The Universe a Vast Electric Organism

by Geo. W. Warder

Therefore on the physical facts of organic creation I agree generally with the scientists. And if they had been informed in some of the vital and intelligent processes of electrical creation, they would never have believed in pantheism, or been pessimistic sceptics or hopeless agnostics. And in my judgment the only thing that will redeem modern science from pantheism is the prevalent belief in and acceptance of the theory of electrical creation.

This will explain the harmony, intelligence, continuity and perfection of the physical universe, and relieve their minds of all grounds for scepticism.

There is "an intelligence or selective power" in matter. There is a great "Chemist-Physicist" superintending nature's operations, sorting out two parts of hydrogen and one of oxygen to compose the raindrop and the waters of the ocean. It is no "fortuitous concourse of atoms," which accomplishes these results and preserves the life of the world. It is the omniscient wisdom embraced in the laws and forces of electric energy, which is the right hand of Deity and the word of Creative power.

To show the possibility and ease with which many of the Bible miracles could have been performed by natural processes at the volition of Divine power, Dr. Albert G. Geyser of New York City, on May 14, 1903, according to the New York World, elucidated many of the miracles by the use of electricity and the X-ray. This he did before the members of the priesthood of the Holy Name Society of St. Anselm's Church, to whom he said he felt he would be able to demonstrate that the miracles were in no way inconsistent with science. After setting up his apparatus, he said:

"For centuries those who thought deeply on the matter have been puzzled with grave doubts as to the possibility of God being all-seeing and all-hearing. What did the telephone reveal thirty years ago? Did it not reveal forces in nature that would allow men to hear voices at great distances? And now, thanks to the great Roentgen invention of only nine years ago, we are able to see through a four-foot wall simply by means of this puny apparatus."

Then he set the great glass wheels of his battery in action and allowed his audience to look through pieces of thick timber, and other solid bodies. He showed how simple it was to produce a halo of electric fire about his head though he remained a distance of ten feet from the apparatus. As he raised the two negative and positive poles to his head the electricity passed through and out of the crown of his head in a circle of flame. Then he compelled his machine to shoot jagged flashes of lightning. Then, referring to the Bible account of the descent of the Holy Ghost in a pillar of fire, he called for volunteers, and Thomas MacKaye came forward onto the platform. He then placed two steel rods on each side of him, and started his apparatus, when tiny sparks began to jet off of Mr. MacKaye's clothing. Soon the sparks grew to curling flames, and the man's entire body became as a mass of writhing blue and white flame. Yet afterwards when he stepped from the platform not a thread of his clothing was singed. Rev. Father Ruppert, at the close, said: "Nothing I have ever seen has brought me to so fully understand God's miracles."

These pantheistic devotees are even trying to make waves of ether, air and water intelligible things, and seem to think they are in the nature of a circulating medium for this world-God, like blood is the circulating medium of man's body. Even so orthodox a scientist as Prof. Serviss, in the New York American of May 16th, 1903, goes into panegyrics over waves and wave motion as follows: "The undulatory theory of energy is carrying everything before it. It is not saying too much to aver that wave motion is concerned in nearly all the phenomena of physical life.... Think for a moment of what is included in the science of waves. In the air all sounds, all musical harmonies are waves; in the solid globe, all earthquakes are waves; in the ether light, electricity and heat are waves. It is waves that make the stars visible, and yet more mysterious oscillations picture for us on photographic plates marvelous nebulous objects. Lord Kelvin has been credited with the statement that the fluttering of a butterfly's wing sets up vibrations that shake the universe."

This is superficial science, for it explains nothing. Waves are simply a form of motion, and a form of motion creates nothing. Vibrations of what? Wave motions of what? Our learned friend does not inform us. Vibrations and wave motions are like heat sensations, they are not realities; the force that creates them is the reality, and they are but the mode or law of operation. The reality—the force creating these vibrations and wave motions—is electricity. Yet he does not mention this fact or any cause, but gives all the credit to the motion or manner of motion, and ignores the cause, which is the most important of all. Mr. Titus seems to think motion has consciousness, for he states that, "the consciousness which is wrapped up in motion" becomes more or less active in matter, and that God sleeps in the atom, and man is a potential deity.