c. FORM
231. The sun cannot be in the absolute middle of the solar system, on account of its antagonism with the planets, which would likewise become the centre. The collective mass of the planets is the secession of the sun from the centre. The situation of the sun or the degree of its excentricity bears relation to the polar force of the planets. The form, under which the solar system really exists, cannot therefore be the sphere, but the ellipse, i. e. the duplicity of the centre.
232. The sphere is only the type of the universe, of the æther, but not of the solar system nor the Finite. No Finite is absolutely spherical. As the real universe can only exist in a bicentral condition, so is there in this respect also no universal central body. It is there, but under the form of bicentrality, as sun and planet. God only is monocentral. The world is the bicentral God, God the monocentral world, which is the same with monas and dyas. The primary polarity, the dyas, the radiality, the light establishes itself in nature as bicentrality, which is the cosmogenic expression for self-manifestation or self-consciousness. Self-consciousness is a living ellipse.
233. The bicentrality determines the distance of the planets from the sun. If the sun as the active pole be strong or energetic, the planets will occupy a remote situation; if it be feeble or weak, one that is near. The strength of the polar energy depends, however, upon the quantity of the mass. Were the mass of the sun less, all the planets would range nearer to it; were it greater, they would be all driven further off, as electricity repels the pith-balls of elder-wood; more than this the planets are not towards the sun, but even less. The energy of the solar polarization depends not merely upon its magnitude, but also upon the velocity of rotation, which harmonizes with the former; the latter, however, depends upon the original velocity of rotation of the æther. The velocity of the rotation of æther being assumed as definite, that of the sun must be definite also, and with this everything accords.
234. The circumvolution of the planets around the sun is a _polar_ process of _attraction_ and _repulsion_, by virtue of the primary law in the solar system, by virtue of the light. The planet then can only be repelled in the neighbourhood of the sun from the sun, when it has the _same_ solar pole in itself, when it has become positive; and can only attract it at a distance from the sun, when it has received the opposite pole to the sun, or has become negative.
235. This is only conceivable in that the planet, while it draws nearer to the sun, extinguishes in itself by its _own_ power the negative pole, and produces on the contrary the positive pole, or becomes a sun; and that, as it removes itself from the sun, it again extinguishes the positive solar pole, and generates the negative planetary pole within itself. This substantial production of alternating poles upon the planet takes place through the diversity of its surface as water and land, through the oblique position of its axis, whereby summer and winter are produced, through the processes, or through the life that is upon it, through the processes of decomposition and combination effected by water, through the revival and death of vegetation, and even the white colour of snow. The planet discharges its pole in the neighbourhood of the sun, like a cork pellet, and reloads of itself at a distance from the sun; and thus oscillates to and fro, like the hammer in an electrical bell. The course of the planets takes place with the greatest ease. It is everywhere no force of weight, of impulse, but of the easiest self-motion. The planet revolves by its own force to and from the sun, like the blood circulates to and from the heart.
236. The planet cannot, however, be diverted from its course, because the other heavenly bodies, probably the comets, do not act mechanically but only polarly upon it. By means of this polarity they maintain themselves always at a distance, even as the sun keeps itself at a distance from the planets. In addition to this, the polar tension between the comet and the sun is stronger than between the comet and the planets. The perturbations of the planets depend upon their polar relations to each other. Although the planets have a centrifugal tendency, they are not thrown by a prodigious mechanical force in the direction of the tangent, and then drawn back by an attractive force of the sun, that has no import or meaning; but they course in a playful manner round the sun. A theory of attraction of this kind has no physical sense. Such an attraction is a _Qualitas occulta_, an angel which flies before the planets. It does not create the world by impulses and strokes, but only by vivification.
237. Were the planet dead, it could not be attracted or repelled by the sun; it would have from the very beginning always maintained a similar pole in itself, and it could therefore only move in a circular manner around the sun. The circular motion or course around the sun is not generally conditioned by the polarity of the planets, but depends upon the primary rotation. Proportionably to the mutual interchange of polar operation between the sun and planet, the latter would only approach the sun in the line of the apsides, and thus remove from it; but by the primary rotation it is conducted around it. The elliptical path is consequently the result of rotation and of the polar or linear interchange of operation between the two heavenly bodies.
238. The moon would keep a wholly circular path around the sun, if it were not disturbed by the earth, were it not through the difference of the earth's poles to passively retain also different polarities; for the moon is in itself dead.
239. The moon is not attracted more forcibly by the earth than the sun; and therefore it remains not by the earth. The sun exercises more polar action, more photal action upon it than the earth, and yet it falls not into the sun, for the very same reason that the earth itself does not fall in. The moon is forsooth to be regarded as itself a planet with a definite charge of electricity, which is always equably maintained by light; as such it rotates circularly about the sun. But it rotates in the same path wherein the earth rotates; therefore the latter operates upon it and draws it in its strange serpentine line around the sun.
240. The more living a planet is, by so much the more excentric is its path, because it enters into great opposition with the light.
241. If polarization by light be the cause of the attraction and repulsion of the planets from the sun, so is it also the cause of the distance of the planetary masses generally. The individual distance of the several planets is determined by the energy of their own polar excitation. Planets, which possess a strong polar energy, must range further than the others from the sun. This polar energy is, however, dependent upon the magnitude and density of the mass, upon the level state or unevenness of the surface, upon the capacity for heat, upon the quantity of water, upon the position of the axis in regard to the path, upon the possible processes of vegetation; it is thus not to be determined. Before vegetation was upon the earth, there were other processes, e. g. the aqueous precipitations, that changed the polarity; so that the path might formerly have been different to what it subsequently was or is now.
242. Planets are consequently those bodies which possess in themselves a peculiar degree of polarity and a substantial change of the same, whereby their individual distance and the nature of their paths are determined.
COMETS.
243. The comets are heavenly bodies, devoid of a persistent grade of polarity, and without any substantial change in the same. They obtain their polarity solely from the sun, like the cork-pellet from the electrical machine. The comet is therefore repelled as far from the sun as there is still an action between it and the polarity that has been imparted to the comet.
244. At the point where all antagonism between comet and sun ceases, the former must remain stationary, and resolve itself again into æther. This is the case with those comets that never return. These comets are temporal coagulations of æther by light, and thus continued creation.
245. The æther coagulates where the light, already polarized in part by the operations of other heavenly bodies, encounters it. This depends upon fortuitous constellations.
246. These comets originate like the planets; they are æther condensed in the form of an orbitar ring. This dissevered _orbitar ring_ is the _tail_, which is only a more gaseous æther, through which, or even through the nucleus itself, the stars are seen. The tail follows the comet not really but only ideally. Around the nucleus, so far as it is prolonged, the light concentrates the æther. New æther is constantly emitting light, while that which was before illuminating as tail again becomes dark and again sinks into a state of indifference. The tail is only an optical spectrum. For how can the tail be really a part of the comet, since it is always turned backwards from the sun, since it therefore follows and precedes the nucleus? The nucleus is only the lamp which kindles the æther surrounding it for some time. The light suffers a modification through the nucleus; it therefore polarizes only the æther behind it. The tail is the evident example of what is antecedent in the origin of the heavenly bodies. It is the heavenly body conceived in the act of becoming, but unto which polarization is wanting; it cannot therefore concentrate itself, but again dissolves when the nucleus is gone. Every heavenly body is a mass of æther in the world-space, which is materialized by light, and separated out of its indifference into difference, into more solid masses. Finally, the tail becomes dense æther, a nucleus.
247. These comets are thus true meteors; as they originate, so originate the globes of fire, by polarization occurring in the atmosphere, or even too above the limits of the atmosphere.
248. Meteoric stones are terrestrial comets. The opinion that they come from the moon has no foundation. There is probably as little metal as water upon the moon.
249. Returning comets are probably polarized by two suns.
250. A comet can never come into collision with a planet; the fear of such an event is equally absurd with the hypothesis, that a comet had produced the deluge or displaced the earth's axis.
251. Two planets also can never come into mutual collision, not even those that have been recently discovered, although their paths intersect each other.
252. The planets are returning comets, which, however, before they have come to the second sun, have produced within themselves the opposite pole to the sun. What happens to the comets through the influence of the second sun, the planets effect of themselves.
B.--_STÖCHIOGENY._
CONDENSATION.
253. Through its separation into polar masses the æther becomes _condensed_, heavy and material.
254. This condensation is the result of the _fixation_ of a definite pole on a definite mass of æther. The essence of the æther consists in its having no fixed pole, but that all the poles oscillate to and fro with the greatest facility from one particle of æther to the other. This is what is meant by indifference, by equivalency of poles; no part of the æther differs from another, because none retains permanently a definite pole, but each of them all the poles. The formation of the heavenly bodies is none other than an union of poles to a definite mass of æther.
255. A mass of æther with a fixed pole is a dense matter; such a mass of æther I call _terrestrial_ matter, but the æther itself the _cosmic_. Sun and planet must be terrestrial matters, for the essence of both consists in the difference of their poles.
256. The cause of the fixation of poles resides in light.
257. The heavenly bodies go to ruin by removal of the fixation of the pole abiding on the mass, substratum or substance, not by mechanical demolition. The destruction of the heavenly bodies is a retrogression of their mass into æther by means of fire. Heat does not drive the bodies, after the manner of a wedge, from each other, but only suppresses their polarity, and then the atoms must withdraw from each other. Heat depends only on the destruction of poles, _not_ upon extension. The heavenly bodies are ruined in the same way that they have originated, namely, through the primary act in its retrogression.
