William George Hooper

“ The Universe is God's teaching in symbol and in type. It is His great picture-book, where in living form He has portrayed Himself, and all that belongs to Him--His nature, character, wisdom; His greatness, glory, and His power. The Universe is a temple, where He sits enshrined in the things His own hands have made, and where those who have eyes to see, and hearts to learn and understand, may adore and worship Him. ”

“ When we remember its ponderous mass, with its volume more than 1,200,000 times that of our earth, its huge girth of more than 2-1/2 millions of miles, and this always aglow with fire the most extensive known--fires so intense that they cover its huge form with a quivering fringe of flames which leap into space a distance of 80,000 miles, or even 100,000 miles, or over one-third of the distance of the moon from the earth,--remembering all these facts, what must be the volume and intensity of the aetherial heat waves which they generate and send upon their course into space on all sides! ”

“ The Pleiades and the twenty millions of suns that form our own galaxy and the Milky Way, with all their varied colours, tints, and hues of white, golden, orange, ruby, red and blue, green and grey, silver, purple and yellow, buff and fawn, emerald and green, lilac and coppery. Thus we see the distant Orion, so far away that swift-footed Light, with its speed of more than eleven million miles per minute, has to travel for more than thirty thousand years before it spans the gulf that intervenes between it and us, and brings to us the news of its existence there. ”

“ Thus our term Centrifugal Force really implies, and demands, a motion of the Aether which is ever directed away from the centre of gravity of any body, whether that body be an atom or molecule, satellite or planet, sun or star. From the phenomena of heat we have seen that there exists a repulsive motion, due to the aetherial medium, which is ever exerted from the central body of any atomic, planetary or stellar system, that repulsive motion being due to the pressure of the universal Aether, which not only surrounds all atoms, but also surrounds all other bodies in the universe. ”

“ A man must indeed be lacking in vision who cannot see behind all things the evidence of a richer and fuller truth than that which merely lies on the surface, or who fails to read and learn the greatest truth that circles the Universe in its ultimate unity, which indisputably points to the existence of an Eternal and ever-living Spirit, a God. I affirm that there is no scientific truth, even including the law of the conservation of matter and motion, which has been enunciated in this work, but what is reconcilable with the existence of an Eternal and Infinite Spirit ”

“ Even the aetherial atoms, which form the foundation stones of the universe, have their own purpose to fulfil in the glorious scheme of the Universe conceived by the Eternal Infinite; and to suppose that a star has no purpose to fulfil, no task to perform, is to suppose something altogether opposed to the teaching of all Philosophy. Why even man, with his finite wisdom, would not be so foolish, so unwise, as to make a star, and set it in the firmament of heaven for no purpose at all! ”

“ By the same reasoning, it is just as illogical to deny the existence of an atom of Aether because it cannot be seen or felt, as it is to deny the existence of an atom of hydrogen or oxygen. An atom of Aether reveals itself to the senses in the same way that an atom of hydrogen or oxygen does, that is, by the force or energy which it exerts. Its vibrations can be manifested to the body in the form of heat, while the undulatory motion which the aetherial atoms transmit in the form of light, reveal the presence of the aetherial atom to the sense of sight. ”

“ Thus we learn that all the dreams and thoughts, all the hypotheses and postulates of old-world as well as present-day philosophers find their consummation and ultimate realization in one universal, atomic, electro-magnetic medium.
If this fact does not stamp the theory with that authority which is undeniably associated with the names of some of the scientists quoted, then all the greatest men in the scientific world have lived and toiled, thought and dreamed in vain, while the priceless gems of their imagination and research are treated as worthless and valueless. ”

“ Thus, if there is a centre of gravity to a galaxy, even to the Milky Way itself, then, going one step further, with a faith that laughs at scientific data and leaps beyond the narrow bounds of pure reasoning, we affirm that there must even be a centre of gravity to the entire Universe. ”

“ All great discoveries of science have been the outcome of applying the principle, that what is true of the visible and seen, is true of the invisible and unseen; that what is true of the known, is true of the unknown; that the principles and laws [61] which govern the small also govern the large and the great. It was thus that Newton discovered his great Law of Gravitation, as he was able from the falling of an apple, to rise to the application of the same principle to our satellite the moon, and this led him on to the discovery of the Law of Gravitation. ”

“ Such a hypothesis is contrary to all laws and rules of Philosophy, and to continue to advocate its claims is to remain where we are in relation to the cause of Gravitation, and in complete ignorance of the beauty and harmony of the wonderful physical mechanism that underlies the whole of the universe. Of course, if experience and observation are no guide to Philosophy, then we will let imagination run riot, and postulate the most extravagant explanations for the varied phenomena of the heavens. ”

“ The very essence of Gravitation is that atoms, or particles, attract each other. If there were no particles, or atoms, it is obvious that there would be no attraction, and therefore no Gravitation. Wherever, therefore, there are to be found atoms of any kind or sort, whether they be atoms of hydrogen, oxygen, silver or aetherial atoms, there the Law of Gravitation holds good, and attraction between these atoms is to be found. In other words, any substance which is atomic, is also gravitative. Now Aether is atomic as has been shown, and therefore from that standpoint it is also gravitative. ”

“ Although we know nothing of what an atom is, yet we cannot resist forming some idea of a small particle which represents it to our mind, and though we cannot say what electricity is, so as to be able to say whether it is a particular matter or matters, or mere motion of ordinary matter, yet there is immensity of facts which justify us in believing that the atoms of matter are in some way endowed or associated with electrical powers to which they owe their most striking qualities, and amongst them their chemical affinity. ”

“ For it must be remembered that every star is a sun, which, reasoning by analogy, is the centre of a stellar system, just in the same way that our sun is the centre of our solar system. Like our sun, all stars shine by their own light, and the quality of that brilliancy decides the magnitude of the star, the magnitude being indicative of the relative brilliancy of a star rather than its size. ”

“ Our conception of an aetherial atom was based upon the analogy of our own planet, and there is every reason to believe that the little world in which all atoms live and move and have their being, is analogous to a planetary or solar system, in which we find the two essentials of matter and motion ever associated together, to form a larger and more complete mechanism. For atoms are not simply mere points; they possess real dimensions, with a determinate and fixed form, differing in their relative weights, and in the amount of motion or force with which each is endowed. ”

“ Each and every one, small or great, glittering or blazing, sun or planet, are ever creating or generating Aether-waves, and impressing them with all the [79] details and particulars of their nature and existence; and these Aether-waves ever bear upon their mystic wings the impressions received, carrying the information given with lightning speed to the very confines and limits of infinite space or the material universe; beyond which exists nothing but the ever-living and active energy of the Divine, the only unlimited, unbounded, and absolute infinitive. ”

“ The solar fires are ever glowing, and their flames ever burning, robing the solar disc with its quivering fringe, or madly leaping on every side to a distance of one hundred thousand miles, and by their madness lashing the aetherial atmosphere into fury, creating aetherial waves, myriads upon myriads, and sending them with lightning speed across the intervening space. ”

“ Now if there be this quantity of heat existing in the sun, and heat according to the first law of thermodynamics has a mechanical value, which is that it can push or lift a body through space, the question arises, as to what is the mechanical value of this heat of the sun? Are we to suppose that if one unit of heat can lift 1 lb. 772 feet, the millions and millions of units of heat which are constantly being poured out of the sun into space are doing no work at all? ”