The Immensity Of Creation

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Title:     The Immensity Of Creation
Author: John S. Adams [More Titles by Adams]

IT is well for man to consider the heavens, the work of God's hands; the moon and the stars, which he has created. To look forth upon the universe, of which we form a part, fills us with high and ennobling thoughts, and inspires us with an earnest desire to press onward in the endless path, at every step of which new wonders and new joys spring up to greet our vision, and to gladden our souls.

Whichever way we look, above or below us, to the right or the left, we find a boundless expanse teeming with life and its enjoyments. This earth, large as it may appear to us, is less than a grain of sand in size, when compared with the vastness around it.

Take your soul away from earth, and send it on a mission of research among other worlds. Let it soar far away to where the dog-star, Sirius, holds its course; and then, though nineteen billion two hundred million miles from earth, a distance so great, that light, travelling, as it does, at the rate of six million six hundred and twenty thousand miles a minute, would require three years to pass it,--even then, when the journeying spirit had reached such a point, it might pass on and on,--new worlds meeting its gaze at every advance, and new wonders being seen as far beyond the point it had attained as the inconceivable length of the path it had already travelled multiplied a myriad of times.

We can scarcely comprehend the vast distance of Sirius; yet, great as this distance is, it is the nearest star to our system, and stars have been seen whose distance from the earth is estimated to be a thousand times as great!

Can human mind mark that range? A thousand times nineteen billion two hundred million! And were we to stand on the last of these discovered stars, we might look yet far beyond, and see "infinity, boundless infinity, stretching on, unfathomed, forever."

To have an idea of the vastness of creation, we must possess the mind of the Creator. What are we? We live and move and have our being on a grain of creation, that is being whirled through boundless space with inconceivable rapidity. And we affect to be proud of our estate! We build houses and we destroy them; we wage war, kill, brutify, enslave, ruin each other; or, we restore, beautify, and bless. We are vain, sometimes. We think the world was made for us; the stars shine for us, and all the hosts that gem the drapery of night created for our special benefit. Astonishing presumption!-born of ignorance and cradled in credulity!

The mind grows dizzy as it attempts to conceive of constellation beyond constellation, on and on, through endless space.

Commencing with this earth, the mind given up to serious reflection muses upon its broad extent of territory, its continents and its oceans, and it appears very large indeed. Forgetting, for a moment, its knowledge of other planets, it believes that this world is the whole universe of God; that the sun, moon and stars, are but lights in the firmament of heaven to give light upon the earth. But truth steps in and change the mind's view. It shows that, large and important as this earth may appear, the sun, which is spoken of as inferior, is three hundred and fifty-four thousand nine hundred and thirty six times larger; and the stars, that seem like diamond points above us, are, many of them, larger than the sun, one being one billion eight hundred million miles in diameter. Yet, such a bulk, when compared to the universe, is less than a monad.

A "monad" is an indivisible atom. It is as incomprehensible as the mysteries of creation, or the duration of eternity.

Tripoli, or rotten-stone, an article used in every family, and tons of which are daily employed in manufactories, is composed entirely of animalculæ. In each cubic inch there are forty-one billion, that is, forty-one million-million of these living, breathing creatures, each of whom has organs of sight, hearing and digestion. Think, if you can, of the internal organization of beings a million of whom could rest on the point of a cambric needle!

But there are more minute forms of creation than even those. Deposit a grain, the four hundred and eightieth part of an ounce of musk, in any place, and, for twenty years, it will throw off exhalations of fragrance, without causing any perceptible decrease of weight. The fragrance that for so many years goes forth from that minute portion of matter is composed of particles of musk. How small must each of those particles be, that follow each other in ceaseless succession for twenty years, without lessening, to any perceptible degree, the weight of the deposit! And yet we have not reached the monad. A celebrated author

Niewentyt. made a computation which led to the conclusion that six billion as many atoms of light flow from a candle in one second as there are grains of sand in the whole earth, supposing each cubic inch to contain one million!

Here we must stop. Further advances are impossible, yet our end is not attained; we have not yet reached the monad, for the animalculæ and the less sentient particles of matter, light, are not, for they are divisible.

The insect can be divided, because it has limbs with which to move; and an intelligence higher than man can doubtless see emanations from those particles of light. But a monad is indivisible! Think of each cubic inch of this great earth containing a million grains of sand, and those countless grains multiplied by one billion, or a million-million, and that the product only shows the number of particles of light that flow from a candle in one second of time!-and not a monad yet! Minds higher than ours can separate each of these particles, and yet perhaps they find not the indivisible, but assign over to other minds the endless task.

With such thoughts let us return to our first point, and remark that the star tens of billions of miles distant, one billion eight hundred million miles in diameter, is but a monad when compared with the creations of the vast universe of God!

Here the mind sinks within itself, and gladly relinquishes the herculean task of endeavoring to comprehend, for a single moment, a fractional part of the stupendous whole.

Deep below us, high above us, far as the eye of the mind can see around us, are the works of our Creator, marshalled in countless hosts. All animated by his presence, all breathed upon by his life, inspired by his divinity, fostered by his love, supported by his power.

And in all things there is beauty-sunbeams and rainbows; fragrant flowers whose color no art can equal. In every leaf, every branch, every fibre, every stone, there is a perfect symmetry, perfect adaptation to the conditions that surround it. And thus it is, from the minutest insect undiscernible by human eye, to the planet whose size no figures can represent. Each and all the works of God order governs, symmetry moulds, and beauty adorns.

There are all grades of beings, from the monad to the highest intelligences, and man occupies his position in the endless chain. Could you hear and see, as seraphs listen and behold, you would hear one continuous song of glad praise go up from all creation; you would see all things radiant with smiles, reflecting the joys of heaven. And why? Because they follow nature's leading, and, in doing so, live and move in harmony.

Who can scale the heights above us, or fathom the depths below us? Who can comprehend the magnitude of countless worlds that roll in space-the distance that separates the nearest orb from our earth, the worlds of being in a drop of water, the mighty array of angel forms that fill immensity?

Well may we exclaim, "Great and marvellous are thy works, O Lord of Hosts, and that my soul knoweth right well!"

[The end]
John S. Adams's short story: Immensity Of Creation

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