258. It is only the pole, no other concealed property, which maintains the being of the mass. The mass is not a terrestrial mass subsisting simply by its own rest. Nothing material is the cause of the form of matter, but the Spiritual. Matter has therefore no quality, no consistence of itself, but is nothing, is æther. Mass cannot supplant mass, nor mechanism destroy anything material. The destruction must proceed from within.
259. The fixation of poles in the substance is the _impenetrability_ of matter. It is only the spirit in matter which renders this impenetrable, not the mass itself.
260. The æther is penetrable, and therefore also _penetrating_. Heat is penetrating; light, as æther in a state of tension, is only partially penetrating.
261. All the diversity of matter depends upon the fixation of poles in the substance. For there is no diversity in the universe without poles, without binary division. The substance always remains the same, it is only the poles that change. The substance is the Indestructible, the Persistent, the æther, the nothing.
262. The fixation is the perquisite, but the necessary one, of the substance. The diversity of things resides only in the perquisite. In the substance all are alike. There is only _one_ substance, only _one_ essence.
ELEMENTAL BODIES. (_How many kinds of Æther-condensations may exist?_)
263. The æther has three forms, and can therefore condense itself after a ternary manner, or in other words, there can be only three kinds of fixations of poles.
264. The condensations of the several forms of æther must be simple matters or _Elemental bodies_, as they are called.
265. There can therefore be only three simple bodies, a body of gravity = 0, one of light = +, and one of heat =-.
266. If the heat of the æther becomes fixed, the rarest, most mobile and lightest body must originate. The body of heat is _Hydrogen_.
267. If the light of the æther becomes fixed, a less dense, and thus a less heavy matter, must originate, and one whose atoms are moveable against each other. The body of light must be the most active in nature; it must determine the changes of all other elemental bodies. The body of light is _Oxygen_.
268. If the gravity of the æther become fixed, the greatest condensation must originate. The densest matter is necessarily the heaviest. The dense matter must be immoveable in its atoms, i. e. endowed with form. The body of gravity is _Carbon_ (as basis of the metals).
269. Besides these 3 elemental bodies, hydrogen, oxygen and carbon, there can be no other simple bodies. All other bodies must be only different degrees of fixation of the above-mentioned bodies, or combinations of the same. Different degrees of carbon are without doubt the metals. Different degrees of oxygen are probably chlorine, iodine, bromine. Different degrees of hydrogen are probably sulphur. Nitrogen is probably peroxydised hydrogen, or an oxyd of hydrogen; this is indicated by its medium weight, and its perfectly azotic character.
ELEMENTS.
270. Simple bodies cannot exist for themselves, for there can nowhere be an æther, which merely belongs to gravity, or merely to light or to heat.
271. An elemental body is never a Total, but invariably a Polar, a something not whole, properly a half or rather but a third essence, a fraction. One-sidedness is therefore the character of the elemental body.
272. One pole is nowhere produced, but all are invariably present together. The terrestrial matter completed must therefore consist of the three primary bodies, but occurring in diverse proportions. As light and heat can never subsist without the substance of the æther, so also can no body of light and no body of heat subsist per se without the body of gravity or carbon, and vice versâ. The general materials of nature are therefore combinations of the three primary bodies.
273. The æther is the totality of the primary bodies in equal proportion, where thus no pole is fixed, but all are comprehended in fixation, i. e. in constant change.
274. All other general matters must be also combinations of the three primary bodies, but with different fixation, or in unequal proportion. There can consequently be only four general matters.
275. The first general matters are called _Elements_. There are only four elements, one general and three particular.
1. Element, Fire. 2. - - - - Heat. 3. - - - - Light. 4. - - - - Gravity.
276. Each element is a total representation of the æther.
277. An element is not that which is chemically inseparable, but it is only the _Whole_, which has first originated. But the elemental bodies are chemically non-decomposible, because they are already separate, being moieties or fractions.
278. The heat element is the hydrogen element--_Air._
279. The light element is the oxygen element--_Water._
280. The gravity element is the carbon element--_Earth._
281. In each element, beside the basic or combustible elemental body, there is also oxygen; for they are verily naught else than the æther fixed by light, æther that has become heavy by means of light.
AIR.
282. The first condensation of the æther must be that which corresponds to its condition as heat. This element, as being that in which the atoms have no connexion, must be therefore the lightest and rarest. In this element the poles must be fixed in the least degree, and therefore change with the slightest operation. This element is therefore moveable in all directions, is the most unstable, and in form most similar to the æther.
283. Active freedom from form predominates in it, i. e. its atoms are constantly striving to withdraw from each other, or the mass to extend. This endeavour is called elasticity. Elasticity is none other than the endeavour to become a greatest or interminable globe. The terrestrial matter, with this striving towards an universal globe, is called _gas_.
284. The formless internally moveable element, constantly extending itself and changing its pole, is the _Air_.
285. The air is the first terrestrial element, the first degree of ætherial condensation associated with the feeblest fixation of poles, the constant change of which is manifested in its electric relations. It corresponds in every respect, in mobility, extension, general penetration, &c., to heat. The air consists of a preponderance of the body of heat or hydrogen (oxydulated as nitrogen in the proportion of 79 by volume), and of a fair quantity of the body of light or oxygen (21); also of a very small amount of the body of gravity or carbon, as evidenced in the carbonic acid.
286. The air is a maximum of air, a medium of water, and a minimum of earth.
287. As heat is not merely indifferent æther, nor merely its motion or extension, but is the æther moved by the polarity of light, so is the hydrogen gas in the air not in a pure state, but converted by oxygen into nitrogen. The air is in every respect therefore an element that has undergone combustion, an oxyd of hydrogen and carbon.
288. The oxygen is that which is everywhere active, exciting, moving, and vivifying everything; it is the light in the Terrestrial. The nitrogen is inert, as it were mortified, and therefore mortifying or causing death; the former the +, the latter the-. The greatest activity among all terrestrial elements resides in the air, since all polarizations issue from it.
289. The changes in the air are accompanied by constant changes of temperature, for they are verily in themselves nothing else than changes of caloric-æther.
290. All subsequent elements must originate from or be condensations of air, even as this has arisen out of, and been a condensation of, the æther.
291. Condensations, however, are fixations of poles; the other elements differ therefore only from air by having other poles fixed in them.
292. Since the poles are at the same time fixed more internally on these elements, they can no longer have the gaseous form.
293. They must on this account contain more bulk and be therefore heavier.
WATER.
294. If the polarity of light becomes fixed in a certain quantity of the mass of æther, or the oxygen of the air obtains the preponderance, a less changing element originates possessing a more definite character, and the atoms of which adhere more strongly to each other than those of air.
295. This element has, in addition to the gaseous effort towards a general globe or periphery, the effort at the same time also to a centre, or to an individual globe. It is therefore neither elastic or gaseous. The effort of a mass to a _special_ and _general_ globe is a conflict betwixt form and want of form. This effort is called _fluidity_.
296. The fluid element must contain a preponderance of oxygen (85), and less hydrogen (15). There is also some carbon present in it. The carbon of water is to be sought in the slime of the sea, for the sea, and not fresh water, is the primary water.
297. The fluid element oxygen is the _Water_. Water in large as well as in small quantities, seeks to represent the globe, namely, to form drops. It possesses therefore the effort unto form, while it is always relapsing into formlessness. This oscillation between form and formlessness is the conception of fluidity, which is therefore essentially different from that of gasidity; it might be said that the latter were the arithmetic or constant change of numbers; but that fluidity were the combination of arithmetic with geometry.
298. If the essence of water consists in the contest between form and formlessness, it must thus seek to produce fluidity everywhere. Liquefaction is, however, called solution, namely, globules are formed, both on a large and small scale. The function of water is therefore solution. It dissolves the air, (imbibes it) like the earth.
299. Water is more difficult to analyze than air, because its poles are more fixed.
300. In the analysis of water, the body of heat emerges in a pure state as hydrogen, because the antagonism here subsists in an abrupt manner; in the air it is constantly changing. Hydrogen is therefore nitrogen wholly deoxydised.
301. If water is the oxygen-element, so is it the light-element or condensed light-æther; thus it is as little something absolutely new as the air.
302. Terrestrial life originates out of water, as does the cosmic life out of light. All form originates from water; for it is the general fluid, or that which strives towards form. Without water, there would be no life, no Solid and no Organic.
EARTH.
303. If the gravity of æther condenses itself, or the action of gravity be fixed in a quantity of æther, there originates immobility of the atoms, i. e. an effort upon their part towards a single direction, namely, simply towards the centre. The effort towards a single direction or towards the centre, is cohesion or rigidity.
304. The mass with fixed gravity is carbon. If therefore the carbonic acid of air, or the carbon of water, obtain the preponderance over the other elemental bodies, there thus originates the rigid centripetal element.
305. The heavy, rigid, carbon-element is the _Earth_. The earth is neither gaseous nor fluid. The earth contains a preponderance of carbon, with a tolerable quantity of oxygen, and a slight amount of hydrogen and nitrogen. The earth is an oxyd of carbon.
306. If fire is indicated by + 0-, the air then corresponds to the-, the water to +, the earth to the 0. The earth is therefore the Identical, water the Indifferent, air the Different; or the first the centre, the second the radius, the last the periphery of the general globe or of fire. The earth is naught but an accumulation of points. If radii occur in it, it happens only because all points have not place in the middle point.
