M M

V O LU M E IX

E SSAY S— PH ILOSO PHY

CO NTENT;

TH E COLLO"
UY OF M ONOS AN D U NA
TH E CO NV E RS ATI O N OF E I R OS A N D CH ARM I O N .

TH E OF FUR NITU RE
 3

3 ) ) J 3 3

E U RE K A

THE M ATERIAL AND S P IRI TUAL

U N IV ER S E

"
Pub lished a s E ur eka : A Pr o se Po em, Geo P Put
na m , N ew Y o rk , 1 8 4 8 , a n d dedi ca ted to Alex a n der vo n
”
. .

Hum b o ld t "
f
"
l
To o
the few who l v e m e a n d
th
who
t o th o w h o th i k to
ov to t o
n —
m I l e— h se who
ee r a th e r an se the d re a m ers an d
th ose who f it h m o ly r li t i —
c h r c t r o f T th -
p u t a i n d rea s a s i n th e n e a e s v
1
ff r th i ook of T th
o e s B ru s , n o t i n i ts T l
a a e ru e l e r,
t y th t bo d T th c ti t t i g
b ut fo r the B e a u
t To th r
a
t
e s e I p e se n
a un s in i ts
co po i t o
th e - ru
P od c t
; ons
m s i n a s a n A rt r u
u n it

-
rue .

o
a l ne o c or
l e t us sa y a s 3 R m an e ;
. g g
it I b e n o t ur in to o
fty cl i Po
,

lo a a m , as a em .

o o th fo c ot
Wha t I her e p r p u n d is true — ere re it a n n d ie
o r it by it
a n y m ea n s trodd dow
b e n ow th t
en n so a It d ie, it
wi ll i g i to
r se a a n if v rl t i g
th e L e E e a s n .

N v r th l
e e it
e ess Po
is a s a o y t t
em nl tha I wish his wo rk to
d g d ft
b e j u e a er I a m d d" ea .

IT is with humility really un assumed— it is

w ith a sentiment even of awe— that I pen the
opening sentence of this work : for of all c on ceiv
able subj ects I approach the reader with the
most solemn— th e mo st compreh ensiv e — the mo st .

di cul t the most a ugust

ffi — .

Wh at terms shall I fin d sufficiently simple in

-
t h eir sublimity sufficien tly sublime in th ei r
a
 6 i ALLAN PO E
‘

p és t f lié Ph s l M i cal
‘

O t
s y i ca etap hy s ,

a n d M a thema tica l— oi the M a teria l an d Sp iritual

Un iverse : —o i its E ssen ce its O rig in its Cr ea , ,

tion its Pr esen t Con dition a n d its D estin y I

, .

shall b e so rash moreo ver as to c hallenge the

, ,

concl us ions and thus in eff ect to question th e

, , ,

sagacity of m any of the gre atest and most j ustly

,

reverenced of men .

In the beginning let me as distinctly as p os

,

sible anno unce— not the theorem which I hope

to demonstrate for wh atever the m athem ati
—
,

e ia us may assert there i s i h this world at least

, , ,

i
n o such th n g as demonstration — b ut the r ul ing
idea wh ich throu ghout this volume I sh all be
, ,

c ontinu ally endeavoring to su ggest .

My general proposition then is this — 1 nthe , ,

Orig in a l Un ity o f the First Thin g lies the Sec

on da r y Ca use o f A ll Thin g s with the Ger m of ,

their In evita ble An n ihila tion .

In illus tration of this idea I propose to take ,

such a survey of the U niverse that the mind may

be able to receive and to perceive an individual
impression .

He who from the top o f E tn a c asts his eyes

leisurely aroun d is a ff ected chiefly by the ex ten t
,

and diversity of the scene Onl y b y a rapid .

whirling on his h eel co ul d he hop e to comprehend

th e panorama in the sublimity of its o n en ess .

B ut as on the summit of E tna n o man has

, ,

thought of whirling on his heel so no man has ,

ev er ta ken into his brain the f ull uniqu ene ss of

w“W EUREKA 7
'

the prosp ect ; an d so again wh atev er cOnsider a

, ,

tions lie involv ed in this uniqueness h av e as yet ,

no practical existence for mankind ‘

I do not know a tr eatise in which a surv ey of

the Un iverse using the w ord in its most com
—

preh e ive
ns and only Jg
e itim ate acceptation — is
-
‘

taken at all and it may b e as well here to men

tion that by the term U niverse wh erever em
“ ”
,

ployed with out q ualification in this essay I mean ,

to designate the u tm ost con ceiva b le exp an se o f

sp a ce, with a ll thin g s, m a teria l,
sp iri tua l an d
tha t can b e ex is t wi thin the c o mp a ss
im ag in ed to
o f tha t exp an se In speaking of wh at is o rdi
.

“ ”
n a rily implied by the expression , U niverse ,
“
I shall take a phrase of limitation— the U n i
”
v erse o f stars Why this distinction is con sid
.

ered nece ssary , will be seen in the sequel .

B ut even of treatise s on the really limited al ,

tho ugh always as sumed as the un limited U n i ,

verse Oi sta rs I know none in whic h a survey

, ,

e ven of this limited U niverse is so taken as to ,

warrant deductions from its in dividua lity Th e .

neare st approach to such a work is made in th e

“
Cosmos of Alexander von H umboldt He .

presents the subject however n o t in its indi

, ,

vidual ity b ut in its generality H is theme in .

,

its la st result is th e l aw of ea ch portion of the

,

merely physical U niverse as th is law is related

,

to the l aws of every o ther portion o f th is

merely p hysical U nivers e H is desi gn is simply
'
.

syn seretical . In a word h e discusse s th e un i

,
‘

versal ity of material relation and disclo ses to ,

the eye of Ph ilo sop h y wh atev er inferences h av e

8 WO RK S OF ED GAR ALL AN P OE

h ith erto lain hidden b ehin d this universality .

B ut however admirable be the succinctness with

wh ich h e has treated each partic ular point of his
topic the mere multiplicity of these points occa
,

sions necessarily an amo unt of detail and thus

, , ,

an invol ution Of idea whic h p reclude all in di ,

vidua lity of impre ssion .

It seems to me that in a imi ng at th is latter ,

e ffect and thro ugh it at the c onsequences — the

, , ,
— s —
concl usion s the suggestion the speculations
o r if nothing better o ff er itself the mere gu esses
, ,

whic h may resul t from it we require something

—

like a mental gyration on the h eel We need so .

rapid a revol ution of all things about th e central

point of sight that while the minuti ae vanish al ,

togeth er even the more conspic uous Obj ects b e

,

come blended into one Among the vanishing .

minuti ae in a survey of this kind wo uld be all

, ,

exclusively terrestrial matters The E arth .

would be considered in it s planetary relations

alone A man in this view b ecomes mankind ;
.
, ,

mankind a member of the cosmi cal family of

Intelligences .

And n ow before proceeding to o ur subj ect

,
’
proper let me beg the reader s attention to an
,

extract or two from a somewh at remarkable let

“
terf wh ich appears to h av e been found corked i n
a bottle and floating on the M ar e Ten eb rarum
an ocean well described by th e Nubian geog
r apher P tolemy H ephestion b ut little f r e
, ,

q uen ted in modern day s u nl e ss by the Tran s c en

See ta l e ,
“
M e l l o n ta T a ut a , vo l . III .
, pre se n t e di t io n .

E DIT O R .
 EUREKA 9

den talists and some other divers for crotchets .

The date of thi s letter I confess surprises me

, ,

even more particul arly than its contents ; for it

seems to h ave been written in the year two tho u
sand eig h t h u ndred and forty -
eight As for the .

passages I am abo ut to transcribe they I fancy , , ,

will speak for themsel ves .

D o yo u know my dear friend

, says the ,

writer addressing no do ubt a contemporary

, , ,
“
D O yo u kn ow that it is scarcely more than eight
or nine hundred years ago since the m etaphysi
eiaus first consented to relieve the people of the
singu lar fancy that there exi st b ut two p r a c ti
wm
ca b le r o a ds to Tr uth? B elieve it if yo u can "It
appears however that long long ago in the
, , , ,

night of Time there lived a T urkish philosopher

"
,

called Aries and surnamed Tottle Here p os

-
.
,

sib ly
,
the letter writer mean s A ri stotle ; the best
names are wretchedly corrupted in two or three
thousand years . T h e fame of thi s great man
depended mainl y upon his demonstration that
snee z i ng is a nat ur a l provision by means of
which over-
,

p1 o foun d think ers are enabled to ex

p el superfl uo us ideas thro ugh the nose ; b ut he
obtained a scarcely less valuable celebrity as the
fo under or at all events as the principal p r op a
,

gator Oi what was termed the deductive or a

,

p r i o r i philo sophy He started w ith what he

maintained to be axioms or self-
.

evident
truths — and the now well -
,

un derstood fact that

n o truths are self- evident really does not make
,
x
in the slightest degree ag ainst his spec ul ations
it was sufiicien t for his p urp o se that the truths in
10 WO RK S OF ED GAR ALLAN P OE

question were e vident at all From ax ioms h e .

proceeded logically to resul ts H is most ill us

, , .

trions di sciples were one Tuclid a geometri

" "
,
” “
c ian,
meanin g E uclid and one Kant a ,

D utchman the originator of that species of

,
I

Transcendentalism which with the change mere ,

ly of a C for a K n ow bears his pec ul iar name

‘

.
,
“
Well Aries Tottle flourished supreme
,
‘
th e advent of one Hog su rnamed the Ettrick ,
’
shepherd who preached an entirely di ff erent
,

system whic h h e called the a p oster io r i or ih

,

ductive H is plan referred altogether to sensa

.

tion . He proceeded by observing analyzing , ,

and cl assifying facts— i n stan tioe N a turce as they ,

were somewhat a ff ectedly called— and arranging

them into general laws In a word while the .
,

mode O f Arie s rested on n oum en a that of Hog ,

depended on p hen om en a ; and so great was th e

admiration excited by this latter system that at ,

its first introduction Arie s fell into general dis

,

rep ute Finally however he recovered groun d

.
, , ,

and was p ermitted to divide the empire of Phi

l o so phy with his more modern rival — the savans
contenting themselves with p r escr ib in g all o ther
competitors past present and to come ; p utting
, , ,

an end to all controversy on the topic by the

p ro mulgation of a Median law to the e ff ect that ,

the Aristotelian and B aconian roads are and of ,

right ought to be the sole possible avenues to

,

kno wledge z yo u must know m y , ,

dear friend adds the letter- , writer at this point ,

was an adj ective invented as equivalent to Hog

 EURE KA 11

ian an d at the same time more dignified and

,

e uphonious
-
.

