The mystery of space

by Robert T. Browne

When we speak of form it must not be understood thereby that reference is made only to the gross physical form, but to the entire range of vital assumptions or vehicles which life ensouls for purposes of manifestation. This range we believe to cover the whole path of kosmogenesis seriating from the densest to the most subtle. Our chief concern, however, is the immediate effect which the totality of life's operations will have upon humanity or the form which it ensouls as the human organism. For it is impossible that humanity shall escape either the general or the specific results of the exalting power which life exerts over materiality and its appurtenances. It is, of course, impossible here to go into the various implications of this general forward movement of the universum of materiality or even to outline briefly the divergent lines of operation into which a satisfactory exposition of this view would naturally lead. And then to do so would be inappropriate in a volume of this kind. So we shall have to be content at this juncture to limit our study to a consideration of what we believe to be some of the immediate indications of this vast and most far-reaching phenomenon.

In the chapter on the "Genesis and Nature of Space" it is shown that the material universe is engendered at the same time and by the same movement or process as the universum of spatiality and intellectuality and that as the passage from chaos to kosmos proceeds the function of this movement is changed gradually from engenderment to exaltation wherein materiality is transmuted into spirituality. It is, of course, obvious that as materiality is exalted so are spatiality and intellectuality; and that as the one becomes more and more refined, capable of answering to higher and yet higher requirements so do all the others. For, at work in all and through all of these, is the current of life which pervades them, engendering, sustaining and elevating as it proceeds. So that as matter has evolved added characteristics and properties, each answering to a given need and arising out of the necessities inhering in the stage at which it appeared, so has the intellect evolved faculties to correspond therewith. In other words, the evolution of faculties for the expression of the human intellect has proceeded synchronously with the evolution of material qualities. And whenever a new faculty or an additional scope of motility is achieved by humanity there is always found a set of kosmic conditions which answers thereto. The cardinal principles of the doctrine of evolution are not, therefore, adverse to the conclusion that the organs of sense-perception—hearing, touch, sight, taste and smell—have not been endowed upon the human race or attained by it at one time; but rather that each answering to a newly acquired need and opening a wider scope of motility for the intellect has been evolved separately and in due order. It would also seem that the quality of consciousness, as it has been manifested in the various stages of life through which it has passed, and especially the mineral, vegetal and lower animal, has not always been of the same degree of efficiency. Nor has it enjoyed the same kind of freedom which it now enjoys in the highly evolved genus homo. It is equally apparent that matter itself has not always been in possession of the same qualities and characteristics which it now exhibits; but that it, too, has gone through various stages of evolution bringing forward into each new stage the transmuted results of each preceding one as a basis for further evolution and expansion. The innumerable archæological evidences which support this view make it unnecessary to do more than state the facts, as they appear to be substantiated by indubitable testimonies. Furthermore, it is believed that the outstanding implications of these phenomena will not be successfully controverted by those who are disinclined to see such implications in the evolutionary process. In a previous chapter we have briefly sketched the characteristics which mark the upspringing of a new faculty showing how, at first, it appears as an abnormality which exhibits itself in a very few individuals only, and that in a more or less indefinite manner; and how later the number of individuals in which it appears gradually increases, the definiteness of the faculty, at the same time, appearing more marked; then, like a tidal wave, it recurs in a still larger number of persons until, at last after a long period of time usually several thousands of years, it becomes universal exhibiting itself in every individual and appearing as a hereditary characteristic of the entire human race. It is, therefore, not without assurance as to the ultimate soundness of this view that we make the assertions which follow this brief introduction.

