, an endless number of other vibrations exist in nature which have nocorrespondencewith your organisation, and therefore cannot be received by you,consequently you remain for ever utterly ignorant of them. Did you possess other strings to your lyre—ten, a hundred, a thousand—the harmony of nature could more completely translate itself to you, each of the myriad vibrations according to their kind. You would perceive a number offacts which are certainly passing around you, whose very existence you cannot even now guess, and in place of two dominant notes you would be conscious of the grand concert of harmonies everywhere about you.
But although thus ignorant, you are unconscious of it, because all around you are equally ignorant, and therefore it is impossible to compare your limited faculties with those of beings much more highly organised.
Were the eye a combined spectroscope and telescope, it would see the chemical elements composing bodies.
The senses you do possess suffice, however, to indicate the existence of other senses, not only more powerful, but of a totally different order. By the sense of touch, for example, you can, it is true, feel the sensation ofheat;but it is easy to conceive the existence of a special sense, analogous to that by which light reveals to you the aspect of exterior objects, and which would render man capable of judging of the form and substance of an object, its interior structure, and other qualities, by the action of the caloric waves radiating from it. The same reasoning would hold good on the subject ofelectricity. You could equally well conceive the existence of a sense, endowing the eye with the powers of a spectroscope and telescope in one, thus enabling it to see thechemicalelements, of which bodies are composed.
Thus already, from a scientific point of view, you have sufficient ground for imagining modes of perception, quite different from those which characterise human beings. These faculties exist in other worlds, and there are endless ways of perceiving the action of the forces of nature.
Our terrestrial senses are limited.
Quærens.Certainly, master, I own that as you unfold these possibilities a new and singular clearness enlightens my understanding, and your teachings appear to me a true interpretation of the reality. I had already dreamed that similar marvels might be possible, but I had not been able to explain them, enveloped as I still am in my terrestrial senses. One thing is certain, we must be lifted out of our earth-bound limitations ere we are capable of comprehending, or even of attempting to judge, of the scope of the universe.
Thus, being endowed with only a few limited senses, we can but know the facts that are perceptible to them. The remainder is naturally unknown. Can it be that the unknown is infinitely more than the known?
The ordinary senses are insensible to many physical movements.
Lumen.This "remainder" is immense, and all you at present know will seem as nothing by comparison. Not only do your senses not perceive physical movements—such as solarand terrestrial electricity whose currents cross in the atmosphere, the magnetism of minerals, of plants, and of beings, the affinities of organisms, &c., which are invisible to you—but they perceive still less the movements of the moral world, its sympathies and antipathies, its presentiments, its spiritual attractions, &c. I only speak the simple truth when I say, that all that you know, and all that you could know, through the medium of your earthly senses, is as nothing compared to that which is.
Beings exist with other than our senses.
This truth is so profound that it might well be asserted, that beings exist upon the Earth essentially different from you, possessing neither eyes, nor ears, nor any of your senses, but endowed withothersenses, and capable of perceiving that which you cannot perceive, and who, while living in the same world as yourself, know that which you cannot know, and form an idea of nature completely at variance with your own.
Quærens.All this is utterly beyond my comprehension.
Lumen.Moreover, my earthly friend, I can add most emphatically that the perceptions you receive, and that constitute the bases of your science, are not even the perceptions ofthereality. No. Light, lucidity, colours, looks, tones, noises, harmonies, sounds, perfumes, flavours, apparent qualities of bodies, &c., are nothing butforms.
These forms enter into your mind by the avenue of the eye, and the ear, by the senses of smell, and taste, and are represented to you by their appearances, but not even by the essence of the things themselves.
The real nature of things entirely escapes your understanding, and you are utterly incapable of comprehending the universe.
Matter is not solid.