N ow I do assure yo u most po sitively pro

“
c eeds the epistl e — that I represent these mat
ters fairly ; and yo u can easily un dersta nd how
restrictions so absu rd on their very face must
h ave operated in those days to retard the prog
, ,

ress of tru e Science which makes its m ost im

portant advances-as all History will show —b y
,
w

see m ingly int u itive l eap s These ancient ideas

.

c on fined investigation to crawling ; and I need

not s u ggest to yo u that crawl ing among varieties ,

of locomotion is a very capital thing of its

,
.

kind -
b ut becaus e the tortoise is su re of foot ,

for this reason must we clip the wings of the

eagles ? For many centuries so great was the ,

infatu ation abou t Hog especially that a virtu al

, ,

stop was p ut to all thinking p roperly so ca ,

‘

No man dared utter a truth for whic h he

h imself indebted to his so ul alone It matt .

not whether the tru th was even demonstrably

s uch ; for the dogmati z ing philosophers of that p,
epoch regarded only the r oad by which it pro-
V , g

y
a , r

fessed to have been attained The end with .

th em was a point of no moment whateve r — the ‘

me ans "they v ociferated let us look at the

, ,
’

means - and if on scrutiny of th e means it was

, ,

f ound to come neither under the category Hog ,

nor under the category Aries (which means

ram ) why then the savans went no farther b ut
, , ,

c alling the thinker a fool and branding him a

‘ ’
th eori st woul d n ever thenceforward h ave an y
, , ,
‘

thin g to do eith er with him or with hi s t r uths .

 12 WO RK S O F ED GAR ALLAN P OE

Now, my dear friend , continued th e letter

“
writer ,
it cannot be maintained that by the
crawling system exclusively adopted men would ,

arrive at the maximum amount of truth even in ,

any long series of a ges ; for the r epression of

imagination was an e vil not to be c oun ter b al
an ced e ven by a b so lu te certainty in the sn a i l
processes; B ut their c ertainty was v ery far
from ab solute The error of our progeni tors was
.

quite analogous with that of the wi seacre who

fancies he mus t necessarily see an O bj ect the
more distinctly the more closely he
,

his eyes They blinded themselve

.

impalpable titillating Scotch sn ufi

,

and thus the boasted facts of the Ho

by no means always fact s— a point of little im

p ortance b u t for the as sumption that they always

wer e. The vital taint h owever in B aconianism
, ,

— its most lamentable fount of error— lay in its

tendency to throw power and consideration into
the h ands of merely perceptive men— o f those
inter- Tritonic minnows the microscopical savan s
,

— the digger s and pedlers of min ute fa c ts for

,

the most part in physical science— facts all of ,

which they retailed at the same price upon the

h ighway ; their v alu e depending it was sup ,

posed simply upon th e fact of their fa c t with

, ,

o ut reference to their applicability or in ap p l i

V
s c ab ility l n th e de v elopment of tho se ul timate and
only legitimate facts called Law , .

“ ”—
Than th e persons th e letter go es on to say
than th e person s thus suddenly elevated by
Hog- ian philosop hy into a station for which
14 W O RK S O F ED GAR ALLAN P OE
'

sibly exist a t a ll T his they must h av e been v e ry

.

blind indeed not to see or at le ast to suspect ; ,

for even in their own day many of their long ,

a dmi tted axioms had been abandoned : ex ‘ ’ ‘

n ihilo n ihil fit
’
for example and a thing c ann ot
, ,
‘

’
act where it is not and there cannot be an tip ,
‘

’ ’
O de s and darkness cannot proceed from light
‘
.
,

These and numerous similar propositions for

merly accepted without hesitation as axioms or , , ,

un deniable tru ths were even at the per iod of , ,

which I speak seen to be altogether untenable ,

ho w absurd in these p eople then to persist in , ,

relying upon a basi s as i mm utable whose muta

b il ity had become so repeatedly manifest "
, ,

“
B ut even throu gh evidence a fforded by
,

themselves against themselves it is easy to c on ,

vict th ese a p rio ri reasoners of the grossest un

reason t is easy to show the f tility the im
— i u —

p alpability of their axioms in general I have .

'

” -
n o w lying before me it will b e observ ed that
“
we still proceed with the letter— I h ave n ow ly
ing before me a book printed about a tho usand
year ago P undit assures me that it is decidedly
s
.

the cleverest ancient work on its topic which is ,

‘
Logic The author wh o was muc h e steemed
.
’
,

in his day was one Miller or Mill ; an d We fin d it

, ,

recorded of h im as a p oint of some importance , ,

that h e rode a mill- horse whom he called Jeremy

B entham — b ut let us glance at the volum e itself ;
“
Ah Abil ity or inab ility to conceiv e says ,
’

Mr Mil l very properly is in n o case to be r e

.
, ,
‘

c eived as a criterion of axiomatic tr uth No w

’
.
,

that thi s is a palp able tr uism no one in his senses ,

 E UREKA 15

will deny . No t to adm it the p repositio n , is to in

s inuate a ch arge of v ariability in Tru th it self,
who se v ery title is a synonym O f the Steadfas t .

If ability to co nceiv e be taken as a criterion of

Truth then a truth to D avid Hume wo uld very
,

seld o m be a truth to Joe ; and ninety -n ine hun

dr edths of what is undeniable in Heaven wo ul d ,

be demon strable fal sity upon E arth The propo .

sition of Mr Mill then is sustained

. I will not
, ,
.

grant it to be an axiom ; and th is merely becau se

”

I am showing that n o axioms exist ; b ut with a ,

distinction which co ul d not have b ee n cavilled at

even by Mr Mill h imself I am ready to grant
.
,

that if an axiom ther e b e then the propos ition of

, ,

wh ich we speak has the full est righ t to be con sid

ered an axi o m— that no m o r e ab solute ax iom is
'

and consequently that any subsequ ent proposi

, ,

tion which shall conflict with this one primarily

advanced m ust be eith er a falsity in itself— that
,

is to say no axiom o r if admitte d axiomatic

,
—
, ,

must at once neutraliz e both itself and its prede

'

ce ssor .

“
And n o w by the logic of their own pro
“

po under let us proceed to test any one of the

,

axiom s p ropoun ded Let us give Mr M ill the . .

fairest O f pl ay We will bring the p oint to no

'

ordinary iss ue We will select for investigation

- -
.

m
no co mon place ax io m no axiom of what not ‘

the less prepostero usly because o nl y implie dl y ,

h e terms his secondary class— as if a positive

truth by definition coul d be either more or less
po sitively a tru th : we will select I say no ax , ,

iom of an un q uestionability so questionable as is

16 WO RK S OF E D GAR ALLAN POE

to b e found in E uclid We will not talk for ex

.
,

ample abo ut such p rep ositions as that two

,

straigh t line s cann ot enclo se a sp ace or t h at t h e ,

whole is greater than any o n e of its p arts We

’

will aif e r d the logician ev ery advantage We will .

com e at once to a pr epo sition wh ich he regards as

the acme of the unquestionable—as th e quintes
sence of a x iomatic undeniability Here it is :
.

‘
Contradictions canno t b oth be true —that is ,

cannot c oexist in nature Here Mr Mill means

-
. .

for instance and I giv e t he m ost forcible ih

,

stance concei v able — th at a tree must be eith er a

,

tree or n o t a tree— th at it cann ot b e at the

same time a tree and n o t a tree : all wh ic h is

quite rea sonable of itself and will answer re

m arkab ly w
,

ell as an ax iom until we bring it in to

,

collation with an axiom insisted up on a few

p age s before ; in oth er words— words whi c h I
i —
have prev o ly employed until we te st it by
u s
‘ ’
the logic of its own propo under A tree Mr .
, .

‘ ’
Mill as serts m ust be either a tree or n o t a tree
, .

Very well : and n ow let me ask hi m why To , .

this little query there is b ut one respons e— I defy

any man living to inv ent a second The sole an .

swer is thi s — Because we fin d it imp ossible to

‘

con ceiv e that a tree can be anything else than a

’
tree or n ot a tree T h is I repeat is Mr Mill s
.
, , .
’

so e an swer
l — he will n o t p r eten d to suggest eu
other ; and yet by his o wn showin g his answer is
, ,

clearly no an swer at a ll — fer has he n o t already

required us to admit as an axiom th at ability or
, ,

inability to conceive is in n o case to be taken as a

,

criterion of a iomatic truth ? T hus all

x — ab solute n
 EUREKA 17

ly all arg umentation is at sea without a r ud

his
der Let it n ot be urged that an exception from
.

th e general rul e is to be made in cases where th e ,

‘
impossibility to conceive is so pec ul iarly grea t ’

a s when we are called up on to conceiv e a tree

b o th a tree and n o t a tree Let no attempt I say
.
, ,

be made at urging this setticism ; fo r in the first ,

place there are no deg r ees of impossibility and

,
‘
,

thus no on e im possible conception can be m o r e

pec uliarly impossible than another impo ssible
c onception : in the second pl ace Mr Mill h im , .

self— no do ubt after thoro ugh deliberation— has

m ost distinctly and mo st rationally excl uded all
, ,

o pport unity f o r exception by th e emph asis of ,

his propo sition that in n o c ase, is ability or ina

, ,

b ility to conceive to be taken as a criterion of

,

axiomatic truth : in the third place e v en were ,

exceptions a dmissible at all it remains to be ,

shown ho w any exception is a dmis sible her e .

That a tree can be b oth a tree and n ot a tree is ,

an idea which th e angels or the devils m ay eu , ,

ter ta in and wh ich no do ubt many an earthl y

,

B edlamite or Transcendentalist do es
, ,
.

Ne w I do n o t qu arrel with these ancients

-
,
“
continues the letter writer so much on acco unt t

W
f

eiz ma n n logi e
,

of the
which to e p am was basele ss worthl es s an d l§
“

“ ‘

fantastic altogether— as on acco unt of their pom-

, , , ,

l ‘
M t
p e n s and infat uate pr e scription of all o ther

roads to Tru th than the two narrow and crooked

—
p aths the one of creeping and the other of
crawling— to which in their ignorant perversity
, ,

they have dared to confine the Soul— the So ul

IX 2 .
18 WO RKS OF E D GAR ALLAN POE
«
tee th A: Tu e s - (
l at e; w
t
which loves nothin g so well as to soar in th ose
regio n s of ill imitable intuition whi ch are utterly
inc o gniz ant of p a th ‘
.
’

“
By the by my dear friend is it not an ev i
, ,
s

dence of the mental slavery entailed up on tho se

‘
bigoted p eo ple by their Hogs and Rams that in ,

spite of the eternal p rating of their sav an s abo ut

r o a ds to Tr uth n o n e of them fell eve n by acci
, ,

dent into what we n ow so distinctly p erceiv e to

,

be th e broadest the straightest a n d m o st avail

, ,

able Of all mere r eads— the great thoro ughfare

the majestic highway of the Con sisten t? Is it
n o t wonderful that they shoul d h ave failed to
deduce from the wo rks of Go d the v itally m e
m enteus consideration that a p erfec t c on sisten cy
ca n be n o thin g b ut an a b so lu te truth ? H ow
pl ain— ho w rapid o ur progress since the late ah
n o un cem en t of thi s pr o position B y its means, "
investigation ha s been tak en out of the han ds of
the gre un dm ol es, and given as a duty, rather
than as a task, to the true to th e o n ly true
—

thinkers— to the ge nerally- educated m en of ar

dent imagination These latter . Keplers — o ur

o ur Laplaces specul ate theori e these are z —

the terms— c an you n o t fancy the sho ut of see m

with which they wo uld b e received by o ur p ro f

genito r s were it possible for them to be looking

,

over my shoul ders as I write ? The Keplers I r e ,

peat sp ec ul ate— theoriz e— and their theories are

,

merely corrected reduced— sifted— clear ed lit

—
,
~

tle b y little of their chafi O f inconsistency— until

,

at length th ere stands apparent an un en cum

bered Consisten cy a cons i stency which the most
—
 EUREKA 19

t lid admit— because it is a consistency— to be

s o
an ab sol ute and unquestionabl e Tr u th .