307. The capacity for analysis of the elements comports with the serial order of their origin. The air is most easily analysed, the water with difficulty, the earth scarcely or not at all. The æther is occupied in eternal analysis, and therefore appears only when it is momentarily polarized unto light or heat, i. e. obtains the disposition to fixation.
308. If air represent arithmetic, so does earth the geometry or universality of forms. Water is the synthesis of both, the algebra; æther the analysis.
309. The geometrical figures of the earthy are called crystals; the
geometry of the earth is Crystallography.
310. In the creation the three primary ideas attained only by degrees to reality. First of all the trias becomes real in the air, then the dyas in water, and lastly the monas in the earth. The creation of the elements is none other than a representation of the three divine ideas in a finite sphere. Creation is a process of formation of the nothing.
311. Creation ceases with the production of the fixed or stable form; for all ideas have parted from each other, and settled down into the most Individual, with which separation all further formation of new matters necessarily ceases. Creation is a constant analysis of the æther, of air, and finally, of water.
312. The element that is correspondent to gravity necessarily occupies the centre upon the planet. It is surrounded by the element corresponding to light, the water, like the centre is by the radii; both are enveloped by the heat-element or air, which forms the periphery of the globe, the integument of the planet.
313. The forms of the elements are the following; water is spherical in its greatest as well as least parts; for it is the point merging out of itself, and can therefore nowhere acquire form. The earth is everywhere nothing but point; it is therefore concrete, and every part self-subsistent or individual, while in water no part subsists for itself, but at every opportunity is confluent with the other, and therefore arrives nowhere at individuality. Finally, air is the eternal flight of the smallest parts to the periphery. In the earth the Finite or Singular is for itself; in the water it is so only through the Whole; in the air it is not indeed for itself, but is there only the Whole without individualized parts.
314. The world is twofold, an ætherial and a terrestrial; both are transcripts or copies of each other, and both ultimately of God. The terrestrial world has originated out of the æther; it is therefore further removed from God than the æther; this is the discharged, purified Terrestrial.
315. God is a threefold Trinity; at first the Eternal, then the Ætherial, and finally the Terrestrial, where it is completely divided.
316. The holy primary number is 3; the second is 9. The æther is 1 in 3; the other elements are simply the 3 of the æther, together 4. 2 × 3, however, or 6, lies at the bottom of this 4. The symbolic numbers are consequently 1, 3, 4, 6, 9, which fundamentally are one and the same, but in different combinations. With this, however, all formation does not yet terminate; to the 4 elements is added the vegetable and animal kingdom. The number of the days of creation is 6.
C.--_STÖCHIOLOGY._
FUNCTIONS OF THE ELEMENTS.
1. _Functions of the Æther._
317. The spiritual activity of æther manifests itself as a _process of combustion_, which appears as fire. The combination of the substance with light and heat is fire; the elements have therefore originated by a process of combustion. All matter has undergone combustion, and indeed æther has been submitted to the same process. The process of fixation of the æther or the process of condensation, is consequently a process of combustion.
318. Each heavenly body has originally burnt, was nothing but fire; the Vulcanic has preceded the Neptunian agency. It was, however, the primary process of combustion, through which the at present combustible matters first originated. The present volcanoes must not be regarded as synonymous with the primary combustion. There it was not Vesuvii that burnt, but æther.
319. What has not been burnt upon the planet, is again reduced. A something that has not originally suffered combustion is a contradiction. The metal is therefore not the Original, as for obvious reasons also, the solid cannot proceed directly out of the æther, without having been first gaseous and fluid. The processes of combustion upon the planet are all secondary, are imitations of the primary combustion in matter, in the elements. Fire consists of the combinations of the three activities, gravity, light, and heat, which are now to be separately considered.
a. GRAVITY.
320. The functions of gravity are exhibited principally in the motion of the heavenly bodies, and are so completely unfolded in works upon Physics and Astronomy, that they may here be passed over in silence.
b. LIGHT.
321. The æther and the terrestrial matter are correlative, like Higher and Lower, unity and multiplicity, and therefore stand in the same antagonism with each other, as the air with the two inferior elements. The æther is constantly seeking to convert the matter into itself, to render it indifferent by depolarization, this, however, to condense it. Matter is only condensed æther. This condensation proceeds, however, from the polarization of light, and it is consequently the activity of light by which the æther hardens into matter.
322. The activity of the æther or the light dies or becomes obscured in matter. The next obscuration of light, or its immediate transition into matter is the polar primary body, _oxygen_. Oxygen is the corporeal light. It is the spirit of light to posit every thing with an internal polarity, to convert everything into oxygen, to render everywhere free the oxygen pole; for the process of fixation can only happen through activity = light, and fixation is a production of primary bodies.
323. Light is the manifestation of positive tension, of the tension of oxygen. When this reaches its maximum, light issues forth. This is evident upon the planet. Every generation of the Similar takes place through the similar principles; the cosmic generation of light must be therefore imparted also by positive tension, by that of oxygen. No reference has been here made to the negative relation of oxygen in electrical tension; it does not come under the denomination.
324. The sun is the body of oxygen, the _water_ in the world-space; the planet, however, is the basic body, the earth in world-space. The æther is diffused between the two as the air of heaven. The sun appears to have only the density of water; for it is four times less dense than the earth, and is thus pretty nearly in the condition of water.
325. The sun must be water, even because it is a body of oxygen. It must be denser than water, because it is in the centre, is central water.
326. It gives out light only, because it is water; for as such it is in eternal motion.
327. The solar water is moved by the planets, like ebb and flow. At every point of the sun opposite to which a planet stands, there is flow; there the illumination is stronger, in other situations weaker. There must be several seas of light upon the sun, as many as there are planets placed opposite to it. There is nowhere a perfectly quiescent point in the sun; therefore it is nowhere wholly solid.
328. The shining is an ebb and flow of the sun. Query Do not the spots and flashes of the sun depend upon this? The ebb and flow also of the sea gives out light; every motion in water shines. The sun does not simply shine by external motion, but because it is by this motion polarized unto the Innermost. It is a true gelatinous animal, a body trembling through its whole mass, and thereupon phosphorescent.
329. The sun is not inhabited. It has no firm ground.
330. The contest of the primary principles of the elemental bodies upon the planet appears as light.
331. Light is now more closely characterized. It is no longer merely the tension of æther generally, but tension of material elemental bodies. Thereby the light has been torn from heaven and given to the earth. Light has a chemical relation, and admits therefore of comparison with terrestrial matters.
332. Through light the negative, its opposite or the basic, pole has been evoked in matter. The sun is self-posited as oxygen against the planet as Azotic or phlogiston; hydrogen and carbon. Light therefore deoxydises the bodies; it converts them into itself, into a polar principle. Acids placed in the light become deoxydised; nitric acid, muriate of silver. Oxygen is developed in light out of water. In like manner the constituent parts of the air continue separated only through light.
INFLEXION.
333. The light tends from the sun to the earth, not merely because the polarization in accordance with its nature streams forth from the centre to the periphery, because the light is radiality; but because the earth is the basic pole of the sun. It is thus polarity, and not simply the straight line, which light obeys. Light tends to the centre of the earth, because between this and the sun the tension oscillates. The line of tension is only between the two centres.
334. In whatever direction light may fall upon the earth, it must strive towards the middle point. Those bodies that have in themselves the earthy nature, attract the light, not by virtue of an hidden quality, but out of the antagonism with the sun; now it may proceed either from greater density or from true basic import.
335. Rays of light, which pass close to the earth, as rays of tension between the sun and another star, become, from the polarity of the earth being stronger than that of the star, diverted from their straight direction and drawn towards the middle point. This diversion of light from its direct course is called _Inflexion_.
336. It is chiefly basic bodies that inflect the light towards themselves. No such body has an infinite shadow. In other respects, all bodies inflect because they are much denser than light.
TRANSLUCENCY AND REFRACTION.
337. Light, as an Ætherial, permeates matter, and must on that very account pass toward the middle point of the earth, because it is virtually none other than the tension of both middle points, the earth and the sun. Originally therefore the light must have gone through the earth.
338. This permeation is not, however, mechanical but dynamic, and is indeed necessarily a propagation of the tension of æther through the matter.
339. Matter is susceptible of the same polarization of which the æther is susceptible, because it is on no account different from the æther; the polarization only takes place more slowly.
340. The transmission of light is called _Translucency_.
341. The æther is transparent, because it is everywhere the propagation of the tension of light, because it is itself, or becomes, light everywhere. Bodies can also be transparent, only in so far as they are the light itself, i. e. in so far as the same polarization can be excited in them which is constantly excited in æther by the sun. But this is not only possible, but necessary; for matter is surely the æther itself, only condensed. The polarity æther must therefore be capable also of being excited in the condensed æther, although in a much less degree. The transparency of matter is a tension of æther continually ringing through matter. The whole universe originally was transparent; it has only originated through tension of light.
342. Matter is a tension of light that has become central. This continuous tension of light in matter in relation to the centre, and thus with curvation, is called _Refraction_.
343. All transparent bodies must refract light. The bodies are, however, denser than the æther; therefore the light, which passes from a rarer into a denser medium, must be refracted towards the centre (plummet of incidence), and in the reverse case turned from it.
344. Materiality is not the only determinant of refraction, but also the density of the element, the earth refracting light more than water, and this more than air.
345. The density also is not the only determinant, but the quality also of the matter; the Basic or Planetary must refract more than the Oxygenic or Solar.
