have passed several hours away from the Earth. It is well to isolate
one's self thus at times amongst the celestial solitudes. The soul
obtains a fuller possession of itself, and in its solitary reflections
it penetrates profoundly into the universal reality. Terrestrial
humanity, you understand, is, as regards moral as well as physical
life, the result virtually of the forces of the Earth. Human strength,
figure, weight, all depend on these forces. The organic functions are
determined by the planet. If life is divided with you between work and
rest, between activity and sleep, it is because of the rotation of the
globe, and day and night. In the luminous globes, and those lighted by
many Suns alternately, they do not sleep. If you need to eat and drink,
it is in consequence of the insufficiency of the atmosphere. The bodies
of the beings who do not eat are not constructed like yours, since they
have no need of a stomach and intestines. The terrestrial eye enables
you to see the universe in a certain way, the Saturnian eye sees in a
different manner.
[Sidenote: Other senses than those of the Earth.]
There are senses which perceive other things than those which you
perceive in nature. Each of the worlds is inhabited by a race
essentially different, and sometimes the inhabitants are neither
vegetables nor animals. There are men of all possible forms, of all
dimensions, of all weights, of all colours, of all sensations, of every
variety of characteristics. The universe is infinite. Our terrestrial
existence is only one phase of the infinite. An inexhaustible diversity
enriches this marvellous field of the eternal Sower. The function of
science is, to study all that the terrestrial senses are capable of
perceiving. The function of philosophy is, to form a synthesis of all
defined and determined ideas and facts, and to develop the sphere of
thought.
What would you say if I told you not only of the physical differences
of humanity, but also of its moral and intellectual diversities?
Its varieties are great--too much so, indeed, for you to thoroughly
understand them. As an instance, I will give you just one noteworthy
example. In your terrestrial humanity, intellectual or moral worth
counts for nothing in advancing a man, whatever may be the value of his
ideas, or the worth of his personal character, unless he possesses the
means and the determination to push himself forward. No one seeks for
hidden merit. A man must needs make his own way, and struggle against
intrigue, cupidity, and ambition--a strife which is the antipodes of
what ought to be. It results, therefore, that the noblest and most
worthy people remain in obscurity, whilst position, wealth, and social
distinction are often showered on worthless intriguers.
Ah well! I recently visited a world belonging to one of the most
luminous regions of the Milky Way, where an intellectual order
absolutely different exists; where the constitution of the Government
is such, that only those distinguished for their virtues are placed at
the head of the State; and their function is to seek out, and place in
responsible positions, men worthy of the trust.
In that country, in short, the search is as eager for the discovery
of merit and intelligence, as it is in yours for gold and diamonds.
All is done there for the benefit of humanity. They have not invented
any Academy, as they cannot conceive that a man of worth (instead of
being sought after) should be compelled to waste his time in visits
of ceremony, and find, probably, that a titled nobody (who has known
better than he how to cajole votes) has been preferred to himself. So
true it is, that the system prevailing in other worlds is far more
enlightened than that of yours.
[Sidenote: The magnifying power of time.]
Now, my dear terrestrial friend, you know what the Earth is in the
universe; you know something of what the heavens contain; and you know
also what Life is, and what Death is. We shall soon see the dawn of
morning, which puts spirits to flight and brings our conversations to
an end, as the approach of your terrestrial day causes the brightness
of Venus to fade away. But I should like to add to the preceding ideas
a very interesting remark suggested by the same observations. It is
this: If you set out from the Earth at the moment that a flash of
lightning bursts forth, and if you travelled for an hour or more with
the light, you would see the lightning as long as you continued to
look at it. This fact is established by the foregoing principles. But
if, instead of travelling _exactly_ with the velocity of light, you
were to travel with a little less velocity; note the observation that
you might make: I will suppose that this voyage away from the Earth,
during which you look at the lightning, lasts a minute. I will suppose
also, that the lightning lasts a thousandth part of a second. You will
continue to see the lightning during 60,000 times its duration. In our
first supposition this voyage is identical with that of light. Light
has occupied 60,000 tenths of seconds to go from the Earth to the point
in space where you are. Your voyage and that of light have co-existed.
Now if instead of flying with just the same velocity as light, you had
flown a little less quickly, and if you had employed a thousandth part
of a second more to arrive at the same point, instead of always seeing
_the same moment of the lightning_, you would have seen, successively,
the different moments which constituted the total duration of the
lightning, equal to 1000 parts of a second. In this whole minute
you would have had time to see first the beginning of the flash of
lightning, and could analyse the development of it, the successive
phases of it, to the very end. You may imagine what strange discoveries
one could make in the secret nature of lightning, increased 60,000
times in the order of its duration, what frightful battles you would
have time to discover in the flames! what pandemonium! what unlucky
atoms! what a world hidden by its volatile nature from the imperfect
eyes of mortals!
[Sidenote: Vision of the analysing eye.]
If you could see by your imagination sufficiently, to separate and
count the atoms which constitute the body of a man, that body would
disappear before you, for it consists of thousands of millions of atoms
in motion, and to the analysing eye it would be a nebula animated
by the forces of gravitation. Did not Swedenborg imagine that the
universe by which he was surrounded, seen as a whole, was in the form
of an immense man? That was anthropomorphism. But there are analogies
everywhere. What we know most certainly is, that things _are not_ what
they appear to be, either in space or in time. But let us return to the
delayed flash of lightning.