It has already been stated that for a very obvious reason, namely, the satisfaction of the needs of our present humanity, the intuition is for the time dominated by the intellect and held in subjugation by it so that all of man's external operations are governed and dictated almost entirely by the intellectuality, allowing the intuition only rare moments when it can come to the fore at all. This is the rule in the evolution of faculties and characteristics. The higher faculty, although potentially present in every way, is ever held in abeyance while the lower is brought, under the rigors of its own evolution, to a point where its joint operation with the higher may be executed with the least possible friction and retardation as also with the greatest possible coördination and coöperation. Accordingly, notwithstanding the fact that materiality must possess in potentiality all the qualities which it will at any time reveal, it is nevertheless necessary that these qualities shall come forth gradually and in due order. Similarly, humanity has come into possession of its various faculties of mind, and powers of physiological functions, by insensible degrees, the higher always being held in abeyance until the lower is fully developed. Those faculties which are to bestow added powers, additional freedom and a greater scope of motility are the ones which appear later than those which are truly primitive in character. These facts have been amply demonstrated by the science of embryology wherein it is shown that ontogeny is a recapitulation of phylogeny. That is, the history of the development of the individual is a recapitulation of the development of the species. Thus the various stages of development through which the human embryo passes while in utero are but a repetition of similar stages through which the entire human species has passed in its phylogenetic development. Wherefore, it is certain that humanity has not attained, at one and the same time, all the powers of mind and body which it now possesses; that the childhood of the human race represented a time when it had but few faculties or organs of sense-perception—indeed a time when the higher sense-organs of smell, taste and sight were entirely lacking although residing in potentiality therein.

It is undoubtedly true that the earth has passed through a similar evolution with respect to its own material characteristics, that its childhood was, in all points, analogous to the childhood of humanity; that the air, earth and water were wholly absent, except in potentiality, during the nebulous youth of its genesis. It is even probable that there are at work to-day processes which in the future shall culminate in the evolution of newer, higher and more complicately organized species of plants, animals and minerals. Every year brings fresh evidences that crystallize the conviction that the earth has been the scene for the appearance of many strange orders of animal life. Fossiliferous strata are continually yielding incontestable testimonies of changing flora and fauna. We count the animal and vegetal life of to-day as being more highly developed than that of any other previous age, and it is well that this is so, for simplicity of organization and primality of manifestation are always succeeded by complexity and a greater scope of adaptability.

We have said that the whole of that movement of the intellect which has brought forth the metageometrical creations of hyperspaces, the curvature of space and its manifoldness together with the entire assemblage of mathetic contrivances are merely the early evidences of the appearance in the human race of a new faculty, a new medium of perception whereby the Thinker shall acquire a still greater range of motility than that now offered by the intellect. Attention has been called also to the fact that this phenomenon has been manifested not alone in the field of mathematics, but in art, religion, politics and also in science in which we have only to witness the marvelous strides already made in the discovery of radio-active substances, the Roentgen, Becquerel, Leonard and other kinds of rays. It Is quite confidently believed that these forward movements in every branch of intellectual pursuit, these combined efforts of the intellect, in peering into the occult side of material things, are in response to the evolutionary needs of the Thinker, and in addition, are the evidences, and shall in time be the cause, of the development of an additional set of faculties. Function, or the performance of acts, determines faculty or the power of action and ultimately the organ itself. Thus the mere wish to perform aroused by desire and vitalized by the will actually terminates, in the course of time, in the genesis of a faculty, or the power to perform. The constant upreaching yearnings of the Thinker through his intellect for greater freedom and a larger scope of action, the desire to peer into the mysteries of life and mind, the infantile out-feelings of the mentality after some safer and surer basis for its theory of knowledge cannot fail in producing not only the faculty or power to satisfy these cravings but the very organ or medium by virtue of which the satisfaction may be attained.

It is not strange that in mathematics the intellect should have found first the clue to the existence of a higher sphere of intellectual research wherein it might become the creator of the various entities which peopled the new found domain; it is not strange that the mathematician should, in this instance, have assumed the role of the prophet proclaiming by various mathetic contrivances (although unconsciously) that the human race is nearing that time when it shall actually be able to function consciously in some higher sphere; neither is it to be wondered at that the voice of the prophet is heard and respected throughout the earth; for, indeed the mathematician is a spokesman who, as a rule, is unmoved by sudden outbursts of passion and ecstatic frenzies of emotions but calmly and dispassionately verifies his conclusions, tests them for consistency and having found them to satisfy the most rigorous mathetic requirements hesitates not to propound them. For this cause humanity respects the mathematician, and when he speaks listens to his voice. It is well, too, that this is so; for the history of mathematics is clearly the history of the development of the intellect. So exact a determinator of the quality of intellectual efficiency is it that its reign may be said to be an absolute monarchism whose lines of dominance extend to the minutest desire or appetency. It has always been the guide of the intellect, going before, as it were, blazing the trail, pushing back the frontiers of the intellect's domain and clearing away the debris so that the intellect with its retinue of servitors might have an easy path of progress.