346. As translucency is not a dead transmission of light, but a continued propagation of tension; so must it be viewed as a process of light in matter, but one excited from without. Translucency is a _co-illumination_, like the concord of equally attuned instruments.
347. Co-illuminating bodies are thus analogous still to the æther. If there are non-transparent bodies, they can only be found in the earth-element, which, being furthest removed from the æther, has perfected itself independently, and they must indeed be wholly deoxydised.
348. The co-illumination of bodies or their transparency is an effort of deoxydation. Bodies that cannot at all be deoxydised are non-transparent.
REFLEXION.
349. Transparency belongs only to those bodies which have in themselves a twofold character. It will be shown that the metals are absolutely identical matters, and therefore non-transparent. The metals are the only non-transparent bodies. Metaleity = non-transparency.
350. The light falls upon a non-transparent only through a transparent body, and thus one in which the tension of light propagates itself. This co-illumination of the matter placed in front of the non-transparent body cannot cease to co-illuminate; the tension must thus abide in it, and turn back from the non-transparent body, in a straight direction if the tension fell direct upon it, at a certain angle, if obliquely. This phenomenon is called _Reflexion_.
351. Reflexion is no repulsion of light, but only its tension continued into the medium, in which the tension has been.
352. A non-transparent body indicates nothing for the tension of light but the limit of the co-illuminating matter; it does not at all operate itself upon the light, it is as it were a void space.
353. Transparent bodies also reflect partly, because they are only relative æther, because they only co-illuminate, are not themselves tensed; or because the basis in all is the metal. Every other medium is, however, an æther differently fixed; in every one therefore the tension has been changed; every medium is thus a limit for the tension, and therefore the transparent bodies also reflect. Since the tension becomes altered, when it passes into another medium, it always remains by preference in the neutral medium; therefore reflexion originates also by the air, when the light passes out of glass very obliquely into it.
_Operation of the terrestrial Elements upon Light._
DECOMPOSITION OF LIGHT--COLOURS.
354. It results from all this, that light cannot enter unchanged into mutual operation with matter. The tension of æther changes itself in matter. This change of light through the influence of matter is a debilitation of the tension of æther and lastly its complete cessation. There can be therefore no absolutely transparent matter; the æther only is this absolutely transparent matter. The denser a material is, by so much the more will it be capable of suppressing in itself the tension of light. The most transparent bodies must also become with a greater density adiaphanous or opaque, because the Metallic increases in them.
355. This suppression or expiration of the tension of light in bodies has received, as likewise proceeding from the mechanical theory of light, the name of _absorption_. The absorption is not a mechanical adherence of the particles of light in the pores of bodies. There are no pores for light, and this requires none.
356. The absorption or _decrescence_ of light is a retrogression of light into the indifference of æther, into _darkness_. Light in conflict with matter does not continue light, but becomes a mean condition between light and darkness.
357. The substratum of light, the æther, has two extreme conditions, and only two, the tensed and the non-tensed; the one is the _light_, the other the _dark_. Between the two, however, are the mediate conditions of _twilight_ or "clare-obscure." The light æther emits rays, the dark does not; the mediate conditions are half the two. The light condition is the clear unsullied light, the absolute translucency; the darkness is the absolute want of translucency; the mediate members are offuscated light, mediate tensions of æther.
358. The mean tension of æther, or light mingled with darkness, is called _Colour_. Colour is a finite, fixed light, the actual transmission of light into matter.
359. No matter can be uncoloured. An uncoloured matter is a nonentity.
360. Since matter is rigidified light, even so must it be posited in reference to colour, like light. Pure light materially substantiated or posited is _White_. The untensed æther materially posited is _Black_.
361. The mediate tensions of æther, or the mixture of Light and Dark, are mean conditions of White and Black, mixtures of the two extremes or androgynisms of White and Black. If we do not call White and Black colours, colours are then partial positions of light in matter, or in the dark.
362. Colour originates only in the _confinity_ of Light and Dark, or in the limit between White and Black. They are therefore microscopic.
363. Darkness is the cause of colours.
364. There is nothing visible but colour, but the coloured matter. The Non-corporeal itself is invisible. Darkness is the cause of all visibility. Were there no darkness, there would be no world for the eye. Colours are only illuminated darkness.
365. In the limit between Light and Dark there is neither White nor Black, but their possible mediate conditions, or the proper colours, the material tensions of æther. If the shadow-line of light be viewed under a magnifying glass, colours will be seen to reside in it. They are invisible only before on account of their minuteness. The prism and the lens do nothing else than magnify the shadow-line of light. They only show the colours that already exist therein, but do not create them.
366. There is properly only _one_ colour between White and Black; it is the transmission of light into matter generally. If we look through a prism with the refracting angle presented downwards, at an horizontal fissure in the shutter of a dark chamber, the red colour is then exhibited upon the upper and lower borders of the spectrum so formed within the eye; thus, in both instances, where the Dark is above and the White beneath, as also where the latter is above and the former beneath, as on the inferior border of the opening. Upon the lower border of the upper Red, and thus in the Clare, Yellow appears, which is consequently a mixture of Red and White, as seen through the thinner part of the prism. Yellow is thus brighter Red. Upon the upper border of the lower Red, thus also in the Clare, Blue appears, which is consequently a mixture also of Red and White, but the latter seen through the thicker part of the prism. Blue is thus offuscated Red. If Yellow and Blue be mixed, Green then originates. There can be therefore only four colours, whereof the Red is a mixture of Black and White, Yellow of Red and White, Blue of Red and Black, Green of Blue and Yellow. The first three are simple or mixed colours, the last a compound colour or a medley. These colours are parallel to the gradations in nature, or the latter are none other than the materializations of colours or the gradations of light. All other colours must be contained in the Red; it must serve as the basis or groundwork of all; it must be the noblest, most total, fullest and purest colour. This colour is the first position of the æther as matter, and thus of _fire_. _Fire-colour_ is the first-born, the noblest, highest, fullest, purest; it is the ætherial, cosmic colour. In fire the light is offuscated by gravity, and thereby coloured.
367. The light is not, however, perfected by its position as fire, but is posited also terrestrially. There are therefore terrestrial colours also.
368. There can be only three terrestrial colours, neither more nor less; for there are only three different material or offuscated positions of light.
369. The first terrestrial offuscation of light is the _air_. The colour of the air is thus second in the rank of colours. As the fire-colour plays the chief part in the cosmic and in all colours, so does the air-colour among the terrestrial. It is the highest colour of the planet.
370. The second offuscation of light is water. The colour of water is the third colour.
371. The third offuscation of light is the earth; and this colour is the last, the most ignoble. The colours part into two series, the cosmic or solar, and the terrestrial or planetary. The cosmic is the Red. The first terrestrial is Blue. The second is Green. The third is Yellow. Red alone is worth as much as all the three others taken together. It is the identification of all numbers. Green is merely their synthesis, the terrestrial, finite totality.
372. The genesis of colours is thus the genesis of the elements, or that of matter. It cannot be otherwise; for the becoming of matter is verily an offuscation of light, a coloration. Colour agrees essentially with the elements, and is itself nothing different from element. Fire is in its essence red, as being the impartient of light and heat; air is in its essence nothing else than the blue æther by virtue of its being gaseous; water is the green æther, earth the yellow. If the æther is tensed, it then becomes red or fire; if it attains its blue stage, it becomes air; at the green stage, water, upon the yellow, earth.
373. The elements are only gradations of light, colours. They have therefore been formed according to the laws of light; for colours are without doubt the legitimate developments of light.
374. Red, as being the solar or fire-colour, ranks parallel with oxygen; the more powerful indeed the combustion, the more powerful is the oxydation, and by so much redder the flame. Matters also become red through oxydation. The Red vanishes lastly into White, and thus the highest oxydation is white.
375. The next interchange of Red is with Blue; it becomes red by oxydation, this again blue by desoxydation, but by excessive alkalization and terrification, yellow. It is Red that imparts oxydation, Blue that resolves it and reduces the poles to indifference.
376. From the same cause Red warms, but Blue on the contrary does not. The calefaction given out in prismatic spectra of colours is an impure work, in which refractions, diversions and convergences of light, as well as demi-foci, cooperate.
377. The sun in the firmament may be viewed as the bright opening in the darkened chamber. Colours are therefore nothing but images of the sun in darkness, self-manifestations of the sun in dark matter. A point of light thrown into darkness is colour. This is the case around the sun, which is therefore surrounded by a hollow globe of colours, by its own refulgence. The rainbow is a ring around the sun consisting of infinite positions of the solar spectra in darkness.
378. The symbolical doctrine of the colours is correct according to the philosophy of nature. _Red_ is fire, love--Father. _Blue_ is air, truth and belief--Son. _Green_ is water, formation, hope--Ghost. These are the three cardinal virtues. _Yellow_ is earth, the Immoveable, Inexorable, falsity the only vice--Satan. There are three virtues, but only one vice. A result obtained by Physio-philosophy, whereof Pneumato-philosophy as yet augurs nothing.
COLOURS AND PLANETS.
379. Every condensation of æther by light is consequently a production of colour, and inversely, every production of colour is a condensation of the æther. The laws of coloration run parallel with those of materialization, or, what is more, are the same. The planets are thus produced according to the laws which light exercises in the production of colours.
380. There are as many productions of heavenly bodies as there are of colours, and thus there are four.
381. The sun is the incorporation of Red or fire, the planets are that of the three terrestrial colours. The comets belong to the kingdom of darkness.