“
I have often thought my friend th at it must , ,

h ave p uz z led the se do gm atic ian s of a thousand

years ago to determine even by wh ich of th eir
, , ,

two boa sted r e a ds it is that the cryp tographis t u .

0

d"
1
M “

atthin s t h e solution of the more complicated cy

N

h — o r by which of them Champollion g u ided

p e r s
man kin d to these important and innumerable
truths which for so many cent uries have lain
, ,

entombed amid the phonetical hieroglyphics of

E gypt . In especial wo uld it not have given
,

these bigots some tro uble to determine by

whic h of their two roads was re ached th e
most momentous and s ublime of a ll their
truths the truth the fact of g ravita tion ?
— —

Newton deduced it from the laws of Kepler .

Kepler admitted that these laws h e g uessed— J

these laws whose investigation disclosed to the

greatest of British astronomers that p rinciple ,

the basi s of all (existing ) physical p rinciple s in ,

going behind which we enter at once the neb ul o us

k ingdom of metaphysic s Y es l— these vital laws .

Kep ler g uessed— that is to say he im agin ed ,

them Had he been asked to point o ut either the

.

deductive or in d uctiv e ro ute by which he at

t a in ed them his reply might have been— I know
‘
,

nothing about r outes— b ut I do know the ma

chinery of the U niverse Here it is I grasped it . .

with m y soul — I reached it thro ugh mere dint o f

in tuitio n . Alas poor ignorant old man "Co ul d
’
,

not any meta physician have told him that what

h e called intuition was b ut th e conviction re
‘ ’
»
20 WO RK S OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

sui ting from deductions or in duction s of which

the p rocesses were so shadowy as to hav e e sc aped
his consc i o u sne ss el uded his reason or hidden
, ,

defiance to his capacity of expression ? H ow

‘ ’
great a pity it is that some moral ph ilo sopher
had not enlightened him ab out all this "How it
wo uld have comforted him on his death - bed to
know tha t instead of having gone int uitively
, ,

and thus unbecomingly he had in fact proceed , , ,

ed decorou sly and legitimately that is to say

Hog- ishly or at least Ram-
,
ishly— into the vast
h alls where lay gleaming untended and h itherto , ,

unto uched by mortal hand— un seen by mortal

eye— the imp erishable and pricele ss secrets of the

U niverse "
“
Yes Kepler was e ssentially a theo rist; b ut
,

thi s title n ow of so mu ch sanctity was in th o se

, , ,

ancient days a designation of supreme con

,

tempt . It is only n ow that men begin

to appreciate th at divine old man— te sym a

p athiz e with the prophetical and poetical

'

rhapsody of h is ever memorable words For .

m y part continu es the unknown correspondent

, ,
“
I glow with a sacred fir e when I even think of
t h em and feel that I shall never grow weary of
,

their rep etition — ih concl uding this letter let ,

me ha ve the real plea sure of transcribing t hem

I c ar e n o t whether m y wo r k b e
‘
once again —

r ea d n ow o r b y p osterity I can aff o r d to wait a

.

cen tur y fo r r ea ders when Go d him self has waited

six tho usan d yea rs fo r an o b server I triump h . .

I hav e s tol en the g olden secret of the E gyp tian s .

I will in dulg e my sacr ed fury

’
.
 '

22 WORKS OF E D GAR ALLAN P OE

beginning ) woul d be the preferable co urse b ut ,

for the diffi c ulty if not impossibility of present

, ,

ing in this co urse to the un astr on om ical a p ic

, , ,

ture at all comprehensible m regard to such con

siderations as are involved l n q ua t ty n i — that is

"
t o say in n umber magnitude and di stance
r
, , .
e
distin ctn ss m tell 1 g 1 b 1l 1 ty, at all p oints
fs a pr i mary eature iff m y general design On
—
,
'

im o n
“

1 p r ta t t opics it i s better to be a good deal pro

lix than even a very little ob sc ure B ut ab struse .

n ose is a q u ality appe r taining to no s ubj ec t p er

se . All are alike in facility of compreh en sion to
, ,

h im who approache s them by properly graduated

steps It is merely because a stepping-
. stone here ,

and there is heedlessly left unsupplied in o ur

,

road to D i fferential Cal culus that this latter - is ,

not alto gether as simple a thing as a sonn et by

Mr Solomon Sees aw
. .

By way of adm itting then no chan c e for m is " , ,

a pprehension I th ink it advisable to proceed a s

,

if even the more obvious facts of As tronomy

were unkn own to the reader In combining the .

two modes of discussion to which I have referred ,

I propose to ava il myself of the advantage s p ec u

liar to each— and very e specially of the iter a tion
in detail which will be un avoidable as a c o n se
q u en c e of the plan Commencing with a descen t
.
,

I s hall reserv e for the return upwar ds tho se ih

d ispensable consideration s of q uan tity to whi ch
all usion has alre ady been made .

Let us begin then at once with th at merest of

, , ,
“ ” “ ” “
words I n finity
,
This like
. Go d spiri , ,

a n d some o ther expre ssion s of wh ic h the equiva a

 "

E UREKA 23

lents exist in all langu ages is by no me ans the ,

“

exp ression of an idea b ut of an e ff ort at on e I t

the possibl e attem
.
,
3K:
fi ~ M _

stands for pt
to
i
d r ec tion of th i s c fi o r t the cloud
—

behind which lay forever invi sible the o b j ect of

, ,

thi s attempt A word in fine was demanded by

.
, , ,

means of whi ch one huma n being might p ut h im

self m rel ation at once with a nother human being
and with a certain ten den cy of the human
lect Out of th is demand arose the word In fin
.

”
,
‘‘

ity which 1s thus the representativ e ut of th e

thoug ht of a thoug ht "u ti s “ U f ?“
.
e a a

As regar ds tha t infinity n ew cons idered— mi?

“
in nity of space we often h ear it said that its
fi —

idea is admitted by the mind— is acqui esce d in

is entertained— o n acco unt of the greater difficul
”
ty which attends the conception of a limit B ut .

this is merely one of these p hrases by which even

p rofo und think ers time o ut of min d have occa , ,

sio n all y taken plea sure in d eceiving them selv es .

“
Th e quibble lies concealed m the word diffi
“ ”
cul ty The mind
. we are told ente rtains
, ,
‘‘

the idea of lim itless thro ugh the greater difficul ,

ty which it fin ds 1 n entertaining that of limited ,

”
sp ace Ne w were the p rop osition b ut fairl y
.
,

p t its abs urdity wo uld become transp arent at

u ,

once Clearly there is no mere difiicul ty m the

.
,

ca se The a ssertion intended if p resented a o

.
,

c o r din g to its intention and without sophistry , ,

“
would run thus The mind admits the idea o f
lim itless th rou gh th e greater im p ossib ility of en
tertamin g t h at of limited space
,
”
.
 24 WO RK S OF ED GAR AL LAN POE

It must be immediately seen th at th is is not a

question of two statements between who se r esp ec
tive credibilities o r of two arguments between
—

wh ose r esp ec tiv validitie s— the r eason is called

upon to decide L 1§ a r§
n atter of two conceptions ,

Wéd ly impb b
~

i M
" '

di r ec tl
"

c on fl ict n an d
8 1 5le, one o f whl clithe in tellec t is supposed to be
capable of entertain ing on acco unt of the greater
,

imp ossi b ility of entertaining the other The .

choice is n o t made between two difii cul ties ; it

is merely fan cied to be made between two im p os
sib il ities Now of the former th ere a r e degrees
.
, ,

b ut of the latter none — j ust as o ur impertinent

ter-
,

writer has already su ggested A task m ay .

m ore or less difficul t ; b ut it is either pos sible

not po ssible —there are no gr adations It .

t be more difiieult to overthrow the Andes

an ant -hill ; b ut it can b e no more im p os
sib le to annihilate the matter of the one than
the matter of the other A man may j ump ten.

feet with le ss difficulty than he can j ump twenty ,

b ut the imp ossib ili ty of his leaping to the moon

is not a wh it less than th at of his leaping to the
d o g- star
Since all this is undeniable : since th e choice of
the mind is to be made between imp ossib ilities
a of conception : since one impo ssibility cannot be
greater than another : and since thus one c an , ,

not be preferred to another : the philosophers

wh o n ot onl y maintain on th e groun ds men
A ,

9 tio n e d man
,
s id e
’
a of in fini ty b u t on acco unt of ,

su c h suppositio us idea in fin ity itse f l are p l ain

—
,

ly engaged in demons trating one impo ssibl e

 i
i?" EUREKA m a u w
fb
’

25

thmg to be possible by showing how it is that

‘

some one o ther t h i ng is impossible too

—
This
i .
,

it will be said is nonsense and perh aps it is ;

, ,

indeed I think it v ery capital nons ens e b ut fore ,

g o all claim to it as nonsense of mine .

The readie st mode however of displayin g the

, ,

fallacy of the philosophical argument on thi s

qu e st ion is by simply adverting to a fa ct r e
,

specting it which has been hitherto quite over

looked the fact that the argument allu ded to
— 4

both proves and disproves its own proposition .

-
”
The mind is imp elled say the theologians and ,
, , 0
“
others to admit a First Cause by the su perio r(a
, ,

difficulty it experiences in concei ving cau se b e

”
yond cau se without end The quibble as b e .
,
“ ”
fore lies in the word diffi culty b ut her e what
, ,

is it employed to sustain ? A First C ause And .

what is a First Cause ? An ul t imate termina

‘

t ion of ca uses ? An d what is an ultimate termi

nation o f caus es ? Finity— the Finite Thus the .

one quibble in two processes by Go d knows how

, ,

many philosophers is mad e to support n ew Fin

,

ity and n o w Infinity : could it not be bro ught to

support something be sides ? As for the q uibble s,
they at lea st are insupportable
, , B ut to dis .
,

mis s them ; what they prove ih the one ca se is

the i dentical noth ing which they demonstrate in
the other .

