Eureka daily sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1871-1887, 1880-05-18
THE SUN.
Captain Foley's Scientific DISGUST.
tic ON the same.

the IMAGINATION. Inc naturai philosopher
OF to-day may dwell amid conceptions
which beggar those Of Milton. So great
and grand are they that in the contempla-
ton Of them a certain force Of character is
requisite to preserve us from bewilder-
ment. The strange power OF the atoms or
molecules, and the mysterious forces con-
cealed in matter make themselves known
to us in most remarkable phenomena. We
know no more of the origin of the forces
which cause those things, than Of the ORR
gin of matter which holds the secret.
Where matter is force is, for we only know
matter through its forces. Astronomy
shows us our planet thrown off from the
sun i: a molten, fiery mass, to move in an
independent orbit Of its own, and from
that time to the present has been subjected
to the excitements Of heat and light, to its
various actions and reactions, and the
cause of all e~volutions and changes this
world of ours has passed through. Across
the great distant space separating us from
the sun the radiant energy dashes in eight
minutes n thirteen seconds. Imagine
the earth at the suns center, being such a
vast mass its surface would as far distant
as does now the celestial vault, and the
moons orbit would fall nearly two hun
dred thousand miles within his surface.
The spectroscope shows the sun contains
enough Of the same kind OF matter as
Mother Earth consists of to make more
than three hundred thousand worlds like
her. We reach up to some idea Of the in
comprehensive vastness of the solar sphere
and Of the many problems it offers for our
study. Our experience the past winter
shows that were it not for the waves Of
light and heat transmitted to us from the
sum-, this planet would become as dark as
it is possible for the Imagination to con-
ceive, and as cold as IN iceberg. No hu-
mar being could exist. Vast and incom-
prehensible as we find our distance from
the sun to be, we still have to contemplate
greater reaches within the limits of the
solar system. What is the space swept by
the radius-victor Of the planet Neptune
(since circles are as the squares Of their
radii)? This area is nine hundred times
that comprised within the earth's orbit.
Conceive this orbit immersed in the uni
versal ether: a wave Of light emanating
from the sun is propoagated through this
vast space with such rapidity that in four
hours and nine minutes it describes the
entire area comprised within Neptune's
path around the sun. Across this vast in
terval quivers too, in some,mysterious way,
that universal influence we call g~ravita.
ton. The earth moves through 1874 miles
of its orbit every second, and is DETECTED
from a straight line by the sun during that
interval a little less than 12-100 of an inch.
Neptune travels 1885, miles a second, is de-
fected from a stright line during the same
time only about 1900, 900 of an inch, yet by
fbio cI,obt null +ha II, aaoarta Sc ~ aator,
and brings Neptune around once in 164
years. How vast and incomprehensible is
this field of solar operations. Look at the
integrated energies Of our little world, the
stored power of our coal deposits, the
stored greater power of our gold and silver
deposits, the metal atom embosomed in
the universe we received from the sun. In
every wind that blows, in every shower
that falls, in the history of every snow
storm, in the glare Of gas light and can
dies, in the heat of our furnaces, in the
colors OF the rainbow, and in the gorgeous
sun set, in the beauty Of vegetation and its
silent growth, in photography and spectral
analysis (by which we find every wave Of
light reaching US from other worlds, label
ed with elements Of the matter whence it
camel. Our fleets, armies and guns.
What are they? They are generated by
a portion Of the suns energy. He controls
the mariners needle, marshals the Aurora
Borealis, he permits or forbids ice crystal
clouds to hover in the atmosphere, beside
performing various other offices.
And this portion Of the suns energy in
tercepted by the earth, is only one thousand
three hundred millionth part of the whole,
and we convert but a small fraction of this
fraction into mechanical energy. Whence
comes the power on the part of the mole
cules to compel the solar energy to take
determinate forms. Nothing can fall more
soft and silently or tue ear thar the rays
of the great luminary. Let but the atmos-
phere drink in a little more sunshine at
one place than another, and out of it
springs the cyclone or hurricane which
desolates a whole region in its lunatic
wrath. The play OF the suns rays on our
oceans lifts up immense quantities of water
to a higher elevation. In descending it
can be made to assume various forms; to
fall in cascades, to spirit in fountains, to
boil in eddies or flow TRANQUILITY along q
uniform bed. 1t can, moreover, be caused
to set complex machinery in motion, to
turn millstones, throw shuttles, work saws
and hammers, and drive piles, but every
form Of power here indicated would he de-
rived from the suns beams in raising the
water to the height from which it fell.
There is no energy generated by the ma
chinery, the work performed by the water
in descending is merely the parceling out
and distribution Of the work expended in
raising it.
In precisely this sense is all the energy
Of plants and animals the parceling out
and distribution Of a power originally ex-
erted by the sun. Thus, in an almost in
finite variety of physical phenomena, we
see this transmutation Of solar energy.
And were it not for the intermediate posi-
ton Of the vegetable kingdom to check
this degradation Of energy, and raise the
elementary constituents from the chemical
to the organic plane, mans duration here
would be short indeed. This separation is
effected in the leaves Of plants by solar en-
ergy. The constituents Of the carbonic acid
and water are torn asunder in spite of their
mutual attraction, and so persistently do
they retain this attraction that not even a
pressure OF twenty tons to the square inch
is sufficient to reduce them. 1t is difficult
to estimate the magnitude of such power,
as our only standard Of measurement is
the quality of some other force equally
Unreasonable, which is required to bal
ance the first. 1t has been proved by Far
aday that it requires more electricity to
decompose a drop Of water than to charge
a thunder cloud. The carbon and hydro
gen are stored up in the plants and wood,
and the oxygen is set free in the air. When
the wood is burned the oxygen recombines
with the carbon, and the heat then given
out is of the precise amount drawn from
the sun to effect the previous reduction.
The reunion Of the carbon with the oxygen
is similar to the reunion Of our falling
water with the earth from which it had
been separated. We name the one action
gravity and the other chemical
affinity. They are both attraction,
and to our reasoning faculties the falling
Of carbon atoms against oxygen atoms is
not more difficult of conception than the
falling Of water to the earth. All the me-