thing in it but that which
relates to the village. We have the right to be silly, if we
wish to be. And it is no sign of wisdom to say that there is a
county beyond, but that the county boundaries end all, and only
village and county politics may be studied. The European who
believed--no Asiatic or African or American could have believed
--that the earth rested on an elephant and the elephant on
a turtle was wise, in comparison. Nor is it any sign of
intelligence to say that we may learn something of the village
and county while we live, but that to learn anything about the
state and nation we must wait until we are dead. There are too
many in the village who are familiar with both state and nation,
and who have studied their laws, for this to be anything but
idiotic.

Chapter Eight

The Battle Ground

Each and every one of our eighty-odd elementary substances owe
their condition--whether solid, liquid, or gas--to their rate
of vibration. We have reduced all gases to a liquid and nearly
all to a solid form. Conversely, we have raised all solids to a
liquid and nearly all to a gaseous condition. This has been done
by reducing or raising the vibration of each within one octave
--each one of the eighty odd having a special octave, a tone or
half-tone different from any other. Normally, the solids,
vibrating in the lower notes, gather together under Attraction;
while the gases, vibrating in the higher notes, diffuse under
Repulsion. Between them, created by the interchange of these two
forces, is our "skin" of phenomena, or kinetics.

Broadly, the attraction of the universe comes from its vibration
at certain centres in the three higher notes; the repulsion
comes from its vibration everywhere else in the three higher
notes. The central note, D of the scale, represents the battle
ground between the field of kinetics. This in simple
illustration is water turning into gas.

This is the great battle ground, the only one worth considering
in a general view. There are minor "critical stages" which the
chemist studies, but for us, in this broad sketch of the
universe, the important battle-ground is that between solid and
liquid on one side representing gravity, and gas on the other,
representing apergy.

All the solids and liquids of this earth of ours gather at the
centre, in a core, each of the elements (or their combinations)
in this core vibrating in their three lower notes, producing the
attr