"Heat and light are not things in themselves, but different sensations in our bodies, or different effects in other bodies. They are merely effects of this mysterious thing we call radiant energy." He thus sustains my position and the electric theory of creation, which is, that there is but one universal and ultimate energy which he calls radiant and I call electric energy, and which are the same thing.
It is said that an Italian physicist wrote in 1843: "Light is merely a series of colorific indications, sensible to the organs of light, or vice versa; the radiations of obscure heat are veritable invisible radiations of light." This Langley, by his elaborate researches, more refined and complex than all preceding ones, proved to be true. Since so orthodox a scientist as Langley has proven there is but one energy, the other scientists may stumble over it awhile and then accept it, because he is high authority.
Sir Oliver Lodge, in the "Electrical World," of February 21st, 1903, sustains the electrical theory strongly. He says: "All matter is electrical in its nature. The difference between one kind of matter and another lies in the physical and chemical properties of the atoms; but the difference between the atoms is merely due to the difference of the electric grouping of the atoms."
He holds that the Thompson corpuscles are all electric. Thomson's theory is that negative electricity is matter. Lodge holds that all matter down to the ultimate corpuscle is electricity or electrical substance. Thus I am sustained by the highest most recent authority.
Prof. E. L. Larkin, of the California University, said recently: "The earth has a permanent charge of negative electricity, and the atmosphere is positive. The surface potential is therefore very near zero. This permits electro-magnetic waves from the sun to act with unabated energy." Prof. Lucien I. Blake of the Kansas University said in a recent lecture: "All atoms of matter are charged with electricity. All vital actions are always connected with electricity."
I could fill a volume with recent statements of scientists showing that electricity produces all the phenomena of nature, all of which they have learned in the last few years, while as a pioneer in this field of thought I have been trying to propagate these electrical theories for many years.
Every year new facts are discovered showing that electricity is the cosmic, evolving, ultimate and only force in nature and the universe is a vast electric machine or organism moved by electric currents of measureless force and power. The earth revolves around the sun, the sun gravitates around some siderial center in motion like itself, and myriads of suns and planets with their countless population move with many times the velocity of a cannon ball. Stars that seem tranquil and motionless in the heavens are projected through space with a velocity of one hundred to two hundred miles per second. The constituent atoms of our bodies move relatively with as much velocity as the stars in heaven. Motion—electric energy—reigns everywhere, forms everything, controls, handles and evolves all suns and planets, all physical life, substance and organisms in human experience and universal nature.
The electric rays of light from suns and stars of the most distant constellations dart their beams across the universe, and centuries after, the impulse of electric energy enters the human eye, and gives sense and vision to the soul. Thus the dynamic chains of electric light binds into living unity the realms of matter and mind, "through measureless amplitudes of space and time."
These electric currents are not only the source of all natural phenomena, but the sea of electro-magnetism from which they come is the reservoir of life, which stands back of all the myriad manifestations of physical existence, and is the great fountain of vitality from which all life must come.
What is electricity? Tesla says it is "invisible light," Atkins says it is "molecular motion," Fleming says it is "a spiral twist of the ether," but the best definition is given in the Scriptures where it says all things were made by the "word of His power." It is the word of creative power.