The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1890-12-04

Wnlcn the JneOry mas Uaken among tne
wo king hypothesis Of the worlds
thought, second, for our better under
standing, brief outline and analysis of
the accumulated mass of knowledge
which stands as godfather to the infant
theory, and third, the doctrine of evo-
luton as voiced by its most respected
advocates of to- day. e
The ancients considered the earth the
center OF all created things and sup
posed the sun, moon, stars, planets. all
to move in mysterious cycles around
this center for the sole benefit of man.
kind. This was eminently gratifying,
and anything like the application OF
higher criticism to the myth was sure to
disclose the sands and shoals OF human
philosophy and roll great waves to the
ahore. But Galileo's, it does move, was
true OF human thought, and the Copper
mean theory in spite of its adversaries,
and the holy cries of horror raised
against it, not only taught man his place
in the universe, but unfolded to his
mind many kingdom rich in facts yet
t., be acquired, and treasure houses of
knowledge yet to be investigated.
At this time mans horizon, in very
literal sense, was exceedingly narrow.
The moon was not supposed to be not
many miles away, and the sun went
S uth in winter to avoid the severe cold
of our northern climate. Another stride
forward and another height was gained
when Newton advanced his theory OF
gravitation. This was the purest kind
of heresy yet invented. God held the
planets in their places; and how could
anyone possessed of the faith of the
fal hers rise up and say they we're held
in space by the power of gravity?
Away with such blasphemyl But the
world still moved. Keplers laws were
written, and human vision bursting its
bands of superstition and ignorance
stretched away into illimitable space.
Far reaching as the storehouse OF God
Of discovery the human race came into
possession of moons of Jupiter, rings of
Saturn, planet Neptune, worlds upon
worlds beyond the reach OF the naked
! eye, and at once began the survey of
lIe orbits upon which come and go the
glory trailing messengers between un
| b. nd %
domain became unmeasurable and am.
pie room was afforded for the most
venturesome of daring minds. Mathe
matical astronomy became a science and
spectral analysis one of the established
occupations of men. Laboratories at
Leipsic, laboratories at Bohn, at Oxford,
at Cambridge, at Johns Hopkins, are to-
day determining the chemical constitu-
ents of the fixed stars, are assaying the
precious metals of worlds 30 far distant
that light speeding on its way at the
rate OF 1856, 900 miles per second requires
twenty years to flash the quotations Of
the Sirian Wall street through the
spectre telescope of the Lick observation.
Unlimited space opened up to the mind
of man by despised theory!
Gravitationists and the "Theory OF
Gravitation" have passed away and to.
day every school boy learns the laws ol
gravity as he learns to bound his own
State or to multiply fractions. With
the age of Newton the human intellect
had burst the bonds that limited its field
of action in space.
Time was still narrow vale between
the two vast peaks of eternity. In quite
as literal sense as before, from another
standpoint mans horizon was exceed
ingly narrow. The books of Buddha
and Confucius spoke of the ages that
had rolled away, in each fabulous mum
bers that they gained little credence
among thoughtful men. The chronology
OF Usher had established the supposed
truth in the minds of the devout, thai
the act of creation was performed about
six thousand years ago, and that pre-
vious to that time there was-well! no
body dared to imagine what.
The world still moved and industrious
Investigators were accumulating volume
upon volume of evidence with which tt
prove something. Hugh Miller wrote
his Testimony of the Rocks" and th'
alphabet of the geological primer wa
learned. First, it was discovered tina
the earth's crust was arranged in layer
or strata, and the work began Of classi
flying and rearranging them like tn
replacing of discovered leaves in mutt
lated book. Ozoic, Ezoic, Devonian
Sllurian, one after another were fitte'
in place 90 that the numbers ON tn
pages stood in order. Each of thes
fragmentary pages at was restored we
seen to contain thousands and tens q
Thousands of years of mother earth