382. The planets are only suns reflected in darkness as in a mirror; they have originally been hollow globes of colour, then orbitar rings of colour (solar rainbows), then points of colour. The planets are coagulated colours, for they are coagulated light. At that very distance from the sun, where light begins to grow dim, where, to speak in the Newtonian sense, it begins to refract, there planetary mass originates. The mass of the planet thus coagulates together around the sun, but not in an uniform manner like a mass of pulp, but in pauses of colours, exactly like a rainbow.
383. These planetary chromatic arcs or bows of colour are related to the sun like the three terrestrial colours to the cosmic, or as the three terrestrial elements to fire. _Three_ planetary productions must have thus formed around the sun, because the light condenses, materializes itself in three moments. Therefore the planets range themselves in groups at three great distances. To the _first_ production belong Mercury, Venus, the Earth, Mars, Vesta, Juno, Ceres and Pallas. They are the first digression from Red, the Yellow; the Earthy preponderates in them. They are all placed close together. To the _second_ production belong Jupiter and Saturn; water rules them, and fluctuates visibly upon them; they are the Green. They range at a great distance from the former group. To the _third_ and most remote productions belongs Uranus; it is the Blue, in which the air preponderates. It again ranges at a great distance from the former group. The comets are naught but æther, which is about to become air.
384. The production of the earth-planets or of the first group is dispersed into so many as it is on account of the proximity of the sun, on account of the energy of the rays of light, as well as the import of the Earthy, which exists essentially under many forms. The planetary rings have been arranged like scales behind each other, like clouds through electrical pauses; but these repeat themselves more rapidly, in the neighbourhood of the sun.
c. HEAT.
385. While the æther falls into a state of tension or shines, it is thrown into motion. This motion of æther manifests itself as the conatus or effort to extension. The extension, however, considered as a world-phenomenon, is _Heat_.
386. Light, when it operates upon terrestrial matter, excites this to special polarization, whereby the Ætherial that is in it is set in motion, i. e. heat is generated.
387. Light never moves directly the mass itself, but only the Ætherial that is in it. Through this motion of the æther it becomes separated from matter; and this separation is manifested as _free_ heat.
388. Heat is not matter itself any more than light is, but it is only the act of motion in the primary matter. In heat, as well as in light, there certainly resides a material substratum; yet this substratum does not give out heat and light; but the _motion_ only of the substratum gives out heat, and the _tension_ only of the substratum light. There is no body of heat; hydrogen is the body of heat, just as oxygen may be called the body of fire.
389. Heat is real space; into it all forms have been resolved, as all materiality has been resolved into gravity, and all activity, all polarity into light. Heat is the universal form, consequently the want of form.
390. Light properly develops heat out of matter through separation of the fixed poles from the substance, whereby the latter again passes over into æther.
391. The development of heat in a body is not an extrusion of a matter adherent, and as it were foreign, to it; but an ascent of the matter itself into heat. The matter does not develop, or give out heat, but _becomes_ heat, namely æther.
392. The loss which a body sustains by the radiation of heat is as slight as the æther is subtile or rare; thus it is infinitely small, where the æther is infinitely light. We cannot speak of the loss of matter, while it is hot; although a true loss is present, if the point in question be philosophically regarded, it can come, however, as little under consideration as the weight of the æther.
393. The fusion of bodies is a diminution of the fixity of their poles, their further evaporation, and thus an approximation to indifference or the apolarity of æther. Heat is the actual retrogression of matter into æther; light is only the efficient of this transition.
394. As heat becomes originally excited, so must it be always excited; two causes for one effect are impossible. The excitation of heat by oxydation takes place in the same way as by light, namely by polarization and separation therefore of the Indifferent. The generation of heat by chemical processes is based upon the same principle. Lastly, the generation also of heat by compression and simple _friction_ is wholly similar to that which is caused by light. In every case they are only polar, and by no means mechanical operations upon matter, whereby the fixity of the poles becomes changed.
395. It is not a change of cohesion, which the friction mechanically effects, but the act is purely dynamical. The essence of friction consists in the constant renewal of polar change, because thereby an infinite number of projecting points or apices are alternately brought into contact. There is verily no smooth body.
396. Heat is the transition of light unto darkness; for it is indifferent æther, only moved. Colours are thus also a conflict of light with heat, and out of this conflict issues the most beautiful, the highest colour, the Red of fire. In fire, the contest between light and darkness has risen to the highest pitch; the æther therefore is also moved to the greatest degree, becomes hot. If the indifference becomes the maximum, the vital tension then relaxes, the fire is extinguished; finally motion ceases, it is cold and dark.
397. In matter also light and heat operate against each other. Light deoxydizes, heat oxydizes. If light appears to oxydize, it is only by evoking heat.
398. Heat is the function of expansion for matter. Every body has a definite degree or amount of expansion, therefore a definite fixity of æther; this æther is _latent_ heat.
399. Heat operates spherically in matter or in all directions, not in the linear direction like light. The propagation of heat can only take place slowly, because it is not a polar action, but only the result of such an one, only motion. Heat does not penetrate bodies mechanically, but dynamically like light, yet without decomposing them, as light does.
400. Heat is related as indifferent æther to the matter as to a Polar. This relation imparts the _process of conduction_. Light, however, is itself polar and disturbs matter, while it passes through it.
401. With the exception of their cohesion matters are not directly changed by heat.
402. During every process of decomposition, during every process of light heat must be produced, but not light also during every process of heat.
403. Dense materials must conduct heat because they are most opposed to it. It is only the formed element therefore that can possess capacity for conducting heat.
404. Absence of form is the character of isolators of heat, form that of the conductors, apart from every remaining quality. Solid bodies, which easily pass into the formless condition are isolators.
405. The densest bodies among the solids must be the best conductors. Regard may be first paid to the nature of their constituent parts in the sequel of the present section of this work.
406. The conduction of heat is a continuous excitation from one part striving against or resisting the other; the earths (as metals) are the best conductors.
407. Matters, which are images of heat, do not conduct, because they enter only as minimum into conflict with it, and while they expand at once convert themselves into the same. Such is the air. The Heterogeneous only conducts. The heat expands in the air only by continuous motion of the aerial particles. The air is an isolator. Water ranks in the middle between air and earth.
408. With respect also to conduction, light is opposed to heat. Light is conducted by those very bodies, which isolate heat, and isolated, not admitted to permeate or absorbed, by those which conduct heat. The air conducts light, isolates heat; the metal, the earth conducts heat, isolates light; water holds a mediate relation towards the two, yet towards light that of a conductor, because it is deoxydizable.
409. The conduction of light is likewise a process of deoxydation, or a disintegration of matter. By the conduction of light the bodies are chemically analysed, and finally resolve themselves into their principles; such after all is the case with every glass and crystal. As the process of conduction of light may be called a process of deoxydation, so also may it be called a process of the generation of colour. The conduction is an offuscation of light, a colouring; the deoxydation is a solution of the material bonds, an elevation unto colour.
2. _Functions of the Air._
ELECTRICITY.
410. The air is the slightest combination of the primary bodies, and stands in opposition with the two other elements, as more solid combustions. In this antagonism the air lays claim upon the other elements to analyse them; these, however, upon the air, to combine, and undergo more vivid combustion.
411. This antagonism is on a large scale an antagonism of periphery and centre, like the primary antagonism, by which planets and suns have withdrawn from each other. The tension of air with the other elements is called _Electricity_. The centroperipheric antagonism between the sun and the planet, between light and colour, represented in an elementary manner is electricity.
412. Sun and planet are electrically related to each other, and the circumrotation of the latter may be viewed as conditioned by the change of electrical poles. Colours also are only electrical productions. Light itself is similar to an electrical tension of the æther.
413. Electricity is an action of the periphery or limit and thus of the surface of the globe. The surface of the globe is, however, everywhere +-without centre. The principles of electricity are therefore eternally separated without having a middle point, as occurs in magnetism. The electrical poles live in eternal animosity, because they have no point of union. Such is then the essence of electricity. Electricity is therefore only a function of surfaces without any line. It clings only to the upper surface of the bodies, and does not penetrate into their thickness. It is only the tension of the surfaces of bodies against each other, of the apices of divided radii.
414. The air is the periphery, the _limit_ or boundary of the earth. Electricity is therefore the spirit of air. It is in its most active state in that stratum of air which is in contact with the earth, because there the limits are situated. Upon this lightning depends.
415. Electricity, as an aerial function, is terrestrial heat. Both are therefore conducted by the same rigid linear bodies and isolated by the same. The isolation of electricity coalesces with absence of form, or with the transition of denser bodies into air.
416. Electricity is an antagonism between air on the one side and water and earth upon the other. By these therefore two kinds of operation are posited in the air.
417. While electricity is the tension of air with the other elements, it is also the tension of the principles themselves of air. Electricity is a twofold character appertaining to the two principles of air. The tension of æther and of substance, thus the tension of fire repeated upon the two elementary bodies of air, is electricity. Electricity exists under two forms, as the electricity of the substance or body of fire, and as that of the planet. These two conditions are perhaps incorrectly named + E and-E, or positive and negative electricity.
418. The + E is the more energetic, active in itself, polar; it is the electricity of fire represented in oxygen. The-E is the weaker, that which has only been evoked, the basic; it is the electricity of the planet represented in nitrogen, hydrogen, carbon, sulphur. It may be said that-E is related to + E as planet is to sun, as periphery to centre. The sun is + E, the planet-E, the one the electricity of oxygen, the other of hydrogen.
