The Universe a Vast Electric Organism

by Geo. W. Warder

They quote from their great authority, Huxley, who said that "Life was present potentially in matter when in the nebulous form and was unfolded from it by the way of natural development." I am willing to admit it, and to go one step further, and say it was there before the nebulæ was formed in the electric currents of life and power, which are the first manifestations of creative force. The potentiality of all physical life was there in those electric currents, but not the spirit or soul-life of man. That came long after, when the animal organism had been evolved and perfected.

Yes, truly, in a natural sense, as Kingsley says: "Water hates the oil with which it refuses to mix; and lime loves the acid which it receives into itself, and like a lover grows warm with the rapture of its affection." This refusal of water and oil to mix is caused by electric repulsion, and lime and acid is a simple form of electric attraction. Then the pantheists dwell on what they call the "soul-life of plants," the intelligence of birds and beasts, and the regularity of seasons, years, and earth and sun revolutions, and all natural phenomena, which they say proves the world is God. All of which I have endeavored to explain by electrical law and processes; and they conclude all these things prove the pantheism of the universe.

Let us notice some of the wonderful workings and transmutations in nature on which the advocates of pantheism rely. Mr. Titus, as one of its champions, says: "There is a common bond of unity between the different kingdoms of nature—the mineral, vegetable and animal. That there is some primal atomic or common condition, some homogeneous substance in nature, some elemental essence from the aggregations and combinations of which all forms are built up." This is undoubtedly true, and proves that in the atoms and electric laws of nature there are ample means for the creation of infinite substances and countless organic beings. This does not prove pantheism. It only proves progressive, wise electric, natural laws and forces. This "elemental essence from which all forms are built" I have shown elsewhere to be the ocean of electro-magnetism permeating all space and all life forms.

He says: "The processes of digestion and assimilation in man furnish evidence" of these things. That "the vegetable kingdom has power to assimilate earth and mineral and change it into vegetable, and in turn is digested and assimilated by the animal, and converted into an entirely different kingdom of nature." This is true, and I have shown how this is purely an electric process.

The dream of the alchemist, of the transmutation of metals, is mere child's-play compared with the processes of nature occurring every day in the human body. These are all electric transmutations by means of respiration, by digestion and assimilation of food, whereby a great variety of substance is converted into blood and bone, tissue and muscle, and all the functions of life preserved. It is also a correct statement that "all forms of matter have as their basis one common element, denominated primordial matter, protoplasm and homogeneous substance, all intended to designate the first form of matter."

This is true, and we found the first form of matter to be the electric currents of space, and the second form of matter to be the atom or molecule, and afterwards came the primordial cell or protoplasm. We also found that there was and is a common reservoir of life which stands back of its myriad manifestations upon the physical plane; a great ocean of vitality, which each organized being absorbs and gives out as we inhale and exhale the air we breathe. And that reservoir of life is the vast ocean of electro-magnetism in which all things float and exist as in a sea of magnetic life-giving power.

The old hypothetical atom and stolid or solid matter was dead, according to the scientists of a few decades ago. But the electrician, dealing with a higher grade of matter, found that the old idea of matter as dead and inert was untrue, and would not accord with the facts. So that a new definition of an atom had to be formulated, defining it as an electric center of force and motion. And some physicists deem life to be co-eternal with matter. Which is not an unreasonable hypothesis as applied to physical life and substance.

Prof. Tyndall in 1872 said: "Life was present potentially in matter when in the nebulous form, and was unfolded from it by the way of natural development." In this I agree with Prof. Tyndall as to all life, except the spiritual or psychic life of man. And I have elsewhere tried to show how physical life came from the electric currents which formed the nebula, and which was afterwards woven into the earth by electric and atomic assimilation.

Ah! now we come to the gist of all this scientific trouble—pessimistic, agnostic and pantheistic. It is this: "Modern science is firmly rooted in the conviction that inherent powers and qualities gradually unfolded under the operation of natural laws, rather than in a supernatural, extra-cosmic volition introducing arbitrarily new forces." And modern science is partly right. She is right in her facts and her conclusions on this vital and basic point as to all physical creations and natural forces and powers. But I insist that the creation of the soul or psychic life and powers of man are an exception, and do not come within the domain of physical creations. They are on a higher plane and as much above the realm of material forms and substances as our sun is above the earth. They belong to the spiritual world, to the realms of Deity, to the kingdom of God and the hosts of heaven.

They are a part of the great natural forces of the universe. Theologians call them supernatural forces, but they are the natural creative and controlling forces that have sovereignty over all the vast and complicated forms of the visible, material universe.