Conduit

“ In one part two conduits, or pipes, of a harder stone than that of the mountain land, of a different nature, delivered each a small stream of clear and excellent water from the rock into the road for the convenience of travellers. ”

“ Endless volumes have been written on the subject, but in plain words the whole art resolves itself into sound pipes for the conveyance of the fluid portion and efficient ventilation of the receptacles and conduits. ”

“ The four-ways were 3 ft. long, and the singles, 18 in.
A study of the foregoing dimensions will show that the working limits were narrow. Such narrow limits would not pay for the ordinary conduit line in a street, where there is more room. In the tunnel greater liberality meant either reducing the number of conduits or encroaching on the strength of the concrete tunnel lining. The small difference of only 1/8 in. in the size of the mandrel, or a clearance of only 1/16 in. on each side, no doubt did increase the cost of laying somewhat, though not as much as might at first be supposed. ”

“ The river, as it flows, resembles the air that flows over it; the air resembles the light which traverses it with more subtile currents; the light resembles the heat which rides with it through Space. Each creature is only a modification of the other; the likeness in them is more than the difference, and their radical law is one and the same. Hence it is, that a rule of one art, or a law of one organization, holds true throughout nature. ”

“ The channel of a sect! it is a pipe that bursts when the tide of life rises beyond a certain point. The channel of a system! it is an aqueduct through which, if one stone be taken out, the water ceases to reach you. ”

“ Even now, the digging up of a city road reveals a tangled network of water pipes, electric mains, gas pipes, and drain pipes suggestive of the dissection of an animal body. It is but a faint foreshadowing of what is to come. The substratum of life will become more and more complete as conscious life becomes simpler. ”

“ The argument is, that between an individual and any external object with which he has an affective connection, there exists a definite vital flow, as definite and concrete as the electric current whose polarized circuit sets our tram-cars running and our lamps shining, or our Marconi wires vibrating. ”

“ The air is literally filled with a vast net-work of wire, crossing and re-crossing in every conceivable direction, and over these, backward and forward, the thoughts of men are made to vibrate with the speed of lightning, in the elaboration and consummation of thousands of business schemes, and the air, as well as the buildings and streets, is full of human activity and enterprise. ”

“ Through the varied country the new wide roads will run, here cutting through a crest and there running like some colossal aqueduct across a valley, swarming always with a multitudinous traffic of bright, swift (and not necessarily ugly) mechanisms; and everywhere amidst the fields and trees linking wires will stretch from pole to pole. ”

“ The bridge, which makes land across the water, and the boat, which makes land on the water, and the cable, which makes land and water alike—these are the physical forms of the spirit of modern life, the democracy of matter. ”

“ We make a circuit, or we cross over and look behind us, and on the very same ground there is nothing to be seen but the rich brown soil swelling in the sunshine, warm with promise, and chequered perhaps here and there with a green blade bursting through the surface. ”

“ From the works of the architect, the engineer, and the mechanist, as exhibited in full relief, the student, whether at our schools or colleges, will derive the most valuable instruction. The gigantic aqueducts of ancient and modern times,—the viaducts and bridges which span our valleys and our rivers, and the machinery in our arsenals, factories, and workshops, will be objects of deep interest to the general as well as the professional inquirer. ”

“ When this theory is offered in seriousness as a final solution of the [72] mystery in question, we are tempted to ask, Who is electricity? what is his mental and moral status? and how and where did he get his education? Or if by “electricity” is here simply meant the subtile, imponderable, and impersonal fluid commonly known by that name, then let us ask, Who is at the other end of the wire?—for there must evidently be a who as well as a what in the case. ”

“ It turneth about continually in its circuit, And the wind returneth again to its circuits. 7All the rivers run into the sea, Yet the sea is not full; Unto the place whither the rivers go, Thither they go again. 8All things toil to weariness; Man cannot utter it, The eye is not satisfied with seeing, Nor the ear filled with hearing. ”

“ First, we find Conduction, by which heat passes from one particle to another next to it; as when one end of a poker is warmed by placing the other end in the fire. The bodies which allow this power free course are called conductors, and those which do not are named non-conductors, Metals are good conductors; feathers, wool, and furs are poor conductors; and water, air, and gases are non-conductors. ”

“ The child soon discontinues its efforts to thrust an arm through a glass window; and every day learns some new lesson in the properties of material objects. The engineer builds dams as well as the beaver;—but, beside dams, what marvels innumerable does he achieve with his earthworks, his timbers, and his stones! ”

“ And so with every other area of land in the world there is some one channel towards which the ground on all sides slopes gently down, and into this channel all the water will run, on its way to the sea. ”

“ When a conductor is brought near the skin, the snap heard, the spark seen, and the sting felt, are all located together and believed to be different aspects of one entity, the 'electric discharge.' The space of the seen object fuses with the space of the heard object and with that of the felt object by an ultimate law of our consciousness, which is that we simplify, unify, and identify as much as we possibly can. Whatever sensible data can be attended to together we locate together. ”

“ The machinery with which men pump the water from the river for the supply of a single city wears out; but these great engines with which God is constantly keeping the earth supplied with water for man and beast, for tree and flower, for garden and field, never wear out. Truly with the prophet we may exclaim: "He that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out on the face of the land: the Lord is His name." ”

“ This law of spiritual fluid, its communicative properties, and the channel by which it is imparted from one person to another, bear some resemblance, or analogy, to the laws and operations of electricity. Like electricity, it is imparted by the contact of two bodies, through the channel of the nerves. ”