419. These electrical conditions must always be changing in the air, according as the slightest influence is brought to bear upon them from without. The air consists in this change of electrical poles. Were the poles not to change, the air would be a solid element. The earth is an air with _fixed_ electricity, the water with extinguished or neutralized electricity.
420. The twofold character of the aerial principles is increased by every polarizing action from without, and therefore principally by the surface of the earth, which consists of two elements. Were there no surface to the earth, were simply air present, then there would be no electrical change of poles. The surface of the earth itself, however, produces no change of poles in the air, for it remains always neutral; but it becomes unequal or polar from the change wrought upon it by water and earth, by light, by heating and by chemical processes.
421. The air also changes the electricities while it roams over the earth. This wandering motion is a contact of differently polarized tracts of the earth. Every mountain, valley, and river, every meadow is differently polarized; from each the air derives another electricity. Through this ceaseless alternation of polar exchange, its activity becomes so elevated that at last the electricity makes its appearance in a manner cognizable by the senses. The production of electricity by _friction_ admits of a similar explanation. Friction is in miniature, what the sweeping of air is over the earth. Were the earth quite level, and composed of homogeneous matter, the air would not become electric by motion.
422. All terrestrial electricity has been evoked by a change of poles analogous to friction. Through light nothing foreign is posited in the air, any more than by friction, and by both the electricity is attained in a similar dynamical manner.
423. The elements of the air, polarized to the highest degree by electricity, must combine, and this combination is the process of combustion. The final result of electrical tension is combustion of air. It is only, however, the two primary bodies that undergo combustion; the two constituent parts of the air must, therefore, be driven by electricity to their last extreme, even to the most perfect element of fire and the basic or terrestrial substance. The internal combination of both these primary or elemental bodies, or the product of this aerial combustion is next of all _water_. The termination of electrical tension in the air is rain. All rain is the extinguished function, the dying spirit of air. The two hostile principles are reconciled in water. Water accompanies every process of combustion.
424. By electricity the air was separated into the two inferior elements, into water and earth. At present, where the whole water and the whole earth has been precipitated from air, rain is certainly as a rule only water condensed and held in solution in the air.
425. The nitrogen gas is the residue of the primary rain. After the air has become sea by the combination of oxygen and hydrogen, it no longer creates water out of its own bulk, but now rederives it from the sea, and still but imitates its primary process in rain.
426. Were there merely solid land upon the planet, the oxygen pole would be evoked in the air, and the latter would be precipitated wholly as water. Were there merely water or sea upon the planet, the nitrogen pole would be evoked, and the air be wholly precipitated as earth. But since the two elements are constantly and alternately operating upon the air, so must at one time water, at another earth, be generated and precipitated from it. The earths in the act of falling down, or in precipitation, are the meteoric stones. They are only the after-births of the primary decomposition of air.
427. It can indeed be none other than carbonic acid, which is converted by decomposition into meteoric stones, or at least into the metals and earths which they contain. Sulphur must be regarded as the melting down of carbon and hydrogen. In the upper lighter regions of the air carburetted hydrogen gas may very well be present, and condense itself into meteoric stones.
428. The condensation must take place by means of electricity. The greater condensation or solidification, as well as the calefaction, results indeed first through the fall.
429. Their bursting is only conceivable when some hydrogen gas is in the meteoric stone, which gas, when submitted to the highest degree of heat, becomes finally fulminating gas and bursts the stone.
430. Meteoric stones are children of our planet, and not of the world-space. They are the antagonism of the water-formation or of rain.
431. The falling stars are simply indeed condensed carbon or hydrogen gas, but which by reason of its small mass does not become solid. It is probably converted only into sulphur. Thus falling stars would be the other halves of meteoric stones; the latter consisting of a preponderance of carbon, being therefore earths and metals; the former of a preponderance of hydrogen, being therefore carburetted hydrogen or sulphur. A greater number of meteoric stones must fall over the sea than over the solid land.
3. _Function of the Water._
SOLUTION.
432. The function of water is necessarily homologous with the process of combustion, because the main bulk or proportion of water is oxygen. In conformity with its spiritual activity does water seek to convert the two other elements into water, to impart to them its form, to fluidize them. This happens with the air when it has been absorbed; but upon the earth also the water exercises the same action.
433. The function of water is the formation of globes or the _Process of Solution_; it directs itself chiefly against the solid; for the solid element is the redintegrant factor of water. Solution is a positing of the solid under the internal polar form, but the poles of which have not yet separated. Every solid _formation_ has come out of water, as water has out of air; every new formation must also return out of water, by fluidization, by relaxation of the poles. By solution, solid matters are again reduced to their primary condition, and are then capable of reassuming new fixities. The process of solution is a process of becoming water, not by agglutination, but by liberations of fixity; a _Solution_ in the strongest sense of the term.
434. No process of solution is conceivable without oxydation. The dissolved body, while it obtains the aqueous nature, is taken up in the sense of oxygen. No solution occurs without oxygen, as well as no combustion is possible without water. The solvent character of water is based upon the preponderance of the oxygen over the hydrogen.
435. During every solution the two principles of water enter into a state of tension with each other, as the two aerial principles do in electricity. This tension is established by that which is to undergo solution; for everything so circumstanced is polar towards water. During every solution the oxygen is elevated in its pole, and the hydrogen likewise. If the solution be very heterogeneous, they separate, the water is decomposed. In the pure process of solution the water simply abides in a state of tension; if each aqueous principle is actually and independently self-evolved, chemistry then originates; but of this we shall discourse in the sequel. The process of solution may be characterized as the equilibrium of the process of tension between the object that is to undergo solution and the solvent, and between the two principles of the latter, whereby separation is not thus attained. As electricity finally strikes out into the process of combustion, so does that of solution into the chemical.
436. Solution is in essence like electricity. Solution is an electrical tension between oxygen and carbon; electricity is a process of solution between oxygen and nitrogen, a process of tension without separation of principles. Air and water are in a state of constant tension towards each other; and hence therefore result the constant evaporation and the clouds.
437. What lightning is in the air, namely formation of water, that is chemistry in water. The salt in the sea is what the clouds are in the air. Two electrical clouds are what two salts are in the water. Rain is the imitation of the creation of water. Precipitation of salt is the imitation of the creation of earth.
4. _Functions of the Earth._
CRYSTALLIZATION.
438. The earth-element is the highest result of combustion in creation, the highest fixation of æther. The earth is the æther represented as centre in the Material, or it is the identification of all polar binary division in the Terrestrial, independently of oxydation; therefore its parts are motionless, be they dust or compact masses. The earth is the corporeal gravity, the substance as a perfectly simple position without emergence out of itself, the 0, the terrestrial monas. The earth is consequently the heaviest and densest element, and is that which must include the middle point of our own and every planet.
439. In the middle of the planet there is only earth, and nothing else; the middle is not hollow, does not contain any central fire as has been imagined, nor air, and the science of Geogeny will show that no metal also could be contained in the interior of the earth.
440. In the air both material principles are only associated with each other, in water they are mixed, but in the earth identified, blended together.
441. The earth is to the other elements what the sun is to the planets, namely, the basis, the centre and that the mathematical as well as the dynamic centre. That this is the part played by the earth-element is proved not only by its character, but also by its volume. The earth-element exceeds the other elements in mass as much as the sun does the planets; the water is only the vascular system in the flesh of the earth-element; while the air is only the expression of the limit or in other words its integument.
442. Everything therefore that now occurs upon the planet develops itself out of the earth, the water and the air being only the auxiliaries of generation. The Earthy is developed in the water by the air. As creation has been closed with the earth, so may the solid materials, which are now and then found upon the planet apart from the earth, not be products of the first creation, but only developments of the planet when created and cosmically completed.
443. The earth as material gravity is solid. It has, however, originated out of the fluid, therefore by a process of cohesion; this is called the _Process of Crystallization_.
444. The process of crystallization is perfectly equivalent to the process of fixation of the æther, and is only the termination of the same. As light at any spot in the world-space creates a central point, the nucleus of a comet, around which more of the mass of æther is constantly accumulating till it finally coagulates into the solid condition; so does the process of crystallization evoke some particular spot, point or nucleus in the water, wherein the crystallizing forces are excited, which attract the mass that is susceptible of fixation and fashion it into a crystal. The process of crystallization is a process of fixation, and with it also is furnished the theory of crystallization. The process of crystallization is a process of polarization, and one indeed that proceeds from a centre; or, properly speaking, the point, from which the polarizing process emerges in a fluidity that is fixable or in other words susceptible of crystallization, becomes a central point, a middle point and virtually the middle point of the crystal.
445. The process of polarization does not originate absolutely in the fluid, any more than light has the power of concentrating or crystallizing itself in any given part of the æther; but by an external determination. This is a granule, a projecting point in the vessel or in the hollow of the earth, in which the crystals originate. The crystal never begins in the middle of the fluid, but only on its walls or on the surface. The point of polarization or of crystallization has been granted; now this is polar towards the fluid, and works therefore by polarizing upon it, and through this water also passes over into the crystal, forming what is called water of crystallization.
446. This polarization of the fluid passes in every direction; for every polar point is polar all around. Thus a spherical portion of the fluid is polarized round about the point. The fixable parts are spheroidally attracted and gather together from all sides around the point. For were the polarization not to traverse the whole mass, but only according to individual lines, the crystal must then indeed be jagged or indented.