Of co urse no one will suppo se that I here con

,

tend fe r the absolute impo ssibility of tha t whic h

”
attempt to convey in the word In finity .

p urpose is b ut to show th e folly of endeavor

to prove Infinity itself or even our co n cep
‘

,
 26 WO RK S OF E D GAR ALLAN POE

tion of it by any suc h blun derin g ratiocin ation

,

as that whi c h is ordinarily employe d .

“
P3 1
and
am convinced that no hum an being can A mind
not thorou ghl y self-
.

conscious not accusto med to ,

the introspective analysis of its own operations ,

will it is tru e often deceive itself by supposing

, ,

that it has entertained the conception of which

we speak In the cfi o rt to entertain it we pro
.
,

o ecd step beyo nd step we fancy point still b e

,

yond point ; and so long as we con tin ue the ef

fort it may be said in fact that we are ten ding
, , ,

to th e formation of the -idea desi gned ; while the

strength of the impre ssion that we actu ally form
or h ave formed is in the ratio of
,

i f ing whi ch we keep up the mental

it is in the act of di scontinu ing
or fulfil ling (as we think ) the id ea— o f p utting
the finishing stroke (as we suppose ) to the con
c eptio n — that we overthrow at once the wh ole
fabric of our fancy by resting upon so e one '

ul timate , and therefore definite p o

,
This
,
1

fact however we fail to p erceive on account of

, , ,

the absolute coincidence in time between the set

, ,

tling down upon the ul timate point and the act

of cessation in think ing In attempt ing on the
.
,

other hand to frame the idea of a limited space

, ,

we merely converse the processes whi ch in volv e

the im p omib il ity .

We b eli eve m a Go d We may or m ay not b e

.

l ieve m finite or in infinite space ; b ut o ur belief ,

in such c as es is more properly d esignated as

,
 EUREKA 2?

faith and is a matter qui te di stinct from that

,

belief proper from that in tellec tua l b elief

—

whi ch presupposes the mental conception

“

The fact is that u pon the enunciation of any

, ,
“
o n e of that class of terms to which In fin ity
belongs— the class representing thoughts of
tho ug ht he who has a right to say that he think s
—

a t a ll feels M
, elf called upon n o t to entertain ,

a conception b ut simply to di rect his mental

,

v ision toward some given point in the in tell ec ,

tu al fi rm am en t where lies a nebul a never to b e

,

resolved To solve it indeed h e makes no ef

.
, ,

fort ; for with a rapid instinct he comprehen ds ,

not onl y the impossibility b ut as regards all , ,

human p urpo ses the in essen tia lit of its solu

,

tion H e perceives that the Del ty has not de

. ,

sig n ed it to be solved He sees at once that it

.
, ,

lies o ut of the brain of man and even ho w if , ,

not exac tly why it lie s out of it

, There ar e .

p eople I am aware who busying themselves in

, , ,

attempts at the unattainable acqu ire very e asily , ,

by dint of the j argon they emit among those

thinkers- that-
,

theylthink with whom darkne ss and

depth ar e synonymous a k ind of c uttle- fish rep u
W
,

tation for profundity ; b ut M

Tho u ght is its self- co iz ance ; and with some
m m said that no fog
of the mind can well be greater than that whi ch ,

extending to the very boundaries of the mental

domain shuts o ut even these bo und ari es th em
,

selve s from comprehension .

It will n ow be understood that in using the ,

“ ”
phr ase, Infini ty o f Space , I mak e n o call upon
 WORK
'

28 s OE ED GAR AL LAN P OE

re ader to entertain the impossible conception

an a bso lute in fin i ty I refer simply to the
.

”
utmost con ceiva b l e exp an se of space— a
shadowy and fluct u ating domain n ow shr inking , ,

n ew swelling in accordance with th e v acill ating

,

of the imagination .

H ither to the U niverse of stars has always been

,

considered as coincident with the U niv erse

p roper as
, I h ave de fin ed it in t h e commence
ment of thi s D iscourse It has been always
.

either directly or indirectly assumed— at le ast

since the dawn of intelligible Astronomy— that ,

were it possible for us to attain any given point

in space we shoul d still fin d on all sides of us
, , ,

an interminable succession of stars T hi s was .

the un tenable idea of Pascal when making p er

h ap s the mo st successful attempt ever made at ,

periphrasing th e conception for which we stru g

”
gle in the word U niverse It is a .

“
sphere he says of which the centre is ev ery
, ,
”
where the circumference nowhere
,
B ut al
,
.

though thi s intended definition is ih fact n o , ,

de finition of the U niverse of stars we may accept ,

it wi th some mental reservation as a definition

, ,

(rigorous enough for all practical p urpose s ) of

the U niverse p p r o er — that is to say of the U n i ,

verse o f sp a ce This latter then let us regard

.
, ,
“
as a sp her e of which the c en tr e is everywher e ,

the cirbitirtfei en ce n owher e

‘ ”
In fact while we .
,

fin d it impossible to fancy an en d to space we ,

h ave no di ffi culty in pictu ring to ourselv es any

.

on e of an in finity of b eg in n in g s .

As our starting p oint, th en , let us adopt the

30 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

h av e attained a point wh e re o nl y In tuition

id us — -
b ut n ow let m e r ecfir M m
’

if
'

I h ave already suggested as that al o n e

whic h we can p roperly entertain o f intuition It .

is b ut the con vic tio n a r ising from those induc

tion s or deduc tion s of which the p ro cesses a re
so sha dowy as to escap e o ur co n scio usn ess, elude
o ur r easo n, or defy o ur cap a city of exp ressio n .

With th un der tanding, I n ow assert that an

is s —

intuition altogether irresistible, although in ex

p ressible , forces me to the conclusion that what
Go d o riginally created— that th at Matter whi ch ,
by dint of his Volition , he fi rst made from his
Spirit , or from Nih ility , c ould h ave been nothing
b ut Matte r in its utmo st concei vable state of
wh at l-o f Simp licity ?
‘

T hi s will be found the sole absolute assum p tion

.

“ ”
of my D iscourse I use the word a ssumption
.

1 n its ordinary sense ; yet I maintain that even

‘
,

this my primary proposition , is v ery, very far

indeed from being really a mere assumption
,
.

N othing w as ever mor e certai nl y— no human con .

elusion was ever in fact more regularly more —

rigorously deduced é— b ut al as "

, ,

the processes lie

,

o ut of t h e human analysi s — at all event s are b e

utteranc e of th e human tongu e .

n ow endeavor to concei v e what Matter

must be when or if in its absolu te extreme of
, , ,

Simp licity Here th e Reason flies a t onc e to Im

partic ularity-to a particl e— to on e p articl e — a
.

particle of on e kind o — f one c h aracter— o f one .

— — -
nature o f on e size o f one form a p article ,
”—
therefore without form and v oid
,
a particle
 EUREKA 31

p o siti v ely a particle at all i

po nts— a p ar ticle ab
solutely un iqu e indi vidu al undi vided and not
, , ,

indi visible only becaus e He who cr ea ted it by ,

di nt of his Will can by an infinitely less ener

,

getic exercise of th e same Will as a matter of ,

course div ide it

,
.

th en is all th at I p redica te of th e
,

Matter ; b ut I p ropose to show

is a p rin cip le a b un da n tly suf
fi ci en t to M agnu m th e c on s ti tu tio n th e e xis t ,

in g p hcen om en a a n d the p la in ly in evita b le a mn i

hi la tio n of a t l eas t the ma teria l Un ivers e .

The willing into being the primordial particle

has completed the act or more properly the con
,

c ep tio n of Creation We n ow proceed to the

.

ul timate p urpose for wh ic h we are to suppo se the

P article c reated— that is to say th e ul timate ,

p urpose so far as our considerations yet enable

us to see it —th e constitution of the U niverse
from it the Particle
, .

Thi s constitution has b een e ffected by fo rcing

th e origina lly and th erefore normall y On e into
the abnormal condition of M a ny An action of .

this character implies reaction A diffusion from

.

U nity under the con di tions involves a tendency

, ,

to return into U nity— a tendency ineradicable

until sati sfi ed B ut on th es e p oints I will speak
.

more fully h ereafter .

T h e assumption of ab sol ute U nity in th e p r i

m or dial Particle incl udes that of infin ite divisi
b ility Let us concei v e th e Particle th en to b e
.
, ,

only not totally ex h austed by diff usion into

Sp ace F ro m th e o n e P article as a centr e let us
.
, ,
32 WORKS OF E D GAR AL LAN P OE

su ppose to be irradiated spherically— in all direc

tions to imm easurable b ut still defi nite dis
—

tances in t h e previo usly v acant spac e — a certain

inexpressibly great yet l imited num ber of unim
ag in ab ly yet not in finitely min ute atoms .

No w of th ese atoms thus di ffu ed or upon

, ,
s
,

di ffus ion wh at conditions are we p ermitted— not

,

to a ssume b ut to infer from consideration as

, ,

well of th eir source as of the ch aracter of th e

design apparent in th eir diff usion ? Un ity being
th eir source and differ en ce fr om Unity the char
,

acter of th e design manifested in th eir difi usion ,

we are warranted in supposing th is ch aracter to

be at le ast g en era lly preserv ed thro ugh out th e de
sign and to form a portion of the de sign it sel f
-
,

th at is to say we sh all be warranted in con

,

c eiv in g contin ual difi er en ces at all p oin ts from

the uniquity and simplicity of th e origin B ut .
,

for th ese reasons shall we be j usti fied in M ag

,

ining the atoms h eterogeneo us dissimila r un , ,

equal and ineq ui distant ? More explicitly— are

,

we to consider no two atoms as at th eir difi usion , ,

of th e same nature or of th e same form or of

, ,

the same size l— and after fulfilment of th eir dif

‘
,

fusion into Sp ace is absolute in eq uidistan ce

, ,

eac h from each to be un derstood of all o f th em ?

