The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-11-15
Is the Earth a pIanetg
To the Editor of the Journal and courie


 maintain that the Mosaic conception of
 the universe differs from the modern one; we think the best way to contend
 with them is to agree to disagree. and
 attend to other things that are of more present moment We absorb all their arguments, and are content to let them lie fallow. But they must not forget that a good reconnaissance must be
 made both ways, so there are a few ar guments that they must listen to from our point of view, and suffer them to lie fallow also.
 For instance, there is problem
 known as that of "The Three Bodies, "
 to wit, Sun, Earth, Moon. By assum- ing that they are similar globes and
 that the earths clements, as to size, time, etc., are so and so, according to
 measure, the time, distances, sizes etc., of the others result; but conversely, by taking the times, s easons and other
 known elements of all these, and equa-
 ting them mathematically, there neces-
 sarily results a corresponding conclu-
 sion that each mst be an orbit, and
 that their very relations necessitate the recognition of astronomy as 1t IS taught-and as we believe Moses him. self understood it. At any rate, the spirit of inspiration cannot have erred in the cosmogony of the universe, and if there Is error it must be in the un- derstanding of it's interpreters.
 Take for instance these relations of the Three Bodies: Multiply the moons diameter by 10S and we have its dis tance from the earth; multiply the earth's diameter by 10S and we obtain the suns diameter; multiply the suns diameter by 10S, and we have it's dis tance from the earth; hence they must be similar orbs in related orbits.
 But let us mount higher than the problem of the Three Bodies. There are certain planetary laws, analogies, harmonies and constants that are shared in systematically by all the bod les contained in the solar system, the sun being taken as it's center; but all of them vanish if the earth Is so taken. For instance, if the orbital velocity of planet be multiplied by the square root of the semi diameter of it's orbit, the result will, in every case, be 64s.- 800, ,000. This shows that, ranging from the sun outwards, the planets are re- spectively set at proportionate dis tances, and must be arranged in the following order: Sun, Mercury Venus, Earth, Mars; Planetoids: Jupiter, Sa- turn, Uranus, Neptune. Now there are innumerable instances of similar con- stancy that result from the recognition of this sequence. For instance: If the squares of the periodic times of the planets in days, be divided by the cubes of their mean distances from the sun, the earth distance being taken as unity, the quotient is always the square of 365.2422556, which is the num- Der of days in a mean solar year.
 Again, the diameters of these plan cts are, respectively, to the suns di- ameter, as their fixed axial velocities are to the constant 111463.
 Now such harmonies are innumerab ble, and there Is but one mathematical conception that compasses them all, to wit that conversely all the planets Gncluding the earth itself as one of them in its proper place in the se- quence), move in elipses, having the sun at one of their foci, and that they describe equal areas of their orbits in equal times
 If the earth be taken as fixed, and central to the system, then the other nine bodies, including the sun, utter no sort of progressive rythm; the music of the spheres Is fattened into discord. harmony, unity, concert and constance of measure, weight and number, disap- pear completely, and no known mathe- nautical arrangement can account for the system as an entirety
 The argument then Is this: It is not disputed the sun and the planets are related to each other according to the laws that have been discovered their distances, denslties, rota- tions, velocities masses, ratios, times, laws, analogies and harmonies always result in constants and all are evolved from identical equations severally and They form an eliptical focusing at the sun. Well and good, but the same equations ap- piled to the earth result in exactly the same constants and harmonies: What Is true of the times and seasons, dis tances and densities of Mercury and Mars, in their relation to the sun, is true of the earth's cores bonding elements" in similar rela- ton, so that the conclusion Is peremp- .ory and inevitable that the astronomy )f Copernicus, Calico, Kepter, New .on, Laplace, Chambers, Newcomb, in | 'act of these days, and as 1t is taught | md accepted at large, is scientific and | hat no other teaching can be taken as nor found to be revealed in | he Scriptures properly understood.
 There are three kingdoms known to science, animal vegetable, nineral their clements differ according o certain general definitions; when a lew element is discovered 1t is classi- jed according to its definite character sites into it's proper kingdom; metals with metals plants with plants, ami nals with animals.
 It is agreement, each to each, that hat settles the matter; and, in the anne manner planets are planets and he earth is among them in their pas age about the orb that rules them all. III scientific knowledge would collapse nless the same systematic logic that lassifies gold and silver among the 1etals, included the earth among the odies that are properly denominated all that this implies.
 Finally, the earth occupies one of the terms in Bode's law of distances nf ntl, |