This was proven by Newton himself; for there are many phenomena in our Solar System, which he confessed his inability to explain by the law of gravitation; “such were the uniformity in the directions of planetary movements, the nearly circular forms of the orbits, and their remarkable conformity to one plane.”[827] And if there is one single exception, then the law of gravitation has no right to be referred to as a universal law. “These adjustments,” we are told, “Newton, in his general Scholium, pronounces to be ‘the work of an intelligent and [pg 541] all-powerful Being’.” Intelligent that “Being” may be; as to “all-powerful,” there would be every reason to doubt the claim. A poor “God” he, who would work upon minor details and leave the most important to secondary forces! The poverty of this argument and logic is surpassed only by that of Laplace, who, seeking very correctly to substitute Motion for Newton's “all-powerful Being,” and ignorant of the true nature of that Eternal Motion, saw in it a blind physical law. “Might not those arrangements be an effect of the laws of motion?” he asks, forgetting, as do all our modern Scientists, that this law and this motion are a vicious circle, so long as the nature of both remains unexplained. His famous answer to Napoleon: “Dieu est devenu une hypothèse inutile,” could be correctly made only by one who adhered to the philosophy of the Vedântins. It becomes a pure fallacy, if we exclude the interference of operating, intelligent, powerful (never “all-powerful”) Beings, who are called “Gods.”
But we would ask the critics of the mediæval Astronomers, why should Kepler be denounced as most unscientific, for offering just the same solution as did Newton, only showing himself more sincere, more consistent and even more logical? Where may be the difference between Newton's “all-powerful Being” and Kepler's Rectores, his Sidereal and Cosmic Forces, or Angels? Kepler again is criticized for his “curious hypothesis which made use of a vortical movement within the solar system,” for his theories in general, and for favouring Empedocles' idea of attraction and repulsion, and “solar magnetism” in particular. Yet several modern men of Science, as will be shown—Hunt, if Metcalfe is to be excluded, Dr. Richardson, etc.—very strongly favour the same idea. He is half excused, however, on the plea that:
To the time of Kepler no interaction between masses of matter had been distinctly recognized which was generically different from magnetism.[828]
Is it distinctly recognized now? Does Professor Winchell claim for Science any serious knowledge whatever of the nature of either electricity or magnetism—except that both seem to be the effects of some result arising from an undetermined cause.
The ideas of Kepler, when their theological tendencies are weeded out, are purely Occult. He saw that:
(I) The Sun is a great Magnet.[829] This is what some eminent modern Scientists and also the Occultists believe in.
(II) The Solar substance is immaterial.[830] In the sense, of course, of Matter existing in states unknown to Science.
(III) For the constant motion and restoration of the Sun's energy and planetary motion, he provided the perpetual care of a Spirit, or Spirits. The whole of Antiquity believed in this idea. The Occultists do not use the word Spirit, but say Creative Forces, which they endow with intelligence. But we may call them Spirits also. We shall be taken to task for contradiction. It will be said that while we deny God, we admit Souls and operative Spirits, and quote from bigoted Roman Catholic writers in support of our argument. To this we reply: We deny the anthropomorphic God of the Monotheists, but never the Divine Principle in Nature. We combat Protestants and Roman Catholics on a number of dogmatic theological beliefs of human and sectarian origin. We agree with them in their belief in Spirits and intelligent operative Powers, though we do not worship “Angels” as the Roman Latinists do.
This theory is tabooed a great deal more on account of the “Spirit” that is given room in it, than of anything else. Herschell, the elder, believed in it likewise, and so do several modern Scientists. Nevertheless Professor Winchell declares that “a hypothesis more fanciful, and less in accord with the requirements of physical principles, has not been offered in ancient or modern times.”[831]
The same was said, once upon a time, of the universal Ether, and now it is not only accepted perforce, but is advocated as the only possible theory to explain certain mysteries.