Matter itself is not what you believe it to be. To speak absolutely, there is not anything that issolid;your own body, a piece of iron or of granite, are not more solid than the air you breathe. All these things are composed of atoms which do not touch each other, and which are in perpetual movement. The Earth, atom of the Heavens, moves in space with a swiftness of 643,000 leagues a day; but, in proportion to their dimensions, each atom which constitutes your own body and that circulates in your blood, moves much more quickly. If your vision were sufficiently powerful to see through this stone, you would no longer see it thus, because your sight would pass through and beyond it. . . .
How man errs in thinking his limited sensations describe those of the universe.
The difference of organisms on Mars, Uranus, &c.
The tie uniting the physical and spiritual world
But I see by the disturbance of your brain, and the rapid movements of the fluid which crosses your closely-concentrated lobes, that you no longer understand my revelations. I will not then pursue this subject which I have thus merely lightly touched upon, with the end in view of thereby demonstrating how greatly you would err, did you attach any importance to difficulties born of your terrestrial sensations, and to assure you that neither you nor any man upon the Earth could form even an approximate idea of the universe. What is earthly man but a mere pigmy! Ah! if you were but acquainted with the organisms which vibrate upon Mars or upon Uranus; if it had but been granted to you, to appreciate the senses in action, upon Venus and upon a ring of Saturn; if during centuries of travel you had been permitted to glance at and observe the forms of life in the systems of the double stars; at the sensations of sight in the coloured suns, to glean the impressions of an electric sense, of which you can know absolutely nothing, in the groups of multiple suns; if a suitable comparison of this ultra-terrestrial state had furnished you with the elements of a fresh knowledge, you would then have comprehended that beings exist—who can see, hear, feel, or, to be more accurate, understand nature withouteyes, without ears, without sense of smell; that an incredible number of other senses exist in nature, senses essentially different from yours; and that there are in creation an incalculable number of marvellous facts which it is absolutely impossible for you to imagine. In this general contemplation of the universe, my friend, one perceives the solidarity—the tie which unites the physical with the spiritual world; one sees from a higher ground the instinctive strength which raises certain souls, tried by the coarseness of matter but purified by sacrifice, towards the higher regions of spiritual light; and one understands how immense is the happiness reserved for those beings, who, even while on Earth, have succeeded in gradually overcoming their lower nature.
Quærens.. To return to the transmission of light in space. Does not light lose itself at last? Does the aspect of the Earth remain eternally visible, and never, on the contrary, diminish in proportion to the square of distance, thus becoming finally annihilated?
The word end applied to space meaningless
Lumen.Your expression "at last" is without meaning, because there is no end in space.
Light becomes attenuated, it is true, with distance, the scenes become less vivid, but nothing is lost entirely. Any number, whateverit may be, perpetually reduced by half, for example, can never become equal to zero. The Earth is not visible to all eyes at a certain distance. Nevertheless it still exists, even though it may not be seen by all; and only spiritual sight can see it.
Besides, the image of a star, borne upon the wings of light, goes into the unfathomable depths of the mysterious abysses of space.
Vast regions exist without stars.
Vast regions exist in space without stars, regions decimated by time, whence worlds have been successively removed by the attraction of exterior suns. The image of a star in crossing these dark abysses, would be in a condition analogous to that of a person, or object, that the photographer had forgotten and left in thecamera.
It is not impossible that such images encounter in these vast spaces an obscure star (celestial mechanics state the existence of many such) in a special condition whose surface (formed perhaps of iodine, if one is to credit spectral analysis) would be sensitised, and capable of fixing upon itself the image of this far-off world.
Thus terrestrial events might be printed upon a dark globe. And if this globe turns upon itself, like other celestial bodies, it wouldpresent successively its different zones to the terrestrial image, and would thus take a sort of continuous photograph of successive events.
Images of this world's events photographed spirally upon other globes in space.
Following moreover, in ascending, or descending, a perpendicular line to its equator, the line where the images were reproduced would no longer be described in a circle, but in a spiral; and after the first movement of rotation was finished, the new images would not coincide with the old ones, nor superimpose them, but would follow above and below. The imagination could now suppose that this world is not spherical, but cylindrical, and thus see in space an imperishable column around which would be engraved the great events of the world's history.
