and quickest activity. There are hundreds of
millions of millions of wing-beats or footfalls in a second.
Mathematical necessities surpass mental conceptions. In a cubic mile
of space there are demonstrably seventy millions of foot tons of power.
Steam and lightning have nothing comparable to the activity and power
of the celestial ether. Sir William Thompson thinks he has proved that
a cubic mile of celestial ether may have as little as one billionth of
a pound of ponderable matter. It is too fine for our experimentation,
too strong for our measurement. We must get rid of our thumby fingers
first.

What is light doing in space? That has greatly puzzled all
philosophers. Without question there is inexpressible power. It is
seen in velocity. But what is it doing? The law of conservation of
force forbids the thought that it can be wasted. On the earth its
power long ages ago was turned into coal. The power was reservoired in
mountains ready for man. It is so great that a piece of coal that
weighs the same as a silver dollar carries a ton's weight a mile at
sea. But what is the thousand million times more light than ever
struck the earth doing in space? That is among the things we want to
find out when we get there. There will be ample opportunity, space,
time, and light enough.

It is biblically asserted and scientifically demonstrable that space is
full of causes of sound. To anyone capable of turning these causes to
effects this sound is not dull and monotonous, but richly varied into
songful music. Light makes its impression of color by its different
number of vibrations. So music sounds its keys. We know the number of
vibrations necessary for the note C of the soprano scale, and the
number that runs the pitch up to inaudibility. We know the number of
vibrations of light necessary to give us a sensation of red or violet.
These, apprehended by a sufficiently sensitive ear, pour not only light
to one organ, but tuneful harmonies to another. The morning stars do
sing together, and when worlds are gone, and heavy ears of clay laid
down, we may be able to hear them

Singing as they shine,
"The hand that made us is divine."

There are places where this music is so fine that the soft and
soul-like sounds of a zephyr in the pines would be like a storm in
comparison, and places where the fierce intensity of light in a
congeries of suns would make it seem as if all the stops of being from