Mathematics, however, has not the aptitude to serve the intuition as it serves the intellect. So the path into which the intuition would lead humanity the mathematician, because of his training and peculiar functions, is unprepared to enter. It is for this reason that when mathematics leads the intellect up to that point where it encounters life it fails, it becomes confused and its dictatorship becomes a mockery, its decrees remain unexecuted and futile. In taking this view we have certainly no desire to offend the mathematician or to detract from the glory of his monarchistic rulership over the intellectual progress of the race; for, in truth, mathematics is the diadem of gold wherewith man has crowned his intellect. Yet it is well, yea imperative in the light of recent developments in the realm of hyperspace, that a careful discrimination should be made as between the sphere of the intellect and that to which the intuition shall attain.

The intuition, long held in abeyance until the intellect should be fully crowned and reach the zenith of its powers, is now coming to the front. It will be many centuries perhaps before it shall have grown to such proportions as those already attained by the intellect; perhaps a few thousand years may pass before the intuition shall have evolved to that point where it may labor as coadjutor to the intellect; but undoubtedly the time will come when it, too, shall reward the Thinker's labors with that which shall be more precious than the crown of gold which the intellect has won. Then, the intellect, grown old and decrepit with years of reigning shall become dim and crystal-shaped and finally pass into automatism or reflexive movements where without the urge of volitional impulses it will perform with exactness, precision and utter loyalty the tasks which it has learned so well to execute in the days of its forgotten glory. Mankind will then be free. A new freedom, wherein the erstwhile lightning flashes of intuition will become fused into one glorious sheen of all-revealing light, shall come to men and thus the race resplendent will walk the earth enshrined in the majesty of divine powers attained as a result of millions of years of aspiration.

That there are supersensuous realms so far above the range of our senses as to be entirely beyond their ken needs now no proof or argument; for the scientist has demonstrated, by the invention of instruments of extreme delicacy and precision, that such a world does really exist. Already we know of stars so distant that, though light traverses in the brief space of an hour six hundred million miles, they might have ceased to shine before the pyramids were built and yet be visible to us in the skies. If the human eye were as sensitive as the spectroscope many thousand tints and shades might be added to the world of color; if they possessed the magnifying powers of the microscope we should live in constant terror and awe of the monstrous entities that teem in the water which we drink and in the air which we breathe; and if our ears could detect the microphonic vibrations which register in the delicate apparatus of some microphones the dead, vacuum-stillness of nature's great silences would appear as a babel of voices by the seaside. The sense of touch, responding to the same range of vibrations as the micrometer, would reveal actually the interstices between particles of the densest elements; and gold, silver, platinum and mercury would seem but honeycombs of matter. But, to the forward-looking there is no element of absurdity in the expectation that all these senses shall, one day, be able to dispense with the artificial aid of physical apparatus and perform, with even greater precision and faithfulness, the task which they now perform so crudely and ineffectively. There are without doubt vibrations of taste and smell which are so far above the range of these senses that they have no effect upon them whatsoever. Notwithstanding the fact, however, that the galvanometer, microscope, the microphone, the spectroscope and the telescope have extended thus the sphere of sense-knowledge there are yet subtler vibrations to which these delicate instruments do not and ought not be expected to respond. But to say, as do many empiricists, that since these phenomena cannot be detected by scientific instruments they do not, therefore, exist seems to be expecting too much of material means as well as exposing oneself unnecessarily to criticism on the grounds of extreme materialistic appetences.

There is indeed need of a more liberal attitude among men of science towards the world of the unseen. Intolerance of the data which it offers will for a time perhaps preserve the aloofness of scientific dogmatism inviolate but there will most surely come a reaction against the dogmatism of science and men will seek freedom and attain it despite their fetters. Sir Oliver Lodge, in his book, the Survival of Man,[29] says: "Man's outlook upon the universe is entering upon a new phase. Simultaneously with the beginning of a revolutionary increase in his powers of physical locomotion—which will soon be extended to a third dimension and no longer limited to a solid or liquid surface—his power of reciprocal mental intercourse is also in process of being enlarged; for there are signs that it will some day be no longer limited to contemporary denizens of earth, but will permit a utilization of knowledge and powers superior to his own, even to the extent of ultimately attaining trustworthy information concerning other conditions of existence."