I have not myself seen this realisation. It is so short a time since I left the Earth, that I have barely done more than glance superficially at these celestial marvels. Before long I shall seek to verify this fact, and see if its reality does not form a part of the infinite richness of the astral creations.
Quærens.If the ray which leaves the Earth is neverdestroyed, master, our actions are then eternal?
Lumen.Certainly they are.
Actions carried for ever on rays of light.
An act once accomplished can never beeffaced, and no power can ever cause it to be as if it had never been. Say that a crime is committed in the heart of a desert country. The criminal goes far away, remains unknown, and supposes that the act which he has committed haspassedfor ever. He has washed his hands of it, he has repented, he believes his actionobliterated. But in reality nothing is destroyed. At the moment when this act was accomplished, the light seized it and carried it into space with the rapidity of lightning. It became incorporated in a ray of light; eternal, it will transmit itself eternally into infinitude.
Likewise a good action is done in secret; the benefactor thinks it is concealed, but a ray of light has taken possession of it. Far from being forgotten, it will live for ever.
Napoleon, in order to satisfy his personal ambition, was voluntarily the cause of the death of five millions of men, whose ages averaged about thirty years, and who, according to the laws of life, had thirty-seven more years to live. Therefore, by this calculation, he caused the destruction of 185 millions of years of human life.
Napoleon's punishment.
His chastisement, his expiation, consists in being carried along by that ray of light whichleft the plains of Waterloo on the 18th June 1815, and to be ever moving in space with the quickness of light itself; to have constantly in sight that critical scene, where he saw for ever crumbling to pieces the scaffolding of his vain ambition; to feel, without respite, the bitterness of despair; and to remain bound to this ray of light for the 185 millions of years for whose destruction he was responsible. By thus acting, in place of worthily fulfilling his mission, he has retarded for a similar length of time his progress in the spiritual life.
And if it were given to you to see that which goes on in the moral world, as clearly as you now see that which passes in the physical one, you would recognise vibrations and transmissions of another nature, which imprint in the arcana of the spiritual world, not only the actions, but even the most secret thoughts.
Speculation upon the problem of communication by luminous signals between the Earth and stars.
An interval of two centuries between question and answer.
Quærens.Your revelations, Lumen, are awful! Thus, our eternal destinies are intimately bound up with the construction of the universe itself. I have many times speculated upon the problem of communication between the worlds by the aid of light. Many physicists have supposed that it will be possible to establish communication between the Earth and the Moon, and even the planets, by theaid of luminous signals. But suppose one could make signs from the Earth to a star, by employing the light, for example, a hundred years must come and go before the signal from the Earth could reach its destination, and the response could only return after the same interval of time had elapsed. Two centuries must consequently elapse between the question and its answer. The terrestrial observer would have died long before his signal could have reached his sidereal observer, and the latter would doubtless have undergone a similar fate before his answer could have been received!
Lumen.It would, in fact, be a conversation between the living and the dead.
Quærens.Pardon a last question, master—one perhaps a little indiscreet, but a last one, for I see Venus is paling, and I feel that your voice will soon cease to be heard. If actions are thus visible in ethereal regions, we can then see, after our death, not only our own actions, but also those of others—I mean those which specially interest us?
For instance, a pair of twin souls, dwelling in perfect unity, would like to see again for a thousand years the delightful hours passed together on the Earth; they would rush into space with a rapidity equal to that of light,in order to have always before their eyes the same hours of joy.
In another sense, a husband would trace with interest the entire life of his companion; and should some unexpected situation have presented itself, he could at leisure examine the causes leading to the same. He might even, if his disembodied companion resided in some neighbouring region, call upon her to observe, in common with himself, these retrospective incidents.
No denial could be admissible before such palpable evidence, and might not this power exercised by these spirits give rise to some strange revelations?