447. In this manner the crystal would have been a globe, from the fixable particles lying together in distinct points, after the manner of pulp. But this is impossible, because the point of starting or departure is differently polarized to the fluidity, being negative according to observation. Every polar process does not operate in continuity, so that one end of the line should be purely positive, the other, however, purely negative; but every polar line is an infinity of poles, where, however, at one end the positive character only, at the other the negative preponderates. Such a line is e. g. as follows, +-+-+-, which begins with + and ends with-; it therefore has a preponderance of + at one end, of-at the other, and yet is both everywhere. By this infinity of polar change the fixable particles range themselves behind each other, while they separate from each other to an infinitely minute degree; these parts polarized behind each other are lines or fibres. Every crystal must accordingly consist of fibres; none possesses an homogeneous or pultaceous structure.
448. In the crystal one principal direction of polarization originates, which is effected by the antagonism of the point of crystallization with the fluid mass. It gives the direction of the crystal and its energy gives the length. This principal line consists of two poles that recede from each other, and these determine the two ends of the crystal, which are always similar, provided no mechanical obstacle be interposed.
449. From each of the mutually seceding poles lines of polarization issue at definite angles, which (like elliptical radii on the periphery) meet at the sides of the newly produced crystal. Then again between these radii tension arises, so that the fibres become lamellæ. The main line between the two mutually seceding poles is the central line or _polar axis_ of the crystal; the angular lines which determine the position of the lamellæ, are the _polar radii_. The polar radii determine the _nucleus_ of the crystal and are therefore nuclear lines; the polar axis determines the whole of the crystal, is the crystal, the central-line, and determines the form in general, or what has been called the secondary form.
450. Since all polar activities operate only in a straight line, there can thus be no globular crystal. Water is only susceptible of assuming the globular form upon a large as well as a small scale, because there are no fixed poles in it. The nucleus does not originate previous to the secondary form; since it is verily impossible for the polar rays to originate without a polar axis.
451. There are no actual degradations in the genesis of the crystal; they are only a mathematical expression for the finished form of the crystal.
452. The number of possible or actual nuclei is definite. They are based upon the combination of the laws of the globe with those of the polarity.
453. The simplest angular body must be circumscribed by at least four surfaces, and thus be a tetrahedron.
454. The fundamental nucleus of crystals is, however, the double tetrahedron or the hexahedron, namely the trilateral double-pyramid; for radii do not proceed simply from the point of commencement, but also from the extremities of the axis. When the superior and inferior radii meet, they must form a double-tetrahedron. The disposition to this form has been implanted in all crystals. If the nucleus becomes no such hexahedron, the aberration from, still admits of being referred to, the hexahedron.
455. There is no prismatic nucleus. The columns and parallelopiped nuclei are only mutilations.
456. The tetrahedron is also only a mutilated nucleus. To the essence of a nucleus belong two tetrahedra, with their bases joined to each other.
457. The six-sided double-pyramid is a duplication of the hexahedron. The octahedric nuclei, are things intermediate between the three-and six-sided interruptions of the natural type, like quadrinumeral or tetrapetalous corollæ in flowers.
458. Columns originate only between the two tetrahedra, without doubt owing to deficiency in bulk.
459. If the three-sided double-pyramid be the primary form of crystals, so must the six-sided column with trilateral terminal pyramids be the ultimate form. The rhomboidal-dodecahedron is therefore the most perfect crystal. It is the most perfect representation of the globe in the angular form.
460. The crystal can not commence with the nucleus and then for the first time continue to grow or even _change_ into the perfected crystal, because it becomes only crystal in the conflict of the linear and spherical action. As little as the sun can be produced without the planet, or vice versâ, so little can a nucleus subsist without what is called the external shell or crust. The nucleus is in fact determined by the shell of the crystal, namely by the polar axis. But inversely also the shell is determined by the nucleus, by the polar radii. A nucleus alone would be called a centre of a circle without circumference. Microscopic crystals therefore have at once the same perfected form as the largest in size. A crystal is an entire heavenly body; it is determined by central forces, which have, however, been roused and conducted by dualizing forces, forces of light. Everywhere do we meet with the same laws of the fixation of æther, upon a small as well as large scale.
461. Every solid matter and thus the Terrestrial generally, is crystallized upon a small as well as large scale. There cannot be an atom that were not crystallized, not arranged according to central and polar forces. Every crystal is therefore, and especially by reason of the infinity of the subordinate poles, crystallized again upon an infinitely small scale, or in other words it consists of infinitely numerous crystals. Every lamella or every particle of the lamella of a crystal consists again of crystals. These are what are called the _integral parts_, properly integral forms of the crystal. They are all probably hexahedra. The metals usually form but very small crystals, probably because the atoms are too heavy and cannot therefore be attracted from any distance.
462. Crystallography has been incorrectly made the principle of division in Mineralogy. A single character can never become a principle of division. If also it were actually true, that the form is always disposed according to the Interior, yet the form could never be the principle of division, but the Interior itself. The form is only the sign, but not the spirit, the essence of the mass.
D.--_KINGDOMS OF NATURE._
INDIVIDUALS.
463. All the matters that have hitherto originated have done so only in a _general_ not a _particular_ manner. They are constituent parts of the universe, in which as yet no distinctions reside. So soon as distinctions occur in the elements, they cease to be general matters, and become particular or individual things. The sum of the individuals is the Kingdoms of Nature.
464. The kingdoms of nature are the repetition of the world upon the planet. This repetition in consciousness is Natural History.
465. Acts of the world repeated upon the planet are combinations of the elements. Creation, which has hitherto advanced, now retrogrades, and thus by the combinations of general elements that have been already created.
466. Combinations of the elements, in accordance with the laws of the world, are upon the finite planet particular or individual bodies. The kingdoms of nature are the totality of particular bodies.
467. That which is not a Particular belongs not to the kingdoms of nature, and thus also does not come within the province of Natural History, but of Physics.
468. The earth-element lies at the basis of all the combinations of the elements. These combinations are therefore ascensions or retrogressions in creation. Only three such combinations are therefore possible, viz. 1. Of the earth with water, or air, or fire--binary combination. 2. Of the earth with water and air, without fire--ternary combination. 3. Of the earth with water, air, and fire--quaternary combination.
469. Out of the binary combination the quiescent bodies originate, for they are only a part of the planet--_Minerals_, _Earths_.
470. Out of the ternary combination originate bodies that are internally moved, for they are a whole planet in Particulars--_Plants_.
471. Out of the quaternary combination particular bodies, moved throughout and rotating around themselves, originate; for they are representations of the whole universe--_Animals_. Individual bodies that are moved internally are called organic.
472. There can be therefore only _three_ Kingdoms of Nature. The first consists simply of individualities, because it is not the equal proportion of all the elements. The two other kingdoms, however, are combinations of the individualities of the earth-element with two or three elements, and are thus equivalent to the planet or to the whole universe. The organic bodies are thus combinations of the Singular with the Whole, and supply the third part of the Philosophy of Nature, the Organology.
FIRST KINGDOM.
MINERAL OR EARTH KINGDOM.
473. Uni-or bin-elementary terrestrial bodies are minerals or earths; their development is Mineralogy in the general sense of that term. The earths regarded individually gives us the science of _Mineralogy_ proper; combined to form a whole, that of _Geology_.
I.--_MINERALOGY._
474. Mineralogy teaches us the development of the earth-element.
475. The earth-element does not exist universally, but only in particular bodies or individuals. There is no general earth, but it is either silicious earth or common salt, sulphur or iron, and so on.
476. The earth-element or the earth can only sustain changes, which are permanent or abiding; for in it alone fixation has become formation, in which the atoms do not move, or whereby at least a constant individual character of body, or one that is chemical, becomes apparent. The changes undergone by the other three elements are not constant, because of the atoms ceaselessly moving and balancing themselves. They do not exist individually, but only universally. There is only _one_ water, _one_ air, and only _one_ fire; there are therefore no igneous, aerial, and aqueous individuals.
477. The changes of the earth-element can only take place upon its fundamental or characteristic body, thus on carbon.
478. Nothing can, however, change of itself. All change must proceed from external influence. All things can be changed therefore by such influences only as are already antecedent to or _before_ them. The two other bodies, however, are prior to carbon; before the earth-element only the three other elements.
479. The earth can therefore be changed in only two ways; either the carbon by the other elemental bodies, or the total earth-element by the other elements.
480. The changes wrought by the influence of these bodies are, however, only partial or fractional changes. Therefore partial or chemical diversities only originate, and with them other different bodies or degrees of such. The changes effected by the elements are, however, total changes, which bear not only reference to the carbon, but to all the constituent parts of the earth-element.
481. Total changes or different conditions of the earth-element are called _Minerals_, or earths.
482. The _genesis_ of minerals, thus their collective character, as differently posited fixations of earth, determines the classes, orders, and genera.
483. The _genus_ is the product of a genetic moment, and is therefore always a definite, chemical mixture, which alone consequently expresses the essential character. Hitherto there has been no definition of mineral genera.
484. _Species_ of minerals are successive developments of the genetic moment, thus stöchiometric subdivisions of the genetic mixture, e. g. the different degrees of oxydation of nitrogen, in the oxyde, binoxyde gases and nitric acid. Hitherto it was not known what a mineral species might be; Physio-philosophy has been the first to introduce clearness to these conceptions.
485. A stöchiometric mixture in the earth-element is an individual.
486. Individuals only are the object of natural history, and thus neither water, air, nor fire. This also was not known previous to Physio-philosophy; it is, however, gradually acknowledged also by empirics.