,

In such a rrangement under suc h conditions we , ,

most easily and immediately compreh end th e sub

sequent most feas ible carrying o ut to completion
of any s uch design as th at whic h I h ave sug
design of v ariety out of unity
ss— h eterogeneity o ut of
 E U REKA 33

word , th e possible m ultiplicity of r ela

utmost
tio n o ut of th e emphatically irrelative On e Un .

doubte dl y therefore we sho uld be warranted in

, ,

assuming all that has been mentioned b ut for ,

the reflection first that supererogation is not

, ,

presumable of any D ivine Act ; and secondly

”

, ,

that the object suppo sed in V iew appears as fe as ,

ible when some of the conditions in qu estion ar e

dispensed with in the beginning as wh en all are
, ,

understood imm ediately to exist I mean to say .

that some are i nvolved in the rest or so instan ,

tan eous a cons equence of them as to make the

distinction inappreciable D i fference of size for .
,

example will at onc e be brought abo ut thro ugh

,

the tendency of one atom to a second in prefer ,

ence to a third on acco unt of particular in eq ui

,
e

distance ; which is to be compr ehended as p ar

“

ticula r in eq uidistan ces b etween c en tr es of q uan ~

tity in n eig hb o rin g a toms of differ en t fo rm— a

,

matter not at all interfering with the generally

eq uable distribution of th e atoms D i fference of .

kin d too is easily conceiv ed to be merely a result

, ,

of difl er en ces in si z e and form taken more o r

,
,

less c on jo in tly z— in fact since the Un ity of th e

,

Particle P roper implies ab solute homogeneity we ,

cannot imag i ne the atoms at their di ffusion dif , ,

f er in g in kind witho u t im agining at the sam e

, ,

tim e a special exerci se of the D ivine Will at the

, ,

emission of each atom for the p urpo se of e ff ect«

,

i n g in each a c h ange of its essential nat ure — so

, ,

fantastic an idea is the less to be indulged as ,

the obj ect proposed 1 s seen to be th o ro ughly at

tain ab l e witho ut such minute and elaborate in
IX 3 .
34 WORK S OF E D GAR ALLAN P OE

t erp ositio n We perceive th er efore upon the

.
, ,

whole that it woul d be supererogat o ry and con

, ,

sequently n phil os0 phic al to predicate of the

u ,

atoms in V ie w of their p urposes an y th ing more

, ,

th an differ en ce of fo rm at their dispersion with ,

in i n i
par tic ul ar eq u dista ce after t all oth er dif
—

fer en c es arisin g at once o ut of these in th e very

-
,
-
first proces se s of mass constitution We thus es
tablish the U ni verse o n a p urely g eom etri"ca l
basis Of course it is by no means nece ssa ry to
.
,

assume ab solute differenc e e v en of form among , ,

a ll th e

ing atoms are of similar form— no ato ms which

can ever appr ox im M e until their ine vita ble re ,

unition at the end .

Alth ough th e immediate and p erp etu al ten

den ey of the dis uni ted atoms to retur n into th ei r
normal U nity is implied as I h ave said in their
, , ,

abnormal dififu ion still it is clear th at this ten

s

deney will be without consequence— a tendency

an d no mo re — un til the di ffusi v e energy in cea s ,

ing to b e exerted shall leave it th e tendency

, , ,

free to seek its satisfaction The D i vine Act

i
. ,

h o wever being considered as determinate an d

, ,

discontin ued on fulfi lment of th e diffus ion we

understand at once a reac tion -
,

, in oth er wo r ds
, ,

a sa tisfia b le tendency of the disunited a toms to

ret urn into On e .

B ut the diff usi ve energy being with dra wn an d ,

th e reaction having commenced in furtheran ce of

the ultimate desig n— tha t of the utm ost p ossib le
 E U REKA t
‘ 0M
ll
”
“e
:
-W 3
lf LL
M “ 5
5
?
Relation— this design is n ow in danger of be in g
frustrated in detail b y reason of th at v ery ten
, ,
:

deney to return which 1 s to e ffect its accompl ish /

ment i n general M ultiplicity 1 s th e obj ec t ; b ut i
.

there is nothing to p revent proximate atoms from

lapsing a t on ce, thro ugh th e n ow satisfiab le ten
deney— b efo r e th e fulfi lment of any ends pro
posed in mul tiplicity into absolute oneness
—

-
”

a mong themselves there is noth ing to impede

the aggregation of vario us uniq ue masses at va ,

r io us points of space — in other words nothing ,

to interfere with the acc um ulation of v ario us

masses each absolutely One
,
it d i v m .
5

For the efl ectual and thorough completion o f .

th e general des ign we thus see th e necessity for

,

a ep ulsion of M t d capacity a separative

r l i e —

som ething wh ic h on Withdrawal of th e di ff us ive

,

Volition sh all at the same time allow the ap

,

p roac h a
,
n d forbid the j unction of t h e atoms
, ;
suffering them in finitely to approximate while ,

denying th em positiv e contact ; in a word having ,

the power— up to a certain ep o ch— b f preventin g

their coalition, b ut no ab ility to interfere with
their c oalescen ce in any re spect or deg ree The .

rep ulsion already c onsidered as so pec uliarly

,

limited i n other regards must be un derstood let

, ,

me repeat as h aving power to p revent absolute

,

c oalition on ly up to a cer tain ep o ch

, U nl e ss we .

are to c onceiv e that th e appetite for U nity amon g

th e atoms is doomed to be sati sfied n ever un o

less we ar e to conceiv e th at what h ad a b egm n in g

is to h a v e an end — a conception wh ich cannot
r eall be entertained h owever m u ch we m ay talk
y ,
36 V ORK S O F E D GAR AL LAN POE
N

or d ream of entertaining it— We are forced to

c onclude that the rep ulsive influence imagined
-
,

,
a — i
will fin l y under pressure of the Un ten den cy
l
collec tively appli ed b ut never and in no degree
,

un til on fulfil ment of the D i vine p urpo ses such

, ,

collective application sh all be naturally made

yield to a force which at th at ul timate epoch , ,

sh all be the superior force preci sely to th e extent

required and thus permi t th e un i versal sub si
,

dence into the inevitable becaus e original and ,

therefore normal On e The conditio ns h ere to

,
.

be reconciled are diffic ult indeed z— we canno t

even comprehend the possibility of their concilia
tion - nevertheless the apparen t impossib ility is
,

brilliantly s uggestiv e .

That the rep ulsive someth in g actually exists ,

we see Man neither employs nor knows a forc e

.
, ,

suffi cient to bring two atom s into contact This .

is b ut th e well - established proposition of th e im

penetrability of matter All Experiment proves .

—all Philosophy a dmits it The desig n of th e r e

.

p sion the necessity for its existence— I h ave

ul —
'

endeavored to show ; b ut from all attempt at in

vestig atin g its nat ure h av e religio usly abstained ;
this on acco un t o f an intuitive con viction that
'

r
ig gj l e at issue is strictly spirit u li es
in a recess 1 mm e rstand
ing— lies in volved in a considerat ion of what n ow
— in o ur human state— is n o t to be considered
in a consideration of Sp ir it in itself I feel in a .
,

word that h ere the Go d has interposed and here

, ,

onl y because here and here only the knot de

,
o

m ended the interposition of the Go d .

38 WORK S OF E D GAR AL LAN PO E

course are composed of these atoms in p r ox im ti te

,

contact and are therefore to be considered as

,

mere a ssemblages of more or fewer difi eren c es ;

and the resist ance made by the rep ul sive spirit ,

on bringing together any two such assemblages ,

wo uld be in the ratio of the two sums of the dif

f er en c es in each — an ex ression which when r e
p — ,

duc ed is equivalent to th 1 s
,
The a m o un t of elec
tricity develop ed o n the app r oxim a tio n of two
b o dies is p r op o r tio n a l to the difier en ce b etween
,

the r esp ec tive s ums o f the a to ms of which the

b o dies a r e c o mp osed That n o two bodie s are ab
.

so lutely alike is a simple corollary from all that

,

has b een here said E lectricity therefore , exist

.
,

ing al ways is develop ed whenever an y bodi es b ut

, ,

m an ifested only when bodies of appreciable dif

ference are brou ght into approximation
,
.

To electricity so for the present contin uing

—
, ,

to call it — we m ay not be wrong in referring the

vario us; physical appearances of light heat and ,

magnetism ; b ut far less shall we be liabl e to err

in attrib uting to this strictly spiritual principle
the more important ph aenomena of vitality con ,

scio usn ess and Tho ug ht On this to p ic ho wev er

.
,
»

I need pause her e merely to suggest that these

phaen omena whether observed generally or in
, ,

detail seem to proceed a t least in the ra tio of the

,

heter og en eo us .

D iscarding the two equivo cal term s

n ow ,
” “ ”
gravitation and electricity let u s adopt ,
“ ”
the more definite expressions a ttr a ction and ,
“ ”
r ep ul sion The former is the body ; the latter
.

the soul : the one is the material ; the other the

 E U REKA 39

Spiritu
al, pr1 n c1 ple o f the U niverse
'
. N0 o ther

p rin cip l es ex is t . A ll phaenome na are referable to

one or to the other or to both combined So
, ,
.

rigorously s this the case s o thoro ughl y demon

1 —

strahle is it that attraction and rep ulsion are the

so le propertie s t h ro ugh which we perceive the

U niverse — in oth er words by which Matter is ,

manifested to Mind that for all merely a rgu

—
,

m en tativ e p urpose s we are ful ly j usti fied in as

,

sum in g that matter exis ts only as attraction and

rep ul sion— that attraction and rep ulsion a r e mat
ter z there being no conceivable case in whic h
—
“ ”
we may not employ the term matter and the
” “ ”
terms attraction an d rep ul sion taken to ,

gether as equ ivalent and therefore conv ertible

, , ,

expressions in Logic .

I said j ust n ow that what I h av e described as

, ,

the tendency of the di ff used atoms to return into

their original unity wo ul d be understood as the
,

principle of the Newtonian law of gravity ; and ,

in fact there can be b ut little difficulty in suc h

,

an understanding if we l ook at the Newtonian

,

gravity in a merely general V ie w as a force im ,

pelling matter to seek matter ; that is to say ,

wh en we pay no attention to the kn own m o dus

Op er an di of the Ne wtonian force T h e general .

coincidence satisfi es us ; b ut upon looki ng closely , ,

we see in detail m uch that appears in coincident

, , ,

and much in regard to wh ich no coincidence at

least is established For example : the Newton-
,
1

, .

ian gravity,when we th ink of it in certain m o ods ,

does n o t seem to be a tendency to on en ess at all ,

b ut rather a tendency o f all bodie s in all dir ec

‘

r
40 WORK S o r EDGAR AL LAN P OE

tion s— a phrase apparently expressi ve of a ten

deney to di fi usion Here then is an inc o in ci
‘

.
, ,

dence Again ; when we reflect on th e m athem at

.

ical law governing the Newtonian tendency we ,

see clearly that no coincidence has been made

g ood in respect of the m o dus op er an di at least

, , ,

between gravitation as known to ex ist an d that '

seemingly simple and direct t endency which I

have assumed .

In fact I have attained a point at which it will

,

be adv isable to strengthen my position by r e

versing my processes So far we have gone on .
,

a p r io ri from an abstract consideration of Sim

,

p licity as that qu ality mo st likely to have char

,

acter iz ed the origin al action of Go d Let us n ow .

see whether the established facts of the Newton

ian Gravitation may not afi ord us a p osterio ri , ,

some legitimate inductions .

Wh at does the Newtonian law declare ? That

all bo di es attract each o ther with forces propor '

tio n al to the sq u are s of their distances P ur .

p o sely I have
,
given in the fi rst place the
,
vu l gar ,

version of the l aw ; and I confess that in this as ,

in most other vulgar versions of great truths we ,

fin d little of a s uggestive character Let us n o w .

adopt a more phil osophical phra seology : — E very a

a to m of every b o dy a ttra c ts every o ther a to m

, , ,

b o th of its own an d of every o ther b o dy with a ,

fo rce whi ch varies in versely as the sq uar es of the

distan ces b etween the a ttr acting an d a ttra cted
a tom Here inde ed a flood of suggestion b urst s
.
, ,

upon the mind .

