Tracks Of A Rolling Stone by Henry J. Coke (top ten books of all time .TXT) 📕

Between Our Present Position And The Frontiers Of Lyra'

(Ball's 'Story Of The Heavens').

'Sirius Is About One Million Times As Far From Us As The Sun. 

If We Take The Distance Of Sirius From The Earth And

Subdivide It Into One Million Equal Parts,  Each Of These

Parts Would Be Long Enough To Span The Great Distance Of

92,700,000 Miles From The Earth To The Sun,' Yet Sirius Is

One Of The Nearest Of The Stars To Us.

The Velocity With Which Light Traverses Space Is 186,300

Miles A Second,  At Which Rate It Has Taken The Rays From

Sirius Which We May See To-Night,  Nine Years To Reach Us. 

The Proper Motion Of Sirius Through Space Is About One

Thousand Miles A Minute.  Yet 'Careful Alignment Of The Eye

Would Hardly Detect That Sirius Was Moving,  In . . . Even

Three Or Four Centuries.'

'There May Be,  And Probably Are,  Stars From Which Noah Might

Be Seen Stepping Into The Ark,  Eve Listening To The

Temptation Of The Serpent,  Or That Older Race,  Eating The

Oysters And Leaving The Shell-Heaps Behind Them,  When The

Baltic Was An Open Sea' (Froude's 'Science Of History').

Facts And Figures Such As These Simply Stupefy Us.  They

Vaguely Convey The Idea Of Something Immeasurably Great,  But

Nothing Further.  They Have No More Effect Upon Us Than Words

Addressed To Some Poor 'Bewildered Creature,  Stunned And

Paralysed By Awe; No More Than The Sentence Of Death To The

Terror-Stricken Wretch At The Bar.  Indeed,  It Is In This

Sense That The Sceptic Uses Them For Our Warning.

'Seit Kopernikus,' Says Schopenhauer,  'Kommen Die Theologen

Mit Dem Lieben Gott In Verlegenheit.'  'No One,' He Adds, 

'Has So Damaged Theism As Copernicus.'  As If Limitation And

Imperfection In The Celestial Mechanism Would Make For The

Belief In God; Or,  As If Immortality Were Incompatible With

Dependence.  Des Cartes,  For One,  (And He Counts For Many,)

Held Just The Opposite Opinion.

Our Sun And All The Millions Upon Millions Of Suns Whose

Light Will Never Reach Us Are But The Aggregation Of Atoms

Drawn Together By The Same Force That Governs Their Orbit, 

And Which Makes The Apple Fall.  When Their Heat,  However

Generated,  Is Expended,  They Die To Frozen Cinders; Possibly

To Be Again Diffused As Nebulae,  To Begin Again The Eternal

Round Of Change.

What Is Life Amidst This Change?  'When I Consider The Work

Of Thy Fingers,  The Moon And The Stars Which Thou Hast

Ordained,  What Is Man That Thou Art Mindful Of Him?'

But Is He Mindful Of Us?  That Is What The Sceptic Asks.  Is

He Mindful Of Life Here Or Anywhere In All This Boundless

Space?  We Have No Ground For Supposing (So We Are Told) That

Life,  If It Exists At All Elsewhere,  In The Solar System At

Least,  Is Any Better Than It Is Here?  'Analogy Compels Us To

Think,' Says M. France,  One Of The Most Thoughtful Of Living

Writers,  'That Our Entire Solar System Is A Gehenna Where The

Animal Is Born For Suffering. . . . This Alone Would Suffice

To Disgust Me With The Universe.'  But M. France Is Too Deep

A Thinker To Abide By Such A Verdict.  There Must Be

Something 'Behind The Veil.'  'Je Sens Que Ces Immensites Ne

Sont Rien,  Et Qu'enfin,  S'il Y A Quelque Chose,  Ce Quelque

Chose N'est Pas Ce Que Nous Voyons.'  That Is It.  All These

Immensities Are Not 'Rien,' But They Are Assuredly Not What

We Take Them To Be.  They Are The Veil Of The Infinite, 

Behind Which We Are Not Permitted To See.

It Were The Seeing Him,  No Flesh Shall Dare.

The Very Greatness Proves Our Impotence To Grasp It,  Proves

The Futility Of Our Speculations,  And Should Help Us Best Of

All Though Outwardly So Appalling,  To Stand Calm While The

Snake Of Unbelief Writhes Beneath Our Feet.  The Unutterable

Insignificance Of Man And His Little World Connotes The

Infinity Which Leaves His Possibilities As Limitless As

Itself.

Spectrology Informs Us That The Chemical Elements Of Matter

Are Everywhere The Same; And In A Boundless Universe Where

Such Unity Is Manifested There Must Be Conditions Similar To

Those Which Support Life Here.  It Is Impossible To Doubt,  On

These Grounds Alone,  That Life Does Exist Elsewhere.  Were We

Rashly To Assume From Scientific Data That No Form Of Animal

Life Could Obtain Except Under Conditions Similar To Our Own, 

Would Not Reason Rebel At Such An Inference,  On The Mere

Ground That To Assume That There Is No Conscious Being In The

Universe Save Man,  Is Incomparably More Unwarrantable,  And In

Itself Incredible?

Admitting,  Then,  The Hypothesis Of The Universal Distribution

Of Life,  Has Anyone The Hardihood To Believe That This Is 

Either The Best Or Worst Of Worlds?  Must We Not Suppose That

Life Exists In Every Stage Of Progress,  In Every State Of

Imperfection,  And,  Conversely,  Of Advancement?  Have We Still

The Audacity To Believe With The Ancient Israelites,  Or As

The Church Of Rome Believed Only Three Centuries Ago,  That

The Universe Was Made For Us,  And We Its Centre?  Or Must We

Not Believe That - Infinity Given - The Stages And Degrees Of

Life Are Infinite As Their Conditions?  And Where Is This To

Stop?  There Is No Halting Place For Imagination Till We

Reach The Anima Mundi,  The Infinite And Eternal Spirit From

Which All Being Emanates.

The Materialist And The Sceptic Have Forcible Arguments On

Their Side.  They Appeal To Experience And To Common Sense, 

And Ask Pathetically,  Yet Triumphantly,  Whether Aspiration, 

However Fervid,  Is A Pledge For Its Validity,  'Or Does Being

Weary Prove That He Hath Where To Rest?'  They Smile At The

Flights Of Poetry And Imagination,  And Love To Repeat:

Fools! That So Often Here

Happiness Mocked Our Prayer,

I Think Might Make Us Fear

A Like Event Elsewhere;

Make Us Not Fly To Dreams,  But Moderate Desire.

But Then,  If The Other View Is True,  The Elsewhere Is Not The

Here,  Nor Is There Any Conceivable Likeness Between The Two. 

It Is Not Mere Repugnance To Truths,  Or Speculations Rather, 

Which We Dread,  That Makes Us Shrink From A Creed So Shallow, 

So Palpably Inept,  As Atheism.  There Are Many Sides To Our

Nature,  And I See Not That Reason,  Doubtless Our Trustiest

Guide,  Has One Syllable To Utter Against Our Loftiest Hopes. 

Our Higher Instincts Are Just As Much A Part Of Us As Any

That We Listen To; And Reason,  To The End,  Can Never

Dogmatise With What It Is Not Conversant.

Publication Date: 05-20-2014

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