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EDITOR FLAMING SworD :—-I pass by, with brief mention, the pitiful narrowing down of the universe to the beggarly circumference of 25,000 miles—barely two months’ journey. Think of it—a man in these days can travel around the universe in about 60 days! Aside from that absurdity, your arguments are as fallacious and misleading as could well be expressed in words. For instance, the attempt to explain the disappearance of a ship’s hull while the masts are still visible, up on the principle of foreshortening or narrowing of the lines of vision, is so utterly inadequate that it ought not to deceive a child. You use the illustration of two railroad tracks approaching each other and disappearing at the vanishing-point. Surely, you are not so flighty as to believe in such an explanation. You know that the two tracks appear to merge into one and disappear together; whereas, the hull, the lowest point of vision, and much the larger object, always disappears first, while the comparatively small topsail remains in sight, which would not be the case on a flat or a concave surface.
Again, why do you ignore the fact that the phenomenon of foreshortening is manifest horizontally as well as vertically? No matter how long nor how high the hull may be, and no matter how small nor how low the sails and upper work,the hull always disappears first. Your attempted explanation of why Chicago cannot be seen from St. Louis, in the concave earth, seems to be utterly unsatisfactory. The distance in a straight line is about 250 miles. There are many telescopes that would practically annihilate that distance and bring your skyscrapers almost to our door yards. With an elevation great enough to overcome the convexity, this could easily be done. From the summit of Pike’s Peak, with the aid of a good glass, Denver can be seen 75 miles away, which half way down the mountain is impossible.—Prof. W. F. P., St. Louis, Mo.
Koreshan Science narrows down the universe to the proper limits of comprehension; it insists upon the exercise of the sense of proportion and the logic of use. But we are not responsible for the fact that the earth, the ground of inhabitation of the world of man, is no more than 25,000 miles in circumference. Does humanity need a larger field of activity? If so, why was it not provided? It is no argument against the beneficent wisdom of the Creator of the cosmos, to say that the earth is pitifully small because a man can travel around it in 60 days. The fact that he can do so speaks volumes for genius, which looks to the universal dissemination of knowledge—universal, we say, because the earth is the universe in fact as well as in common usage of the terms applied to the earth. A condition which prevails throughout the earth is a universal condition; a cosmopolitan city is a city which contains inhabitants from all parts of the cosmos—a strange thing to say in these days of fallacy, but the statement is absolutely true. We violate no principles of law, logic, nor language when we say that the earth is the physical limit of the universal system of existence.
Art has for its basis certain geometrical principles which cannot be ignored. We maintain that art is true. No artist will attempt to produce a perspective drawing or picture of any landscape or waterscape, without the well-known “vanishing-line”— the actual horizon of the picture; he must apply the principles of geolinear foreshortening as well as horizontal and vertical perspective, else his picture will not be a true and accurate projection. Art affirms in boldest terms that the sea horizon is the vanishing-line, not the apex of a bulge of water. The artist’s perspective projection is scientific; it is in accordance with the principles of geometry, and in agreement with the testimony of the camera and the natural orb of vision.
If the geolinear extense were a perfectly flat surface instead of a concavity, practically the same phenomena as related to that surface would be apparent, because within the limit of accessible altitudes of observations, the earth is flat enough to produce an apparent horizon by virtue of the laws of foreshortening. Observe a picture of the sea, or the sea itself, from an altitude of 10 feet. The first mile projects a vertical impression of a given length; the second mile, a shorter picture—about one sixth the length of the first; the third mile, a still shorter picture; the fourth mile, almost a line, beyond which no impression is made of the surface, for the simple reason that the angle is too small to be drawn or perceived. Consequently, beyond the horizon or vanishing-line, no surface can be seen—a fact absolutely demonstrable by diagram true to scale.
If at the vanishing-line the surface becomes invisible, there must be beyond the horizon a curving line of successive vanishing-points, below which no object can be seen. Suppose that at the vanishing-line an object of a given size appears to be just a point; at twice the distance, the object would certainly be entirely invisible; but if its vertical dimensions be increased four times, it will appear to be a point, and so on, according to the square of the distance. Perspective cannot operate below an opaque surface; beyond the vanishing-line, the ratio of perspective accelerates in proportion to the square of the distance. Hence, the hull of a vessel disappears according to the two-fold factor of perspective and geolinear foreshortening; it involves all the principles of vertical and horizontal foreshortening, and the apparent contraction of the earth’s surface. Increase the altitude of observation, and the vision is extended and the vanishing-line appears farther away. Rise high enough in the atmosphere above the concavity, and St. Louis would be visible from Chicago.
The artist knows very well that the vertical contraction of the land or waterscape is due to the increasing acuteness of the angles in proportion to the distance; and if he attempted to picture-a house or vessel, or mountain at some distance beyond the horizon, he would place so much of it out of sight as is hidden by the apparent rise of the surface, and apparently below the vanishing-line—zof because he conceives the earth to be convex, but because the very principles of geometry to which his picture must conform, demand that the objects should be so represented. Art existed before the earth’s convexity was conceived; its principles are the same today; and art says in terms of its own, that the apparent perspective slope of the geolinear surface extends beyond into space, below which absolutely nothing can be seen, without aid to vision.
We want to know if a scientist exists who is ready to affirm and to demonstrate that art is false. Who will affirm that it is? The principles of foreshortening are in agreement with the impression on the camera plate and on the retina of the eye; by virtue of these principles, the vanishing line or horizon appears in the drawing, in the photograph, and in the field of visual perception. We cannot logically deny the testimony of these scientific projections of the relation of the earth and sky to the point of vision; the geometrical principles involved in the art of picture-making demonstrate that the hull of a vessel disappears by virtue of the laws of foreshortening; and no man will ever be able to successfully contradict these statements.
The Flaming Sword · Vol. 16, No. 26 · May 16, 1902 · PDF pp. 12–13