When you travel with the velocity of light, you see constantly the
scene which was in existence at the moment of your departure. If you
were carried away for a year, at the same rate, you would have before
your eyes the same event for that time. But if, in order to see more
distinctly an event which would have taken only a few seconds, such
as the fall of a mountain, an avalanche, or an earthquake, you were
to delay, to see the commencement of the catastrophe (in slackening a
little, your steps on those of light), you would see the progress of
the catastrophe, its first moment, its second, and so on successively,
in thus nearly following the light, you would only see the end after
an hour of observation. The event would last for you an hour instead
of a few seconds. You would see the rocks, or the stones suspended
in the air, and could thus ascertain the mode of production of the
phenomenon, and its incidental delays. Already your terrestrial
scientific knowledge enables you to take instantaneous photographs of
the successive aspects of rapid phenomena, such as lightning, a meteor,
the waves of the sea, a volcanic eruption, the fall of a building, and
to make them pass before you graduated in accordance with their effect
on the retina. Similarly you can, on the contrary, photograph the
pollen of a flower, through each stage of expansion to its completion
in the fruit, or the development of a child from its birth to maturity,
and project these phases upon a screen, depicting in a few seconds the
life of a man, or a tree.
[Sidenote: A chrono-telescope.]
I see in your thoughts that you compare this effect to that of a
microscope which would magnify time. That is exactly what it is; we
thus see time amplified. This process cannot strictly speaking be
called that of the microscope, but rather that of a _chronoscope_ or
of a chrono-telescope (to see time from afar). The duration of a reign
might, by the same process, be augmented according to the good pleasure
of the parti politique.
Thus, for example, Napoleon II. reigned only three hours, but one could
see him reign for fifteen years _successively_, by dispersing the 180
minutes of the three hours over the length of 180 months (in removing
one's self from the Earth with a velocity a little inferior to that
of light); so, by setting out at the very moment that the Chamber had
proclaimed Napoleon II., one would arrive at the last minute of his
supposed reign, only at the end of fifteen years. Each minute would be
seen for a month, each second for twelve hours.
[Sidenote: Light transmission in space.]
The conclusions of this discourse are based entirely on this principle,
my dear Quærens. I have endeavoured to show you that the physical law
of the _successive transmission of Light_ in space, is one of the
_fundamental elements of the conditions of eternal life_. According
to this law every event is imperishable, and the past is always
present. The image of the Earth as it was 6000 years ago, is actually
now in space at the distance that light crossed it 6000 years since.
The worlds situated in that region see the Earth of that epoch. We
could see again our own direct existence and our different anterior
existences. All that we need for this is to be at the proper distance
from the worlds in which we had lived. There are stars which you see
from the Earth, and which no longer exist, because they became extinct
after they had emitted the luminous ray which has only just reached you.
In the same way you might hear the voice of a man at a distance, who
might be dead before the moment at which you heard him, if, perchance,
he had been struck with apoplexy immediately after he had uttered his
last cry.
[Sidenote: There are living forms unknown to Earth.]
I am very much pleased that this last sketch has enabled me at the same
time to trace for you a picture of the diversities of existence and of
the _possibility of living forms unknown to the Earth_. Here also you
see the revelations of Urania are grander and more profound than those
of all her sisters. _The Earth is only an atom in the universe._
I must pause here, for all these numerous and diverse applications
of the laws of light are not apparent to you. On the Earth, in this
dark cavern, as Plato appropriately termed it, you vegetate in
ignorance of the gigantic forces in action in the universe. The day
will come when physical science will discover in light the principle
of every movement and the inner reason of things. Already within the
last few years spectrum analysis has demonstrated to you that by the
examination of a luminous ray from the Sun, or from a Star, you can
learn what substances constitute that Sun and that Star. Already you
can determine, across a distance of millions and millions of miles, the
nature of celestial bodies from which a ray of light has come to you!
And the study of light will afford still more splendid results, both
in experimental science, and in its application to the philosophy of
the universe.
[Sidenote: Anticipations.]
But the refraction of the earth's atmosphere is projecting beyond the
zenith the light shed forth by the distant Sun. The vibrations of the
light of day will let me talk with you no longer. Farewell, my good
friend. Farewell! or rather, _au revoir_! Great things are going to
happen around you. After the storm I shall perhaps return for one last
visit to give you proof of my existence, and to show that I have not
forgotten you. Then, later, when your life upon this little planet is
done, I shall come to you once more, and together we will take our
real journey through the unspeakable splendours of speed. Nor can you
ever, in your wildest dreams, form even a faint idea of the stupendous
surprises, the inconceivable wonders which there await you.
THE END
* * * * *
Transcriber's Notes:
Page 32, Sidenote, "h" changed to "e" (the place where he was in)
Page 34, Footnote, "3,14159" changed to "314,159" (314,159 × 2, it)
Page 139, repeated word "the" deleted. Original read (Even in the the
same system)
Page 160, period added to text (surprise you still more.)
Page 172, Sidenote, "Adromeda" changed to "Andromeda" (World of
Andromeda)
Page 179, "oxgyen" changed to "oxygen" (called their oxygen)