B ut let us see distinctly What it was that New

 E U REKA 41

ton d —
p r ove according to th e gro ssly irrational
definitions of p ro of pre scribed by th e metaphysi
.

cal school s He was forced to content himself

.

with showing how thoro ughly th e motions of an

imaginary U ni verse , composed of attracting and
attracted atoms obedient to t h e l aw he an
n o un c ed, coincide w ith those of the actu ally ex
istin g U niverse so far as it comes under o ur o b
servation . This was the amo unt of his dem on
s tr a tion — that is to say thi s was the amo unt of
,

it according to the conventional cant of the

, .

“
philosophies .H is successe s added proof m ul
i
t p ed
l i by proof — su ch proof as a so und intel
lect admits b ut the dem on str a tio n of th e l aw
—

itself persist the metaphysicians h ad not been

, ,
“
strengthened in any degree O cular p hysica l
.
,
“
proof however of attraction h ere upon E arth
, , , ,

in accordance with the Newtonian theory was , ,

at length much to the satisfaction of some intel

,

lectu al gr ovell ei s aff orded T h i s proof arose col

, .

laterally and incidentally (as nearly all impor

tant truths hav e arisen ) out of an attempt to as
certain the mean density o f the E arth In the .

famous Maskelyne Cavendish and Bailly ex peri

,

ments for this p urpose the attraction of th e mass

,

of a mo untain was seen felt measured and , , ,

fo und to be mathematically consistent with t h e

immortal theory of the British astronomer .

B ut 1 n spite of thi s con firmation of that wh ich

needed none in spite of the so-
— cal led corro b ora
tion of the theory by the so -
“ ” “
called oc ular
and physical proo -in spite o f t h e charac ter of
this corroboration— the ideas which even really
42 WORKS OF E D GAR ALLAN P OE

p h ilosop h ic al men cannot h elp imbib ing of gr av

ity and especially the ideas of it whic h ordi
—
, ,

nary men get and contente dl y maintain are seen ,

to h ave been derived for the most part from a , ,

consideration of the principle as they fin d it de

vel o p ed— m er ely in the p lan et up on which they
stan d .

No w, to what does so partial a cons ideration

’

tend— to wh at species of error does it give rise ?

On the E arth we see and feel only that gravity
impels all b odies towards the cen tre of the Earth .

No m an in the common w al ks of life could be

m a de to see or feel anything els e— co ul d be made
to p erceive that anything anywh ere has a per , ,

p etu a l gravitating
,
tendency in any o ther dir ce
tion than to the centre of the Earth ; yet (with
an exception here after to be specified ) it is a fact
th at every earthl y th ing (not to speak n ow of
every heavenl y thing ) has a tendency not on ly
to th e E arth s centre b ut in ev ery conceiv able
’

direction besides .

Now although th e philo sop hic cannot b e said

,

to err with the vulgar in th is matter they never ,

theless permit th ems elv es to be infl uenced with ,

out knowing it by th e sen tim en t of the vul gar

,
“
idea . Altho ugh th e Pag an fable s are not b e
“
lieved says Bryant in his very erudi te ,
Myth
ology yet we forget o urselve s continually and
,

make inf erences from th em as from existing real

ities . I mean to assert that the merely sensi
tive p erc ep tion of gravity as we experience it o n
E arth beguiles mankin d into the fancy of con
,

c en tr a liza tion or esp ecia lit —

y respecting it has
 E U R E KA 43

been continually biasing towards this fancy even

the mighties t intellects— perpetu ally altho ugh ,

imperceptibly leading them away from the real

,

characteristics of the principle ; th us preventing

them up to this date fro m ever getting a glimpse
, ,

of that vital truth wh ich lies in a diametrically

’
Opposite direction— behin d the p rinc iple s essen
tia l ch aracteristic s— th ose n o t of c o n cen tr al iz a
,

tion or esp ec ial ity— b ut of un iversality an d dif

”
fusion This vital truth is Un ity as the sour ce
.
‘

of the phaen omenon

'

Let me n ow repeat th e definition of gravity

E very a to m of ever y b o dy a ttra c ts ever y o ther
, ,

a to m b o th of its o wn an d o f every o ther b o dy

, ,

with a force which varie s inversely as the squ ares

of th e distance s of the at tr acting and attracted
atom .

Here let the reader pause with me for a mo

‘

ment in contemplation of the mirac ulo us— o f the

,

ine ffable— o f the altogether unimaginable com

p l ex ity of relation involved in the fact that e a ch
a to m a ttr a c ts ever y o ther a tom— involved merely
in this fact of the attraction without reference ,

to the l aw or mode in which the attraction is

manifested involved m er ely in the fac t that
—
‘

each atom attracts every o th er atom a t a ll in a ,

wilderness of atoms so numero us that those whic h

go to the composition of a cannon- ball exceed , ,

p robably in
,
mere point of n umber all the stars ,

which go to the co nstitution of the U niverse .

Had we discovered simply that each atom

, ,

tended to some one favorite poin t to some espe

—

c iall y attractiv e a tom— we sh o ul d still h ave

44 WO RK S OF EDGAR AL LAN POE

fallen upon a d iscovery which in itself wo uld , ,

have sufficed to overwhelm th e mind — b ut wh at

is it that we are actually called upon to compre
h end ? T h at each atom attrac ts— s ympathi ze s
with th e mo st delicate movements of e very other
atom and with each and with all at th e same
,

time and forever and accordin g to a determinate

, ,

law of wh ich the complexity e ven considered by ,

itself solely is utterly beyond th e gras p of the

,

imagination of man If I propose to ascertain

.

the influence of one mote in a sunbe am upon its

neighboring mote I cannot accomplish my pur
,

po se with o ut fi rst co unting an d weigh in g all the

atom s in the U niverse an d defining th e p recise
,

position s of all at one partic ular moment If I .

vent ure to displace by e v en th e billionth p art of

,

an inch the microscopical speck of dust whic h

,

lie s n ow upon the point of my finger what is the ,

character of th at act upon which I h ave adven

tur ed ? I hav e done a deed whic h sh ake s th e
Moon in h er path whic h causes the Sun to be no
,

longer th e sun an d wh ich alters forever th e des

,

tiny o f the multitudinous myriads of stars that

roll an d glo w in th e maj estic p re sence of th eir
C reator
Thes e id eas -
.

conceptions such as these— un

tho ughtlike th oughts —soul- re verie s rather th an
concl usion s or even considerations of the intel
l ect — ideas I repeat suc h as th ese are such as
, , ,

we can alone h ope pro fitably to entertain in any

e ff ort at grasping the great principle A ttrac tio n , .

B ut n ow wi
,
th such ideas with such a vis io n
—

of th e marv ello us compl ex ity of Attraction fairly

46 WORK S OF ED GAR ALLA N POE

at once rectilinearly back to th e central po int of

, ,
”
their origin ?
I reply that they do ; as will be distinctly l

shown ; b ut that the cause of th eir so doing is

quite irrespective of the centre as such They .

all tend rectilinearly towards a centre because ,

of the sphericity with which they have been ir

radiated into space Each atom forming one of
.
,

a gen erally uniform globe of ato ms fin ds more ,

atoms in the direction of the centre of co urse , ,

than in any other and in that direction there

'

, ,

fore is im p ell ed b ut is n o t thus impelled b e

,
m

ca use the centre is the p oin t of its o rig in It is .

not to any p oin t that the atoms are allied It is .

not any lo ca lity either in the concrete or in the

,

abstract to which I s uppose them bo un d Noth

, .

like lo ca tion was conceived as their origin .

u ree lies in the principle Un ity This ,

.

parent This they seek always— im

.

in all directions wherever it is even

—

p artially to be fo un d t hus appeasing in some , ,

measure the ineradicable tendency while on the

, ,

way to its absolute satisfaction in the end It .

follows from a ll this that any pr inciple which , "

shall be adeq u ate to acco unt for the la w or m o dus ,

op er an d i of the attractive force in gener al will

, ,

acco unt for this aw in p articular

l — that is to
say ,
any principle which will show why the
atoms sho uld tend to their g en era l c en tr e of ir
r a dia tio n wit h forces inversely proportional to

the squares of the distances will be admitted as

satisfactorily acco unting at the same time for , ,

th e tendency according to the same law of these

, ,
 EUREKA 47

atoms e ach to e ach ;

the

propositions would involve n o n ecessity of modi

ficatio n in the terms of the Newtonian definition
of Grav ty which declares that each atom at
i

tracts each other atom and so forth and declares ,

this merely ; b ut (always under the supposition

th at what I propose be in the end a dm itted ) it
, ,

s eems clear that some error might occasionally b e ,

avoided in the futu re processes of Science were

, ,

a more ample phraseology adopted — for in

“
stance — E ac h atom tends to every other a tom ,

&c with a force & c : the g en er a l r esult b ein g a

.
,
.

ten den cy of a ll with a simila r f o r ce to a g en er a l

, ,
”
c en tr e .

The re versal of our processes h as thus brou ght

us to an identical res ult ; b ut while in the one
process in tuition was the starting point in the ,

other it was the goal In comm encing the for .

mer j o urney I could only say that with an irre ,

sistib l e int uition I felt Simplicity to have been

,

made the characteristic of the original action of

Go d — in ending the lett er I can only dec lare

that with an irresistible intuiti on I perceive ,

U nity to h ave been the so urce of the observed

phaenomena of the Newtonian gravitation Thus .
,

according to the schools I p r ov e nothing So be,

.

it z— I design b ut t o suggest and to co n vin ce —

thm m m m prou dly aware

th at there exist many of the most profo und an d
ca utiously disc rimina ti v e human intellects wh ich
48 WOR K S OF ED GAR ALL AN P O E
'

cannot help being ab undantly content with my

suggestion s . To these intellects as to my own
—

— there is no mathematical demonstration which

c o u ld bring the least additional tr ue p r o of of th e

great Tr uth which I have advanced— the truth of
O r ig in a l Un ity as the so urce as the p r in cip le of
—

the Un iv ersa l P hazn o m en a For my part I am not

.

sure th at I speak and See— I am not so su re t hat

my h eart beats and that my soul lives — o f the
rising of to - ’
morrow s sun — a probability that as
—
yet lies in the F uture I do not pretend to be one
t ho u s andt h part as su re— as I am of the irre
tr iev ab ly bygone Fa ct that All Things and All
Tho ughts of Things with all their in efi ab l e M ul
,

tipl icity of Relation sprang at once in to being

,

from the primordial and irrelativ e On e .

Referring to the Newtonian Gra vity Dr ,

.

“
Nichol the eloqu ent auth or of The Ar chitec
,
“
t ure of the Heavens says — In truth we h av e
,

no reason to suppose this great Law as n ow re,

vealed to b e the ultimate or simplest and there

for the universal and all -
, ,

comprehensive form of
,

a great Ordinance The mode in which its in

.

tensity diminish es with the element of di stance ,

has not th e a sp ect of an ul timate p rin cip le ;

wh ich always a ssume s the simplicity and self
evidence of th ose axioms wh ich con stitute th e
,

”
b as is of Geometry .