Lumen.You are very earthly, my friend, to think that in the Heavens memories of a material kind will be valued, and I am astonished that you can continue to think them of importance. What should specially strike you in all we have said during these two interviews is, that by virtue of the laws of light, we can see events after they have been accomplished, although they are past, and indeed when they have entirely vanished.
Quærens.Believe me, master, this truth will never more be effaced from my memory.It is precisely this point which I find so exceedingly marvellous.
Forget, I pray you, my last digression.
To say the truth, that which from our first interview has most taxed and surpassed the bounds of my imagination, was to think that the duration of the voyage of the spirit can be not onlynil—negative—but alsoretrograde!
Time retrogressive.
"Time retrogressive!" These two words involve a contradiction in terms. Dare one believe it?
You start to-day for a star, and you arrive yesterday! What do I say—yesterday? You will arrive there seventy-two years ago, even a hundred years ago! The farther you go, the sooner you will arrive! Terms in grammar must be remade for such extraordinary reckoning.
Lumen.This is undeniable.
Speaking according to terrestrial style, there is not any error in this mode of expression, since the Earth was only in 1793, &c., for the world in which we arrived, or for the world which we reached.
Apparent paradoxes anent time.
You have, however, on your little globe certain apparent paradoxes, which give an idea of this one.
For example, a telegram sent from Paris at noon arrives at Brest twenty minutes before noon. But these curious aspects of particular application are not of sufficient significance for you to dwell upon, but rather therevelationof which they are the metaphysical form and the outward expression. Know that time is not an absolute reality, but only a transitory measure caused by the movements of the Earth in the Solar System.
Regarded with the eyes of the soul, and not with those of the body, this picture of human life, not imaginary but real, such as it was, dissimulation being impossible, touches on one side the domain of theology, inasmuch as it explains physically a mystery hitherto inexplicable: I mean "individual judgment" of ourselves after death.
From the point of view of the whole question, the present of a world is no longer a momentary actuality, which disappears as soon as it has appeared, it is no longer a phase without consistency, a gate through which the past is precipitated unceasingly towards the future, a mathematical plan in space. It is, on the contrary, an effective reality, which flies away from this worldwith the swiftness of light, sinking for ever in the infinite, and remaining thus aneternal present.
Events live for ever.
The metaphysical reality of this vast problem is such, that one can now conceive the omnipresence of the world throughout all its duration. Events vanish from the place in which they were born, but they exist in space. This successive and endless projection of all the facts enacted upon every world takes place in the bosom of theInfinite Being, whose ubiquity holds everything in an eternal permanence.
Scientific explanation of ubiquity.
The events which have been accomplished upon the surface of the Earth since its creation are visible in space at distances proportioned to their remoteness in the past. The whole history of the globe, and the life of each one of its inhabitants, could thus be seen at a glance by an eye which could embrace that space. We thus understand optically, as it were, that the eternal Spirit, present everywhere, can see all the past at one and the same moment.
That which is true of our Earth is true of all the worlds in space. Thus the entire history of the whole universe can be present at once to the universal ubiquity of the Creator. I may add that God knows all the past, not only in consequenceof this direct sight, but also by the knowledge of each thing in the present. If a naturalist, such as Cuvier, knows how to reconstruct, by the aid of a fragment of bone, any species of extinct animals, surely the Author of Nature knows by the present Earth the Earth which is past, the Planetary System, and the Sun of the past, and all the conditions of temperatures, aggregations, and combinations, by which the elements have produced the complex condition of things at present in existence.
Present, past, and future, all one.
On the other hand, the future can be as completely present to God in its actual germs, as the past is in its fruits.
Each event is bound in an indissoluble manner with the past and the future.
The future will be as inevitably the outcome of the present, and is, as logically deducible from it, and exists in it as exactly, as that the past itself is therein inscribed for those who are able to decipher it. But—and I emphasise it—the main point of this recital is to state, to make you understand, that the past life of all worlds, and of all beings, is always visible in space, thanks to the successive transmission of light across and through the vast regions of the infinite.
New horizons.
