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The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol. 1 [[Vol. 1, Page]] 500 THE SECRET DOCTRINE. V. THE THEORIES OF ROTATION IN SCIENCE. C ONSIDERING that "final cause is pronounced a chimera, and the first Great Cause is remanded to the Sphere of the Unknown," as a reverend gentleman justly complains, the number of hypotheses put forward, a nebula in itself, is most remarkable. The profane student is perplexed, and does not know in which of the theories of exact science he has to believe. Here we have hypotheses enough for every taste and power of brain. They are all extracted from a number of scientific volumes. C URRENT H YPOTHESES EXPLAINING THE O RIGIN OF R OTATION. Rotation has originated either -- ( a ) By the collision of nebular masses wandering aimlessly in space; or by attraction , "in cases where no actual impact takes place." ( b ) "By the tangential action of currents of nebulous matter (in the case of an amorphous nebula) descending from higher to lower levels,* or simply by the action of the central gravity of the mass. " ** "It is a fundamental principle in physics that no rotation could be generated in such a mass by the action of its own parts. As well attempt to change the course of a steamer by pulling at the deck railing," remarks to this Prof. Winchell in "World-Life." H YPOTHESES OF THE O RIGIN OF THE S EVEN P LANETS AND C OMETS. ( a ) We owe the birth of the Planets (1) to an explosion of the Sun -- a parturition of its central mass;*** or (2) to some kind of disruption of the nebular rings. ( b ) "The Comets are strangers to our planetary system" ( La Place ) . "The Comets are undeniably generated in our Solar system" ( Faye ) . ( c ) The " fixed stars are motionless" says one authority. . . . "All the stars are actually in motion" answers another authority. . . "Undoubtedly every star is in motion" ( Wolf ) . ( d ) "For over 350,000,000 years, the slow and majestic movement of the Sun around its axis has never for a moment ceased" ( Panorama des Mondes , Le Couturier. ) [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * The terms "high" and "low" being only relative to the position of the observer in Space, any use of those terms tending to convey the impression that they stand for abstract realities, is necessarily fallacious. ** Jacob Ennis , "The Origin of the Stars," p. 221 et seq. *** If such is the case, how does Science explain the comparatively small size of the planets nearest the Sun? The theory of meteoric aggregation is only a step farther from truth than the nebular conception, and has not even the quality of the latter -- its metaphysical element. [[Vol. 1, Page]] 501 CONTRADICTORY HYPOTHESES. ( e ) And "the Sun having Alcyone in the Pleiades for the centre of its orbit, consumes 180,000,000 of years in completing its revolution" ( Maedler ) . And also, ( f ) That, " the Sun has existed no more than 15 , 000 , 000 of years , and will emit heat for no longer than 10 , 000 , 000 years more " ( Sir W. Thomson ' s lecture on " the latent dynamical theory regarding the probable origin , total amount of heat , and duration of the Sun ," 1887). A few years ago this eminent Scientist was telling the world that the time required for the earth to cool from incipient incrustation to its present state, could not exceed 80,000,000 years * ; ( Thomson and Tait , Natural Philosophy. ) If the encrusted age of the world is only 40 millions, or the half of the duration once allowed, and the Sun's age only 15 millions, have we to understand that the earth was at one time independent of the Sun? Since the ages of the Sun, planets, and the Earth, as stated in the many scientific hypotheses of the astronomers and physicists, are given elsewhere ( infra ), we have said enough to show the disagreement between the ministers of modern Science. Whether we accept the fifteen million years of Sir W. Thomson or the thousand millions of Mr. Huxley, for the rotational evolution of our solar system, it will always come to this; by accepting self-generated rotation for the heavenly bodies composed of inert matter and yet moved by their own internal motion , for millions of years, this teaching of Science amounts to -- ( a ) An evident denial of that fundamental physical law, which states that "a body in motion tends constantly to inertia , ( i.e. , to continue in the same state of motion or rest), unless it is stimulated into further action by a superior active force." ( b. ) To an original impulse, which culminates in an unalterable motion, within a resisting ether that N EWTON had declared incompatible with that motion. ( c. ) Universal gravity, which, we are taught, always tends to a centre in rectilinear descent -- alone the cause of the revolution of the whole solar system, which is performing an eternal double gyration, each body around its axis and orbit. Another occasional version is: -- ( d. ) A magnet in the Sun; or, the said revolution due to a magnetic force, which acts, just as gravitation does, in a straight line -- varying inversely as the square of the distance. (Coulomb's Law.) ( e. ) The whole acting under invariable and changeless laws, which are, nevertheless, often shown variable, as during some well-known freaks [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * And even on these figures Bischof disagrees with Thomson, and calculates that 350 million years would be required for the earth to cool from a temperature of 20,000 degrees to 200 degrees centigrade. This is, also, the opinion of Helmholtz. [[Vol. 1, Page]] 502 THE SECRET DOCTRINE. of planets and other bodies, as also when the Comets approach to or recede from the Sun. ( f .) A M OTOR F ORCE always proportionate to the mass it is acting upon; but independent of the specific nature of that mass, to which it is proportionate; which amounts to saying, as Le Couturier does, that, "without that Force independent from and of quite another nature than the said mass, the latter, were it as huge as Saturn, or as tiny as Ceres, would always fall with the same rapidity" ( Musee des Sciences , 15 August, 1857). A mass, furthermore, which derives its weight from the body on which it weighs.