No w it is q uite tru e th at
, ultimate prin
”
c ip l es
,
in th e co mm on un derstanding of th e
words always a ssume th e simplicity of geometri
,

cal axio ms — (as for “

self - ,
”
evidence th ere is no
s u c h t h ing ) b ut these principles are clearly n o t
—
 EUREKA 49

ul timate ; in oth er terms wh at we are in the ,

h abit of calling principles are no principles ,

properly speaking since there can be b ut one

—

p r in cip l e the
, v olition of Go d We have no .

right to a ssume then from wh at we observe in

, ,
“
r ul es that we ch oo se foolishly to name prin
c ip l es , an yth ing at all in respe ct to the charac
“
ter istics of a principle p roper The ul timate .

principles of which D r Nichol speaks as hav .

ing geometrical simplicity m ay and do have this ,

geometrical t urn as being part an d parcel of a

,

vast geometrical system and thus a system of , .

s implicity its elf— in which n e v ertheless the , ,

tr uly ultimate principle is as we kn o w the con , ,

summation of the complex — that is to say of the ,

unintelligible— for is it not th e Spiritual Capa

city o f Go d ?
I quoted D r Nich ol s remark h owever not so
.
’
, ,

muc h to question its philosop hy as by way of

calling attention to the fact th at W
,

h ile all men

have a dm itted som e principle as existing beh ind
the l aw of Gra vity no attempt has been yet made
,

to point out what , this principle in particular

is.
— if we except pe rhaps occa sional fantastic
, ,

efforts at referring it to Magnetism or Mesmer ,

ism or Swedenborgianism or Transcendental

, ,

ism o r some oth er equall y delicious ism of the

,

same species and invariably patroni zed by one

,

and the same species of people The great mind .

of Newton while boldly grasping the Law itself

, ,

shrank from the principl e of the Law The .

more fl uent and comprehensive at least if not ,

the more patient and profo und sagacity of La ,

o

IX 4 .
50 wo nx s o r E D GAR ALLAN P OE

place h ad not th e co urag e to attack it

, B ut .

hesitation on the part of these two astronomers

it is perhaps not so very diffi cul t to understand
, , .

They as well as all the first class of mathem ati

,

c ians W l
e e mathematicians so le y : — their intel
‘

lect at least h ad a firml y-

,

pronoun ced mathe

matico - physical tone Wh at lay not distinctly .

within the domain of Physics or of Mathematics

seemed to them either Non -
, ,

Entity or Shadow .

Neverth eless we may well wonder th at Leibnitz

, ,

who was a marked exception to the general rul e

in these respects and whose mental temperament
,

was a singular admixtu re of the mathematical

with the physico - metaphysical did not at onc e ,

investigate and e stablish the point at issu e .

Eith er Newton or Laplace seekin g a principl e ,

and discovering none p hysica l would have rested ,

contentedly in the conclusion that there was ah ~

so lutely none ; b ut it is almost impo ssible to

fancy of Leibnitz that h a ving exhausted in his
, , ,

searc h the physical do m inion s h e wo ul d not h a v e ,

stepped at once bol dl y and hopeful ly amid his

, ,

old familiar h aunts in th e k ingdom of Meta

physic s H ere indeed it is clear that h e must
.
, ,

have ad ventured in search of th e treasure

t hat h e did not fin d it after all was perh ap s b e , , ,

cause his fairy guide Imagination was not suffi

grown or well -
c ien tly well -
, ,

e ducated to direct
, ,

him aright .

I observe d j ust n ow that in fact th ere had

, , , ,

been certain vagu e attemp ts at referrin g Gra vity

to some very u certain is ms These attempts
n
.
,

however altho ugh considered bold,and j ustly so

,
 EUREKA 51

considered looked no farth er than to the gen

,

r i
e al ty — the merest generality — o f the Newton

ian Law Its m o dus op era n di has never to my

.
,

knowledge been approached in the way of an ef

,
a

fort at explanation It is therefore with no un

.
,

warranted fear of being taken for a madman at

the o utset and before I can bring my propo si
,

tions fairly to the eye of those wh o alone are

c ompetent to decide upon them that I h ere de ,

clare the m o dus op era n di of the Law of Gr avity

to be an exceedingly simple and p erfectly ex
plicable thing— that is to say wh en we make o ur
,

advances towards it in j ust gradation s and in

the tru e direction wh en we regard it from the
—

prop er point of view .

Whether we reach the idea of absolu te Un ity

as the so urce of All Things from a consideration
.
,

of Simplicity as the most probable characteristic

of th e original action of G o d —wh ether we ar
rive at it from an inspection of the universality
of relation in the gravitating ph aenomena ; o r —

whether we attain it as a result of the mutu al

cor roboration a ff orded by bo th processes —still ,

the idea itself if entertained at all is enter

, ,

\
ta in ed in inseparable connection wit h another
idea— th at of the condition of th e U niverse of
stars as we n ow perce ive it— th at is to say a , ’

condition of immeasurable diffusion throu gh

space. Now a con nection between th ese two
ideas unity and di ffusion— cannot be estab
—

lished unless thro ugh the entertainment of a

th ird idea th at of ir radia tio n Absolute U nity
—
.

being taken as a centre , th en th e existin g U n i«

 /
sa x WORK S o r E D GAR ALLAN P OE

ver e of st ars is th e result of irra dia tio n from

s

that centre .

No w the laws of irradiation are kn o wn

, They .

are part and parcel of the sp her e They belong .

to the class of in disp uta b le g eom etrica l p r op er

ties . W”e say of them they are true— they are
“
,

evi dent To demand why they are true wo uld

'

.
,

be to demand why the ax ioms are true upon

wh ic h their demonstration is based No thin g is .

demonstrable strictly speaking ; b ut if anything

,

b e th en th e prop erties— the laws in q uestion are

,

demonstrated .

B ut these laws— what do th ey de clare ? Irra

d at on how b y what step s does it proceed o ut
i i — —

war dly from a centre ?

From a lum in ous centre Lig ht i ssues by i rra
,
»

diation ; and the quantities of light received upo n .

any given plane suppo sed to be sh ifting its p osi

,

tion so as to be now nearer th e centre and n ow

farth er from it will be diminished in the same
,

preportion as the squares of the distances of the

plane fro m th e l uminous body are increased ; ,

and will be increa sed in the same p roportion as

these squares are diminished .

The expression of the law may b e thus gen

er al iz ed z the n um ber of light-
—
part icles (or if ,

the phrase be preferred the number of light ,

impressions ) received upon the sh iftin g plane ,

will be in versely proportional with the squares

of the distances of th e plane Generali zing yet .

again we may say that th e difi usion— th e sc a t

‘

tering th e irradiation in a word is d ir ectly

—
,
—

ro
p p ortional w it h th e sq uares o f the di stance s .
54 WORK S OF ED GAR AL LAN P OE

the conclusion that on the hypothesi s th at mat

,

ter was originally irradiated from a centre and ,

is n ow returning to it the concentraliz atio n in

, ,

the retur n proceeds exa ctly as we kn ow the force

,

of g r a vita tio n to p r o c eed .

Now here if we coul d be permitted to assume

,

that concentraliz ation exactly represented the

f o r ce o f the ten den cy to the cen tr e— that the one
was exactly proportional to the other and that ,

the two proceeded together— we sho ul d h ave

shown all that i s required The sole diffic ulty .

exis ting then is to establ ish a direct proportion

, ,
“ ”
between concentrali z ation and the fo rc e of
concentrali z ation ; and this is done of course if , ,
“
we establish su ch proportion between irradia
”
tion and th e fo r ce of irradiation .

A very slight inspection of the He avens as

su res us that the stars have a certain general un i
formity equability or equi distance of distr ib u
, , ,

tion thro ugh that region of space in which co llec ,

tively and in a ro ughly glob ular form they are

, ,

situ ated this species of very general rather

—
,

than abs olute equability being in full keeping

, ,

with my deduction of in eq uidistan ce with in cer ,

tain limits amon g the originally diffused atoms

, ,

as a cor o llary from the evident design of infinite

complexity of relation o ut of irrelation I .

started it will be remembered with the idea of

, ,

a generally uniform b ut partic ul arly un uniform

d istrib u tion of the atoms — an idea I repeat , ,

which an inspection of the stars as they exist , ,

confi rms .

-
B ut e v en in the merely general equ ability of
 E UREKA 55

di strib ution as r egards the atoms th ere appears

‘

, ,

a difficul ty whi ch no doubt has al ready su g

, ,

gested its elf to those among my readers who ha ve

borne in mind that I suppose this equ ability of
distrib ution e ff ected thr o u gh irra dia tion fr om a
c en tr e The very fir st glance at the idea irradi
.
,

ation " forces us to the entertainment of the hith

,

erto uns eparated and seemingly in separabl e

i dea of agglomeration about a centre with dis ,

p ers io n as we recede from it— the idea in a word

, ,

of in eq u ab il ity of distribution in resp ect to the

matter irradiated .

Now I have elsewhere observed that it is

,
*
,

by j ust such difficul ties as the one n ow in qu es

tion such rou ghnesses such p ecul iarities
— —

such protu berances above the plane of the ordi

nary— that Reason feels her way if at all in her , ,

search for the Tru e By the diffi cul ty— the

.

“ ” —
pec uliarity n o w presented I leap at once to ,
.

the secret— a secret which I might never have

attained b ut for the pecul iarity and the infer
enc es which in i ts m er e c ha r a c ter o f p ecu liar ity
'

, ,

it a ffords me .

The process of thought at this point may b e , ,

thus rou ghly sketched — I say to myself

‘

is a tr uth I —

recon
ciled is a consequ ent truth I perceive it E gua
,
— .

b ility or di ffusion fi rst de du ce d a p r io r i and

,

then corroborated by the in spection of phaen o m

ena is also a truth I fully admit it So far all
,
— .

Murd r in th R u Mo rg u
e s - l IV pr e t edi ti on
e e e vo . .
, es n .
56 WORK S OF ED GAR ALL AN POE

is clear around me there are no clo uds behind

—

which the secret— the great secret of the gravi

tating m o dus op eran di — can possibly lie hidden ;
— bu
t this s ecret lies her ea b o u ts mo st assu redl y ;
,

and wer e ther e b ut a clou d in view I shoul d be ,

”
'

driven to suspicion of that cloud An d n ow

.
,

j ust as I say this there actually comes a clo u d

,

into view This clou d is the seeming im p o ssi

.

b ility of reconciling my truth irr adia tio n with

, ,

my tru th eq ua bility of dijfusion

,
I say now :
.

Behind this seem in g impossibility is to be

” “
fo und what I desire I do not say r ea l im
.

possibility ; for invincible faith in my truths

assures me that it is a mere difficulty after al l ;
b ut I go on to say with unflinching confi dence
, ,

that when this difficulty shall be solved we shall

, ,

fin d wr app ed up in the p r o c ess of so lutio n the

, ,

key to the secret at which we aim Moreover .

