The Van Buren press. [volume] (Van Buren, Ark.) 1859-1914, 1897-03-20
HEAVEN NOT IN THE SKY.
Reliance Demonstrates That the Belief on
the AneIents IA Wrong.

Reliance Demonstrates That the Beitef OF
the Aneisnts IA Wrong.
Every church spire pointing it's slen-
der finger to the sky Is a reminder OF
that idea concerning the location OF
Heaven which was universal in former
riuaes and which is still more or less
clearly entertained by millions OF men
and women at the present day. The up
ward glance Of the eye and the aspiring
gesture which instinetigely accompany
references to the Almighty and to
Heaven are additional indications show
ing how daep-rooted Il tae opinion that
the abode of the blessed and the throne
of the Creator are situated not on the
earth. bur above the earth. This idea
of the location of Heaven is not confined
to Christian people, but is common also
among savage tribes, who generally re-
gard the sky as the proper locality for
the homes of their gods and of the dis
emboweled spirits of men. 1t was IN
the skv also that the ancient deittes OF
Greece and the orient were supposed
To dwe[l-at least those who represent
ed the benign powers and the powers Of
light.
Cicero. in one of his most remarkable
and beautiful works. The Dream OF
Scfpio,7 has finely expressed the pre-
vailing belief Of his time and Of the
preceding ages that Heaven lay above
our heads and among the stars.
Cicero represents the grandson Of
scipio Africanus as visiting in dream
the spirit of his grandfather, the con-
| queror of Hannibal. He finds his great
ancestor dwelling high among the
celestial orbs, and from the arch OF the
Milky Way he looks down with wonder
upon the earth. There, too, he dis
covers the spirit of his father and ex-
presses a desire to remain in an abode
so delightful.
mot vet" his father tells him; mot
until Cod. whose temple this is, shall
have delivered thee from the prison Of
| the body canst thou have access to these
| abodes. He has given to men soul, a
ray from those eternal fires which you
call the celestial bodies and stars, and
you cannot, except at the command Of
Him who bestowed It, separate that
soul from it's feshly prison house"
The elder Seipio then goes on to tel
his son that everything below the
sphere of the moon IS mortal and cor
ruptible except the immortal souls o.
men, while everything above the moons
sphere is eternal and incorruptible.
Cicero was a pagan, and the idea!
which he thus expressed. and which
we're generally entertained in his time
were Of pagan origin. Yet they ac
corded in u general way with the an
cient Hebrew idea of the location o.
Heaven. and after the beginning Of th'
Christian era that idea remained sub
stantialIy unchanged The doctrine o
the rotundity of the earth and of thu
existence of people dwelling on the OPP
posite side of the globe from Europ
was resisted and condemned because i
was regarded as inconsistent with tn
orthodox notion of the location o
Heaven overhead. If Heaven were over
head for Christian in Europe, wher
was it when he visited China? Coult
! he put Heaven under his feet by simpl.
! going to another part of the earth2
But science moved on remorselessly
J teaching that the stars were not "eter
] nal fires having a spiritual essence
but simply other and more distant suns
? | and that the planets, although the
! differed from the earth in their precis
E condition, yet closely resembled 1t il
r makeup. Finally, in our own days
have come the demonstrations of tn
! | spectroscope, which give direct proc
e that the sun is composed of precisel
I | such substances as exist on and in tn
$ earth; that the atmospheres of tn
/ | planets consist of the same gaseous ele
e ments that we are familiar with her,
7 and that even the distant stars hav
9 nothing mysterious in their compos
g ton, but contain metals and chemica
d elements identical with those that forr
T. the sun, the moon and the earth.
b Then, too. we know now that tn
q space separating the planets and tn
u stars is an airless region where a dc
v gree Of cold prevails which terrestrit
thermometers would be utterly incap;
BILE of registering. and that these frigi
regions are traversed in various dire,
= tons by wandering comets and meteor
u either in swarms or widely scattered
all Of which consist of iron. carbon
hydrogen and other elements that W
Il encounter continually on earth. !
fact, these vagrant bodies frequent
fall upon the earth, and thus bring
3 tangible proof that neither they nc
the regions of space from which the
= come have anything supernatural abol
i them.
y In short, from one end of the visib
i universe to the other-while there
= infinite variety of combinations an
u conditions-we can find no evident
y whatever that the essential nature
things varies in any manner. The cart
Il is eorruptible and the home of mort;
/ things. The sun is no more immort
- than the earth. It's days are fxe,
= II is simply physical body undergoin
e Development and change according I
j. strict physical laws. II is the san
: with the stars, the same with the entir
Z: universe as far as it lies within our keI
: N. Y World
Powerful Fond o. CLAIMS