Quærens.Two years have fled, Lumen, since the day when you granted me that mysterious interview. During this period, unconsciously for the inhabitants of eternal space, but most consciously for us dwellers upon the Earth, I have often raised my thoughts to the great problems in which you have initiated me, and to the horizons developed before my mind's eye. Doubtless, also, since your departure from the Earth you have made, through your observations and studies, great advance upon a field of research more and more vast. Doubtless, also, you have numberless marvels to declare to me, now that my intelligence is better prepared to receive them. If I am worthy, and if I can comprehend them, give me an account, Lumen, of the celestial voyages which have transported your spirit into the higher spheres; of the unknown truths which they have revealed to you; of the grandeurswhich they have opened out to you, and of the principles they have taught you in reference to that mysterious subject, viz., the destiny of man, and other beings.
Lumen.I have prepared your mind, my dear old friend, to receive marvellous impressions, such as no earthly spectacle ever has, or could produce. It is, nevertheless, necessary that you should keep your understanding free from all earthly prejudice. That which I am going to unfold will astonish you, but receive it from the first with attention as an undeniable truth, and not as a romance. This is the first condition that I demand from my earnest pupil. When you comprehend—and you will comprehend, if you bring to the task a mathematical mind and an unprejudiced spirit—you will see that all the facts which constitute our ultra-terrestrial existence are not only possible, but also real, and moreover, are in perfect harmony with our intellectual faculties as already manifested upon the earth.
Quærens.Be assured, Lumen, that I bring to you an open mind, cleared from all prejudice, and I am eagerly expecting to hear revelations such as the human ear has never before heard.
Space and Light.
Lumen.The events which will form thesubject of this recital have not only the Earth and its neighbouring stars for their subject, but they will extend over immense fields of sidereal astronomy, and make us acquainted with their marvels. Their explanation will be solved, as was that of former difficulties, by the study oflight, a magic bridge thrown from one star to another, from the Earth to the Sun, from the Earth to the stars—oflight, the universal movement which fills space, sustains worlds in their orbits, and constitutes the eternal life of nature. Take care, then, to keep ever in mind, the fact of thesuccessive transmission of light in space.
Velocity of Light.
Quærens.I know that light, whatever it may be, is the agent by which objects are rendered visible to our eyes, that it is not transmitted instantaneously from one point to another, but gradually, like all motion. I know that it flies at the rate of 75,000 leagues a second, that it runs 750,000 leagues in ten seconds, and 4,500,000 each minute. I know that it takes more than eight minutes to cross the distance of 37 millions of leagues which separate us from the Sun. Modern astronomy has made these facts familiar.
Lumen.Do you perfectly realise its undulatory movement?
Undulatory movement of Sound.
Quærens.I think so. I compare it to that of sound, although it be accomplished upon a scale incomparably more vast. By undulation following undulation, sound is diffused in the air. When the bells peal forth their sonorous sound, this is heard at the very moment when the clapper strikes the bell, by those living round the church, but is not heard till one second after, by those living at a distance of 492 yards; two seconds later by those at 765 yards; and three seconds later still, by those at a distance of 1093 yards from the church. Thus sound only gradually reaches one village after another as far as it can go.
In the same way light passes successively from one region in space to another at a greater distance, and travels without being extinguished into the far-off realms of Infinity. If we could see from the Earth an event which is being accomplished upon the Moon; for instance, if we had sufficiently good instruments to perceive from here, a fruit falling from a tree on the surface of the Moon, we should not see the fact at themoment of its occurrence, but one second and a quarterafter, because light requires about that time to travel the distance from the Moon to the Earth. Similarly, could we see an event taking place upona world at ten times greater distance than the Moon, we could not witness it until 13 seconds after it had really happened. If this world were a hundred times farther off than the Moon, we could not see an event until 130 seconds after it had taken place; were it a thousand times more distant, we should not see it until 1300 seconds, or 21 minutes 40 seconds had elapsed. And so on according to the distance.