487. The crystalline form is merely an external character for the species, and therefore the same nuclei may occur in the different orders.
488. Kinds or _varieties_ are different conditions of cohesion. They are therefore not determined by the form of the secondary crystal, since the aberration of forms results only from a stoppage upon their part half way or from the quantitative energy of the polar radii or polar axes.
489. While æther, air, and water, as being general matters, do not belong to the mineral system, what have been called artificial salts must on the contrary be admitted therein, because they are no works of art. The chemist only brings bodies together which do not come together accidentally in nature. It is a true misapprehension of nature's products if those substances only, that adhere to the earth, are recognized as such; surely this definition is perfectly ridiculous.
490. Two kinds or modes of division are possible, a _chemical_, and a genetic or philosophical.
491. The chemical principle of division of the earth are the elemental bodies. The philosophical or naturo-historical principles of division are the elements.
492. In reference to the chemical bodies four combinations only are possible. 1. Carbon, represented as perfectly pure, may be regarded as _Metal_. 2. Carbon united with hydrogen, is manifested in the _Inflammables_. 3. Carbon with oxygen makes its appearance in the _Earths_. 4. Carbon with oxygen and hydrogen in the _Salts_. According to this view, the classes would succeed each other thus:--
1. Ores. 2. Inflammables. 3. Earths. 4. Salts.
Now, as the earths here intervene between the Inflammables and salts, it is at once seen that the series is incorrect; for the earths form by far the largest mass, and must therefore constitute the groundwork or basis of Mineralogy, and thus stand at the commencement. If all metals, Inflammables and salts were to be deducted, the globe of the earth would still lose but little of its magnitude.
493. This chemical division admits thus of no strict arrangement, since what are called minerals follow each other unnaturally. Meantime the chemical view admits also of a philosophical treatment and amelioration of the serial order. It may be said that the earth consists of much carbon, little oxygen and very little hydrogen, without any other element. Salt, of little carbon, much oxygen and little hydrogen, together with water. The Inflammables of little carbon and oxygen, much hydrogen, besides air. Ore, of much carbon, little hydrogen, and still less oxygen with fire. As the fire or the æther is imponderable, so do the three elemental bodies appear blended together into one apparently simple body, with which gravity, light as lustre, heat as spirit and the conduction of heat, are only spiritually combined.
494. But this view leads directly to the _genetic_ division, as the only true one, to that, namely, which has been based upon the mutual influence of all the elements. It is itself the ultimate cause or foundation of chemical division.
495. There can accordingly, as there are only four elements, be only four kinds of minerals. The Earthy either continues unchanged, or it is changed by water, air and fire.
496. When the _earth-element_ originates or separates itself from the water, in order to free itself from all the properties of the latter as well as from those of the air and fire, and to become stiff and solid, the remaining elements exert an incessant influence upon it, and draw a portion of it into their circle, i. e. they confer upon it their properties.
a. The Earth-element can be changed by fire Fire-minerals. b. Or changed by air Air-minerals. c. Or changed by water Water-minerals. d. Or lastly, it is severed wholly and substantially } Earth-minerals. free }
497. Through the influx of _fire_ upon the formation of the Earthy it becomes an identical, homogeneous mass, in which the possibility resides, as in the æther itself, of undergoing all changes. This developmental stage of the earth-element is represented by the _metal_. The homogeneous mass of the metal can become earthy by oxydation, aqueous or saline by acidification, aerial or combustible by being hydrogenized.
498. The metal is unanalysable, as is the æther, although it consists of three forms. The metal is easily restored or brought back from its combinations.
499. Besides, however, the identical, homogeneous or simple character, the metal has still also the three characters of fire or of the æther. It is therefore a triplicity in identity.
a. In so far as _gravity_ is represented in it, it has the identical or homogeneous mass already indicated, and is heavier than all other bodies. It is central mass. It must be regarded as pure carbon. Metal and the body of gravity are one.
b. In so far as light is represented in it, it has the peculiar lustre, which stands again also in intimate connexion with the homogeneous mass. The usual colour of metals is white, the colour of unsullied light. The lustre is properly a self-illumination, and thereupon depends their repulsion of light, or opacity. Metals are therefore adiaphanous or opaque, because they are noncombustible by light. As soon as they become decomposible, namely oxydes, they become also transparent. The metals are the only opaque bodies, because they alone are non-decomposible. All matters become only opaque by admixture with metal, or in so far as the metallic body resides at the bottom of all. The visibility of the world is based upon its metallic character. Without metal we would see nothing.
c. In so far as _heat_ is represented in metal is it extensible, fusible and fluidifiable. Metal is water that has become dense.
500. In so far as the _air_ has acted upon the Earthy during its origin, it has imparted to it electrical and combustible properties; the metal has combined with hydrogen, has become an Inflammable, as in sulphur or pit-coal. Sulphur may be regarded as the intimate fusion of hydrogen with metal; coal as a combination of the same probably elicited by means of oxygen. Inflammables are idioelectric and combustible, because they are rigidified air. That matter belongs only to the Inflammables, which, being once kindled in exposure to the air, continues to burn of _itself_. The Inflammables are volatile, since they undergo combustion, i. e. they take on the condition of their antetype, the air. They have from metal the opacity and the colours, but they do not preserve the lustre or self-illumination. They become transparent simply by crystallization or oxydation.
501. With the generation of the Earthy _water_ imparts also to a portion of the same its properties, dissolubility and transparency. To the metal and hydrogen oxygen is next added. An hydrated Earthy originates. The Aqueo-earthy is fluid in water; it is _salt_. Salt changes its form in the readiest manner, because it is the metatype or likeness of water; and hence its susceptibility to crystallization. It is not combustible by itself, because it is essentially an oxyde and hydroid. Salt is a metal or Inflammable that has undergone combustion, and can therefore never be simple.
502. Now that part of the earth-element, which remains after the salt, the Inflammable and the metal have been separated, is plainly the _Earthy_ or the _earth_. It has therefore no aqueous properties, is not soluble; it has no aerial properties, is not electric and combustible; has no metallic properties, is not heavy, nor opaque and glittering, not fusible and malleable or extensible. The pure Earthy is always fixed or firm, and therefore figurate. The Earthy is a metal, with which the oxygen has been intimately melted down; for it is the identification of all elements.
503. The Earthy is the principal mass, because it represents the earth-element itself. Salt, Inflammable and metal are only subordinate masses, because they are only displacements of the earth-element by the other elements. Therefore a small part only of the Earthy has become salt, a yet smaller Inflammable, and the smallest, metal.
504. Although the metal is simple, it can by no means correspond, as might otherwise appear, to the earth-element; for every element is a totality of elemental bodies, and therefore those minerals, which represent the pure earth-element, must be compound, without, however, exhibiting the characters of the other elements. This is found only in the earths.
505. There are, accordingly, in a genetic point of view, four, and only four, mineral classes. They originate in an ascending direction, from the earth-element by water and air up to fire. The Classes are--
I. Earth-minerals Earths. II. Water- " Salts. III. Air- " Inflammables. IV. Fire- " Ores.
a. _Earths_ are those minerals, which admit of being changed neither by water, nor air, nor by fire; i. e. which are neither soluble, combustible, fusible, neither yield colour, nor are particularly heavy. Such minerals have been properly called earths, as silicious, sacrilegious earth, &c.
b. _Salts_ are those which have aqueous properties, i. e. are soluble.
c. _Inflammables_ are those which have aerial properties, i. e. are inflammable and volatile.
d. _Metallic ores_ are those which have the three properties of fire, are superlatively heavy, yielding light or colour, and fusible.
506. The _Earths_ are to be regarded as the proper total earth-element, namely as carbon neutralized by oxygen. The _Salts_ are to be regarded as combinations of the earth-and water-elements; therefore as combinations of carbon with oxygen and hydrogen. The _Inflammables_ are to be regarded as combinations of the earth-element with the air-element, thus of carbon with hydrogen, which supplies the place of nitrogen. The _Metals_ are to be regarded as combinations of the earth-element with the fire-element; therefore as carbon without any other body, only combined with spiritual actions, namely gravity, light and heat. Hence the apparent simplicity of metals, and the great number of special properties, which are absent in the other classes.
DEVELOPMENT OF THE CLASSES.
507. As there is not simply a single earth, salt, Inflammable and metal, but in each class many of them; we have to inquire what is the groundwork of their further distinctions or of their systematic division. Here also may we go to work again chemically and philosophically.
a. _Chemical Division._
The _Metals_, _chemically_ regarded, do not admit of being separated into constituent parts. They exhibit only physical differences in gravity, colour, hardness, malleability, conducting power, tension or their mutual polarity. If it be endeavoured to arrange them according to these respects, nothing but disorder results. The same is the case in reference to their affinity for oxygen, sulphur, the acids and other metals. Rather more order is at once displayed if their philosophical composition, namely as carbon and fire, be submitted to our consideration.
508. In consequence of this view, the _Metals_ must divide into Earth-metals and Fire-metals; and the latter again into three subdivisions, nearly as follows:--
A. Earth-metals--difficultly fusible and invariably oxydized--Sidereometalla, e. g. Iron--Manganese, Wolfram, Uranium, Titanium, Chromium, &c.
B. Fire-metals.
a. Heavy metals; difficultly fusible, unoxydized or noble metals, e. g. Platinum, Nickel, Cobalt.
b. Light metals; the easily fused noble metals--e. g. Gold, Silver, &c.