The record-union., 1897-07-01
DIAMONDS OF LIFE.
Matter and Soul May be Of the Same
Molecules.
Professor Schroen of Naples Discovers
That Diamonds Propagate
Their Kind.

An astonishing story comes by way
of Chicago from Naples. DR.. Won
Hoist, a professor in good standing in
the Windy City, gives to the American
public news of a discovery made by
his friend and fellow scientist, Profess
sor Won Schroen, native of Bavaria,
but now connected with the University
of Naples.
Professor Won Schroen, says Professor
Won Hoist, has devoted his life and all
his available means to the study of
crystals. He has watched their devel-
opment and photographed the result.
He has discovered that crystals have
propagating powers; that they beget
other crystals He has photographs
which buttress this discovery There
are thousands of these views, taken
from fourteen different kinds of crys-
tails
The photographs show the crystal at
its birth, the head pushing forth from
the mother crystal. The young ones
course is pictured until it grows away
from the mother and its body becomes
complete
According to DR. Won Hoist, 'The
crystal meets another ONE from a diff
ferent mother. The two meet and then
fight, striving and slashing against
each other Their battles are to the
death, one invariably being killed.
Crystals from the same mother new
er fight, however, no matter where they
meet
"All this-the life, the development
and the cont ention of these living
stones-may be plainly seen in the pho
tographs. I am a historian, not a
scientist, so I saw all this as a layman.
But Spencer and others have studied
my friends views. They were struck
with their tremendous Importance and
were enthusiastic over the discovery.
This new truth will revolutionize
philosophy. 1t strikes right to the core
of nature. It's influence will extend to
every branch of science. It forms a
new theory"
AS a historian DR. Won Hoist ought
to know that it does not form a new
theory. This discovery, if, indeed, it
be such, only confirms a theory which
is as universal as the world and as
old as historic man.
'Tis an old saying that the dreams of
the poet anticipate the facts OF sell
ence. The word poet is here used in
no narrow sense. 1t does not mean a
mere maker of verse. It means an i'm
aginative thinker.
Sir John Maundeville, the famous
n1ediaeval traveller, never wrote a line
of poetry in his life. Yet his prose is
compact of the essence of poetry. 1t
is farciful, rhetorical. dreamlike. 1t is
not tied down by any slavish adherence
to apparent accuracy. Yet, though 1t
may sometimes seem to miss the outer
accuracy of the eye it is true 70 the
inner accuracy of the soul. Now, Sir
John Maundeville has anticipated the
professor in a very remarkable pass
age.
"The dymandes in Ynde," he says in
his Travels" grower many to gedre,
one lytille, another greet And ther ben
sum of the gretness of a Bene and
sumo as gret as an Easelle Note And
thei ben square and pointed of her
owne kinde, both aboven & benethen
withouten Worchinge of names hande.
And thei ben noryssed with the Dew
of Hevene. And thei engendren COM
mounly and bringen forthe smale chill
dren that multiplyen and g'rowen allie
the yeer I have Oftentimes assayed
that yif a man kepe hem with lityne
of the Roche and wete hem with May
Dew ofte sithes, thei schulle grove
everyche year, and the smale Wole
waNen CRETE"
But over and beyond Sir John Maun-
deville. the theory which underlies his
speculations and those of PROFESSOR
Schroen is theory which has haunted
the mind of man from the beginning,
that has appeared and re-appeared IN
the dreams of Plato, of Buddha and of
the ancient and modern Pantheists,
that has found clothing of metaphy-
steal language in the German school
of philosophy, from Spinoza to Scho-
penhauer, and that is now receiving the
acclaim of hard headed students Of
science like Edison and Wallace, and
we may add Schroen.
This is the theory that God or life
is imminent everywhere,e not only in
man, not only in dumb creatures, but
in trees, in flowers, in stones, in all
animate and inanimate matter. Pope
has phrased the theory in a couplet
that is easily understood and easily re-
membered:
Whose body nature is and God the SOUL
Nature is simply the physical frame
work through which God renders Him
self ineligible to Himself. The Budd-
hists believe that, just as Clouds steam,
snow, ice, rivers, seas and lakes are
various forms of water, which will
eventually become again part of the
great sea that gathers in all waters
to its bosom, so all forms of life are
mere differentiations of the Deity, to
whom they will return in the Nirvana
or final quiescence of all conscious life.
In the same way modern science tells
us that all material and living things
are but a more or less diversified ar
rangement of the molecules of the one
primeval matter. Edison has express
ly predicted that the time will come
when through our mastery of scientific
principles we may be able to turn stone
into bread. coal into diamonds and
pair of breeches ino a brace of part
ridges. 'Tis but a question of the re-
arrangement of the particles of matter
into new material forms, and the mir
acle will be achieved.
Your body is in the final analysis alb
solutely identical with any other or
ganic bit of matter The cunning
chemistry of your own stomach has al
tered not the constituent elements of
the food you put into it, but the acci-
dental arrangement of it's molecules.
Thus it has transformed fruit and veg
etables into blood, bone, sinew and
flesh. Examine further and you will
discover that fruit and vegetables are
but another form of earth and air and
water.
Science now conducts you little