Extracted text
Editorial transcription, lightly normalized from the scan. Line-break hyphenation, letter spacing, and unmistakable OCR errors have been repaired; the claims remain those of The Flaming Sword.
Editor Flaming Sword:—I desire to ask a few questions regarding some conclusions in Cellular Cosmogony. It is said that there is nothing outside of the earth's shell. (1) Now, how does any one know that, even if we accept the cellular hypothesis? If we are on the inside of the earth, it appears to me that we would have no way of learning whether or not there are other spheres like our own, and independent of this earth. (2) Then again, it is stated that the earth's crust or shell is about 100 miles in thickness. How do you know that? (3) How do you know that the material planets consist of mercury? Why not glass? (4) How do you know that above our atmosphere there is an atmosphere of hydrogen, and above that another kind of atmosphere called aboron?—Dr. W. F., Detroit, Mich.
(1) Koreshanity is a great system of conclusions, reached through processes of analogical, synthetical, and analytical reasoning. We reason from cause to effect and from effect to cause. The laws of comparative analogy are absolute, and when the premise is established, that the relations between the physical universe and man are specific—that man is the highest product of all universal activity—we are in position to compare the anatomy of the universe with the human anatomy, and reach conclusions that are not only rational, but absolute.
The very meaning of the word universe is proof that there is only one system of existence; the universe is a unity of all there is. There must be one supreme cause of all existence, and that supreme cause is the involution of all things, the impression of all activities and experiences in the one great environ. When that one cause has expressed itself completely and perfectly in the outermost form of expression, and we find that that outermost expression is not only perfect, but contains all of the functions of the cause, all of the functions of the perfect man, we have reached the limit of the expression of the one cause; hence there could be no more. We hold to the absolute unity of cause. One perfect cause could not express itself in two perfect universes; and a perfect universe could never divide itself, nor evolve into other forms. Hence there are no other universes evolved from this one, and this one could not evolve from any other.
Existence has form, and limitation is a factor of form; hence the universe is limited. If it is limited, then its space is limited; and if its space is limited, there is no universal space outside of the universe; and if there is no space outside of the shell in which we live, there is no room for other cells outside of this one, for the earth occupies all the space there is.
(2) The conclusion that the earth's shell is about 100 miles in thickness, is reached through analogical processes of reasoning and calculation from the basis of the specific gravity of the substances which compose the universe. We begin with the correspondence existing between the egg and the universe, because the universe is an egg. The thickness of the shell of a common hen's egg and the diameter of the egg, sustain about the same relation as the thickness of the earth's shell and the diameter of the earth. When we take the specific gravity of the substances which compose the universe, we have a premise that is indisputable; and when we ascertain the specific gravity and the depth of our atmosphere, and compare them with the specific gravity and depth of a stratum which all the water in the world would make, we are enabled to deduce a ratio as to the relative thickness of all other substances emplaced in the shell; the results of calculations premised on such ratio, give the thickness to be about 100 miles.
(3) Mercury is the only universal amalgamator. The material planets perform the function of assimilation of the gravic energies received by the metallic planes of the shell; they are in the great digestive tract or alimentary canal of the universe. The disci are forced along between the plates or laminae of the shell by contraction and expansion of the strata; hence, they have a vermicular motion similar to the movements in the alimentary canal of the human system. The planets are in the “bowels of the earth.” You see, the planets perform other and absolutely necessary functions than those of mere reflectors of solar energies. Glass would be entirely out of the question; mercury alone would answer the purpose. Mt. Vesuvius is the principal outlet of the alimentary canal of the physical cosmos. Lava, the nature and origin of which have so long puzzled the “scientists,” is the result of the burning of refuse amalgams in the vulcan fires which constitute the Gehenna of the physical universe.
(4) There are three mental atmospheres, the three heavens, in humanity—the external, the next inner, and the most interior; they constitute the external mind, the spiritual and celestial worlds. Correspondingly, there must be three atmospheres in the physical world, and beneath and outside of the atmospheres is the earth, as viewed by Swedenborg when in a state of illumination; he saw the cellular cosmos. We live in the outer atmosphere; we know what it is, and have ascertained its depth. We know also that there is no free hydrogen in the air, and also that water is the product of hydrogen, for hydrogen is the water producer, according to the meaning of the word. Hence there must be an atmosphere of hydrogen above our own, whence energies gravitate to produce clouds and rain. The nature of the most interior atmosphere is ascertained through analogical analysis of the qualities of life in the celestial atmosphere of humanity, and the translation of the terms over into the domain of the physical cosmos. The word aboron means “the waters beyond.”
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The source scans remain the record. This page preserves the periodical’s argument without presenting its conclusions as independently established fact.
The Flaming Sword · Vol. 13, No. 36 · Jul 1899 · PDF pp. 10–11