The researches of Lodge in England and of Hertz in Germany give us an almost infinite range of ethereal vibrations …. Here is unfolded to us a new and astonishing world,—one which it is hard to conceive should contain no possibilities of transmitting and receiving intelligence …. Here also is revealed to us the bewildering possibility of telegraphy without wires, posts, cables, or any of our present costly appliances …. As for myself, I hold the firm conviction that unflagging research will be rewarded by an insight into natural mysteries, such as now can rarely be conceived.—Professor Wm. Crookes, M.R.A., F.R.S., &c.
Vibratory Philosophy teaches that “in the great workshop of Nature there are no lines of demarcation to be drawn between the most exalted speculation and common-place practice, and that all knowledge must lead up to one great result; that of an intelligent recognition of the Creator through His works.”
“Facts are the body of science; speculation is its soul.”
It has been said that there is nothing more sublime in the history of mind than the lonely struggles which generate and precede success. After the admission made by Professor Rücker, M.A., at the last meeting of the British Association, that the ether may be “the material of which all matter is composed,” and that “we may, perhaps, be able to use and control the ether as we now use and control steam,” there would seem to be grounds for hoping that Keely’s “lonely and prolonged struggles” to utilize in mechanics the ether product which he obtains from his method of dissociating the elements of water, will be more universally recognized and appreciated than they have yet been. Discovery may be unsought and instantaneous, but the inventions for utilizing discoveries may be, and generally are, the work of years.
Keely first imprisoned the ether in 1872, when its existence was denied; or, if admitted by a few, it was called “the hypothetical ether.” In 1888, Professor Henri Hertz discovered and announced, in the Revue des Deux Mondes, that the ether is held in a state of bondage in all electro-magnetic engines. Not until this fact had been made known, were there any scientific men, with one notable exception, who were willing to admit it was possible that Keely might also have “stumbled over” the manner of effecting its imprisonment.
The nature of Keely’s researches, and the length of time in which he has been absorbed by the necessary dead-work, attendant upon research before a discovery can be utilized, may be gathered from a letter recently written by Mr. C. G. Till, of Brooklyn, New York:—
“In Keely’s early struggles, somewhere about twenty years ago, I became acquainted with him, and helped him then to the best of my ability. Indeed I may say that I was god-father to his discovery; for I was with him when the idea first entered his head that he could combine steam and water to run an engine. At that time he made a crude machine, which he actually ran for some time; and this was the original model of the Pneumatic-Pulsating-Vacuo-Engine, in the operation of which he discovered his present force. From that day to this he has been in pursuit of some method as a medium to use what he calls his etheric force with. That he has actually discovered a new force there is not a shadow of doubt. In those days I have known him to sell and pawn everything of value in his house to obtain means to continue his investigations with the money thus acquired; and I am sure that he will eventually give to the world the greatest boon that has been received by it since the advent of Christianity,” etc., etc.
It has been very generally thought that Keely is pursuing the ignis fatuus of perpetual motion. No greater mistake could have been made. The genuineness of his claims as a discoverer rests upon a correct answer to the question, “Is hydrogen gas an element or a compound?”
Science, as Herodotus said, is to know things truly: but science tells us that hydrogen is a simple, that the atom is not divisible, and that latent energy is not locked in the interstitial spaces of all forms of matter from their birth or aggregation. Keely’s system of Vibratory Physics refutes these canons of science. How absurd must seem the idea to many that the schools can be wrong, and that Keely, who has been branded by some of these schools as an impostor, should be right: but time will show whether Keely’s discoveries have “come to stay.” The history of the past shows us that science has never been infallible; that like Christianity she unfolds her truths progressively. Keely teaches that an unknown potency is held in the atom’s tenacious grasp, until released by an introductory impulse given by a certain order of vibration, depending upon the mass-chord of the aggregation; which impulse so increases the oscillation of the atoms as to rupture their etheric capsules. All great truths hold germs potential of ever-increasing growth. It took half a century for the “Principia” of Newton to overcome the contempt that was showered upon it; and now progressive science is overshadowing Newton’s vast attainments. In his giant mind was born the hypothesis that the ether is the cause of light and gravity. Keely has been teaching for years, that ether is the medium of all force. For every effect science requires an efficient cause. Hence, when Faraday found no definite knowledge in exact sciences to satisfy him on certain points he was led into speculative science, or the preliminary reaching after truths which we feel must exist by reason of certain effects that come under our observation, analogous to already known laws:—“reduced facts lie behind us; speculative ones lie before us;” and without these latter science could make no progress. Faraday was only speculating when he said: “Thus either present elements are the true elements; or else there is the probability before us of obtaining some more high and general power of nature even than electricity; and which, at the same time, might reveal to us an entirely new grade of elements of matter, now hidden from our view and almost from our suspicion.”
Faraday’s keen perception and acute practical judgment, were never better exemplified than in Keely’s discovery of Negative Attraction; the laws governing which he is still researching; theorizing that it is the energy which controls the planetary masses in their advance toward each other, and in their recession from each other,—the energy which lifts the seas and the oceans out of their beds, and replaces them once in twenty-four hours; in other words, explaining the mystery of the action of gravity.