“ These regular, every-day transformations of material elements from rock to tree, from tree to man, and back through a continual circuit, would repay us for spending our leisure hours in studying it, with our own eyes as well as with the eyes of others. The glance we have given is sufficiently suggestive to turn the attention of our readers that way. ”

“ I had put myself in right relation to Nature; I had established contact, as electricians would say; and as a consequence all the electric current of Nature flowed through me, vitalising and quickening me in every nerve. Men who live in cities are but half alive. ”

“ Not only can the metaphor of intense illumination of a particular field be justly used of it, but we may say that it seems to accelerate the flow of mental process through a particular channel, and so to draw into that channel the contents of other channels in connection with it, just as a rapid flow of water through a pipe sucks in water from connected pipes. ”

“ These three seven-world circuits of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are spheres of unexcelled grandeur and unimagined glory. Even their material or physical construction is of an order unrevealed to you. Each circuit is diverse in material, and each world of each circuit is different excepting the seven worlds of the Son, which are alike in physical constitution. All twenty-one are enormous spheres, and each group of seven is differently eternalized. As far as we know they have always been; like Paradise they are eternal. There exists neither record nor tradition of their origin. ”

“ The wonderful tenuity with which oil can be spread upon water is evinced by a few drops projected from a bridge, where the eye is properly placed over it, passing through all the prismatic colours as it diffuses itself. ”

“ The path the iron worker daily treads at the edge of the sandy platform, that narrow path that lies between running streams of fire on the one hand and a sheer drop on the other, is but an emblem of the Road of Life along which he must walk. ”

“ We speak of a bridge boldly swinging across the river, a mountain rising proudly to the clouds, a beam resting heavily on columns, lines crowding together or leaning against each other, tones hiding before and seeking each other. We attribute contents of the I to the things which we perceive; we give them mental life, feeling, and conduct, and experience in consequence further responses of our own life of feeling. ”

“ Let us suppose that one possesses a cause of motion well-determined: for example, a quantity of water, immobile in a reservoir, expecting that one allows it to fall, from a given height, in a smaller canal. ”

“ Imagine railway lines coming together about such a revolving table from all the earth, so that an engine could pass from this circular platform toward any quarter of the globe, the only condition being that the short track on the table correspond to the rails of the long track on which it was proposed for the engine to run, and you have an illustration, which in some degree helps us to understand the relation of man’s will to the laws of God. ”

“ Is air a good conductor of sound?
Air is a good conductor, but water is a better conductor than air; wood, metals, the earth, &c., are also good conductors.
733. Why can we hear sounds at a greater distance on water than on land?
For various reasons: because the smooth surface of water is a good conductor; because there are fewer noises, or counter vibrations, to interfere with the transmission of sound; and because there are no elevated objects to impede the progress of the vibrations. ”

“ Thus, those who have to conduct water through lead pipes will do it most successfully on these principles, because its descents, circuits, venters, and risings can be managed in this way, when the level of the fall from the sources to the city is once obtained. ”

“ For instance, this world of ours is pretty well girded now with the telegraph wires and cables; thought, with something less than the speed of thought, flashes from sunrise to sunset, from north to south, across the floods and the desert places. ”

“ Therefore, since it is held by physicists and philosophers and priests that all things depend upon the power of water, I have thought that, as in the former seven books the rules for buildings have been set forth, in this I ought to write on the methods of finding water, on those special merits which are due to the qualities of localities, on the ways of conducting it, and how it may be tested in advance. For it is the chief requisite for life, for happiness, and for everyday use. ”

“ As a river continues to run in the same course, in which its current first began to flow; so the whole creation moves in the same unvaried course as at first, like the continuous current and rippling waves of rivers. ”

“ When the current has been led into a suitable channel, it is expected to shape its own further course, and even to impose on itself the limits—the containing walls—which are needed if its depth and strength are to be maintained. ”

“ Man doth not live by bread alone, to absorb it and to evacuate it.
What is the breath of life? My dear, it is the strange current of interchange that flows between men and men, and men and women, and men and things. A constant current of interflow, a constant vibrating interchange. That is the breath of life.
And this interflow, this electric vibration is polarized. There is a positive and a negative polarity. This is a law of life, of vitalism.
Only ideas are final, finite, static, and single.
All life-interchange is a polarized communication. A circuit. ”

“ Moreover, the air which agitates the plants of our gardens has been moved by another, and this other by yet another; and these motions, subject to all the fixed and constant laws of nature, are all interlinked from the very first motion, just as the wheels are interlocked in a system of machinery. ”

“ As the electric fluid obeys its own laws upon the wire, so, also, does the spiritual or holy fluid convey itself, through certain channels, from one body to another, in accordance with certain legitimate laws. ”

“ When you have educated your Will to a certain height of electric command, you can at your pleasure see at any time, and see plainly, the spirits who inhabit the air; and also those who, descending to long distances below the Great Circle, come within the range of human electricity, or the attractive matter contained in the Earth's atmosphere. ”

“ Auntie Sue, there are as many currents in our river out there as there are human lives. A comparatively few great main or dominant currents in the river flow—a comparatively few great dominant currents in the river flow of life. ”

“ For example, we can converge as above to the limiting character expressing nature at an instant within the whole volume of the train at that instant, or to nature at an instant within some portion of that volume—for example within the boiler of the engine—or to nature at an instant on some area of surface, or to nature at an instant on some line within the train, or to nature at an instant at some point of the train. ”

“ Water will indeed flow indifferently towards the east or west; but will it flow indifferently up or down? It will not; and the tendency of human nature towards good is like the tendency of water to flow down. ”