intelligence and in all the forces concerned were
made, the whole stellar system and its contents might be dwarfed
into the bulk of a grain of sand, or so magnified that each grain
would fill the space now occupied by the whole, and no one would
perceive any change whatever in the scale. In reply to the
statement that nothing can act where it is not, it has been proved
that every atom is virtually omnipresent. It takes the entire
universe to constitute an atom, since the forces centered in each
atom are connected with the whole by the insunderable continuity
of all the laws of being. The science of molecular physics as
expounded by its latest masters is not less astounding than the
wildest soarings of transcendental metaphysics. For instance, it
is proved that if there be ultimate atoms their size must be so
small that it would require at least five hundred millions of them
to an inch in length. In a cubic inch of hydrogen gas, then, for
example, there are 125,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 one hundred
and twenty five septillions of atoms, moving with the inconceivable
velocity that is implied by their making thousands of millions
of changes of direction every second. The view of the dynamic s
tructure of the universe opened in this direction is as
appalling as that unveiled in the opposite direction by the
largest extension of the nebular hypothesis. He who can gaze here
with steady reason need not be staggered by the sublimest doctrine
of religion. Amazed at the spectacle of creative power and wisdom,
equally amazed at the discovering faculty of man, we feel it to be
incredible that he should have been made capable of such thoughts
only to be annihilated after a brief tantalization. Confronting
the immeasurable wilderness of divine glory, strewn all through
with prizes before which his soul burns with the unconsumable fire
of a god like ambition, man lifts his eye to worship and reaches
out his hand to receive. Is he merely taunted with the starry sky,
and mocked with an infinite illusion of progress, suddenly barred
with endless night and oblivion? Behold him emerging out of
nothingness, mastering his self conscious identity, climbing over
the rounds of symbolic experience and language through the heights
of knowledge and love. Strange, helpless, sublime prince of the
universe, beggar of God, when he has attained the summit of
illimitable perception, holding immortal joys in full prospect,
shall he be dashed back