I feel that we shall discover b ut o n e possible

sol ution of the difficul ty ; this for the reason
that were there t wo one would be sup er er o ga
, ,

tory— wo uld be fruitles s -would be empty

would contain no key since no duplicate key
—

can be needed to any secret of Natu re .

An d n o w let us see z O ur usual notion s of

, ,
—

irradiation— in fact a ll o ur distinct notion s of

,

it are cau ght merely from the process as w e see

—

it exempli fi ed 1 n W
o us o utpo uring of r ay-
er e there 1 s a co n tin u

str eam s and wi th a fo r c e

,

which we ha ve a t least n o r ig ht to supp ose

v a r ies a t a ll
. No w , in any such irradiation a s
this— continu ous and of unvarying force— the
regions nearer the centre must in evita b ly be
 EUREKA 5?

always mor e crowded with the irra di ated matter

than the regions more remote B ut I have as .

sumed n o such irradiation a s this I assumed no .

co n tin uo us irradiation ; and for the simple reason

that such an assumption would hav e involved ,

first the necessity of entertain ing a conception

,

which I h ave shown no man can entertain and ,

which (as I will more ful ly explain hereafter )

all observation of the fir m am en t refutes— the
conception of the absolute infi nity of the U n i
”

verse o f stars an d would have involved second

—
,

ly the impossibility of understanding a reaction

,
—
that is gravitation as existing now— since
,
—
,

while an act is continu ed no reaction of course , , ,

can take place My assum ption then o r rather

.
, ,

m y inevitable ded uction from j u st premises

was that of a determ in a te irradiation— one fin al
ly discontinued .

Let me n o w describe the sole possible mode

in which it is conceivable that matter could have
been di ffu sed throu gh space so as to fulfil the ,

conditions at once of irradiation and of generally

equ able distribution .

For convenience of illustration let us imagine , ,

in the fi rst place a hollow sphere of gla ss or o f

, ,

anything else occ upying the space throu ghout

,

which the univers al matter is to be thu s equ ally

diffused by means of irradiation from the ab so
, ,

lute irrelative unconditional particle placed in

, , ,

the centre of the sphere .

Now a certain exertion of thedifi usive power

,
— in
(presumed to be the D ivine Voliti n ) o other
words a certain fo r ce— whose measure is the
,
58 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

q u antity of matter that is to say the number

—
,

of ato ms— emitted ; emi ts by irradiation this , ,

c erta in number of atoms ; forcing them in all

d irection s o utwardly from t e centr e their
h —

proxim ity to each other diminishing as they pro

o ecd—
until finally they are distrib uted loosely
, , , ,

o ver the interior su rface of the sphere .

When these atoms have attained this position ,

o r while proceeding to attain it a second and ,

inferior exercis e of the same forc e— o r a second

a n d inferior force of the same character —
emits ,

in the same manner that is to say by irradiation

—
,

as before —
a second strat um of ato m s which pro
c eeds to deposit i tself upon the fi rst ; the n um
ber of atoms in this case as in the former being
, ,

of course the measu re of the force whi ch emitted

them ; in other words the force being precisely
,

adapted to the p urpo se it affects the force and

—
,

the number of ato m s sent out by th e force being ,

dir ec tly p r op o r tio n a l .

When this second tratum has reach ed its

s
destined position o r while approaching it a
— —

third still inferior exertion of the force or a ,

third inferior force of a s imilar c haracter— th e

n umber of atoms emitted being in a ll c ases the
measure of the forc e — procee ds to deposit a third
strat um upon the second — and so on un til the se ,

concentric strata growing gradually less and

,

le ss come down at len g th to the central point ;

,

and the di ff usive matter simul taneou sly with the

,

di ff usive force is exhausted

,
.

We have n o w the sphere filled throu gh means ,

of irradiation with ato ms equably di ffus ed The

,
.
 EUREKA 59

-
two necessary conditions thos e of irradiation “

and of equ able di ffusion - are satisfi ed ; and by

the so le process in which the possibility of their
sim ultaneou s satisfaction is conceivable For .

this reason I confi dently expect to fin d lurking

,
.

in the present condition of the atoms as dis

tribu ted throu gho ut the sphere the secret of
which I am in search the all -
,
— important prin
c ip l e of the m o dus o p er an di of the Newtonian

law Let us examine then the actu al condition

.
, ,

of the atoms :
They lie in a series of concentric strata They .

are equ ably diffused throughout the sphere .

They have been irradiated into these states .

The atoms being eq ua b ly di stributed the ,

greater the superfi cial extent of any of these con

centric strata o r spheres the more atoms will
, ,

lie u pon it In other words the number of

.
,

atoms lying upon the su rface of any one of the

concentric spheres is directly proportional with
,

the extent of that su rface .

B u t in an y ser ies of c on cen tr ic sp her es the

, ,

sur fac es ar e dir ec tly p r op o r tio n al with the

sq ua r es o f the dis tan c es fr om the c en tr e )
“

Therefore the number of atoms in any stratum

is directly proportional with the squ are of that
’
stratu m s distance from the centre .

B ut the number of atoms in any strat um is

the measu r e of the force which emitted that
-
stratum that is to say is dir ec tly p rop o r tion al
"

with the force .

S u cci ctl y—
n T he su rfa c e s of sp h e r es a re a s th e sq ua re s of
th eir r a dii .
60 WORKS OF EDGAR AL L AN POE

Therefore the force which irradiated any

stratum is directly proportional with the squ are
of that stratum s di stance from the centre
’
— or ,

generally ,

The fo r ce of the irr a dia tio n has b een dir ectly

p p
r o o r tio n a l with the s q ua r es o f the dis ta n c es .

N o w Reaction as far as we know any thing

'

, ,

of it is Action conversed The g en er a l prin

,
.

c ip l e of Gravity being in the fi rst place under

, ,

f -
stood as the reaction o an act as the expression
of a desire on the p art of Matter while existing ,

in a state of difi usion to retu rn into the U nity

,

whence it was diffu sed ; and ; in the second place ,

the mind being called upon to determine the

c ha r a c ter of the desire— the manner in which it

would natu rally be manifested ; in other words

, , ,

being called upon to conceive a probable law ,

or m o dus op er an di for the return ; could not

,

well help arriving at the conclus ion that this l aw

of retu rn woul d be precisely the converse of the
l aw of departure That such would be the case
.
,

a n y one at least wo ul d be ab undantly j u sti fi ed

, ,

in takin g for granted until s uch ti1n e as some

,

p erson should suggest something like a plausible

reason why it should n o t b e the case — un til such
period as a law of retu rn shall be imagined which ,

the intellect can consider as preferable .

Matter then ; irradiated into space with a force

,

varying as the squares of the distances might a ,

p rio ri be supposed to return towards its centre

,

of irradi ation with a force v arying in versely as

the squ ares of th e di stances : and I h ave already
62 WORKS OF E D GAR ALL AN POE

thi ng is wrong— and still more especially if no, ,

beings laws or con ditions exist at all— then the

, ,

thing c ann o t be wrong and con sequently must ,

be rig ht An y de viation from normality in

.

volves a tendency to return to it A di ff erence

-
.

from th e normal from the right from th e j ust

—

— can be understood as a ff ected o nl y by the o v er .

coming a difficul ty and if the force which over

comes the dilfi culty be not infinitely continued ,

the ineradicable tendency to return will at length

be permitted to act for its own satisfaction .

U pon withdrawal of the force the tendency a cts ,

.

This is the principle of reaction as the inevitable

consequ ence of finite action E mploying a .

hraseology of which the seeming a ff ectation will

“

p
be pardoned for its expressiveness we may say ,

that Reaction is the return from the condition of

as it is a n d o ug ht n o t to b e into the condition of
as it was o rig in a lly a n d ther ef o r e o ug ht to b e
, ,
— and l et me add here that the a b so lu te force of
Reaction would no doubt be always fo und in
di rect proportion with the reality the truth—

the absolutenes s — o f r i
the o g a y if ever it
in lit —

were possible to measure this latter —and con

:

se q u ently the greatest of all conceivable r e

,

actions must be that produced by the tendency

which w e n ow discuss the tendency to return
—

into the a b so lutely o rigina l— into the sup r em ely

primitive Gravity then m ust b e the s tr on g est
.
, ,

of f or c es -an idea reached a p rio ri and ab un

dan tly co nfi rmed by indu ction Wh at use I make

,

of the id ea will be seen in the sequel

,
.

The atoms n o w having been diffus ed from

, ,
 E U R E KA 63

th eir norm al condition of U nity , seek to return

to — what ? Not to any particular p oi n t, cer
tain ly for it is clear that if , upon the di ffusion ,
the whole U niverse of matter had been proj ected ,

collectively to a di stance from the point of irra

'

diatio n the atomic tendency to the general centre

,

of the sphere woul d not have be en distu rbed in

the least — the atoms would n ot have sou ght the
point in a bso lute sp ace from whi ch they were
originally imp elled It is merely the c on dition
.
,

and not the point or locality at which this con

dition took its rise that these atoms seek to r e
,

estab li sh —it is merely that con dition which is

~

“
their n o rm a lity that they desire
, B ut they .

“
seek a centre , it will be said and a centre is
,
”
a point . T r ue ; b ut they seek this point not
in its character of point — (for were the whole ,

sphere moved from its position they would seek, ,

equally the centre ; and the centre then woul d be

,

a n ew p o in t) b ut becau se it so happens on
—
,

acco unt of the form in which th ey collectively

exist (that of the sphere ) — that onl y thr o ug h
—

the point in question— the sphere s centre— t hey

’

can attain their tru e obj ect U nity In the dir ec

,
.

tion of the centre each atom perceives more

atoms than in any other direction E ach atom .
.

is impelled towards the centre bec ause along the

straight line j oining it and the centre and pass
ing on to the circ umference beyond there lie a ,

greater number of atoms than along any other

straight 1ine — a greater number of obj ects that
seek it the in dividu al atom— a greater n um ber

of tendencies to U nity— a greater number of sat

64 WORKS OF E D GAR AL LAN P OE

isfactio n s for its own tendency to U nity— in a

word becaus e in the direction of th e centre lies
,

the utmost po ssibility of satisfaction generally , ,

for its own indi vidual app etite To be brief the .

,
,

con ditio n U nity is all that is really so ught ; and

:

, ,

if the atoms seem to seek the centre of the sphere ,

it is only impliedly through implication— b e

,

cause such centre happens to imply to inclu de , ,

or to involve the only e ssential centre U nity

, ,
.

B ut o n a cco un t o f this implication or involution ,

there is no possibility of practically separating

the tendency to U nity in the ab stract from the ,

tendency to the concrete centre Thus the tend .

ency of the atoms to the general centre is to all ,

practical intents and for all logical p urposes the ,

tendency each to each ; and the tendency each

to each is the ten den cy to the centre ; and the
~

one tendency may be assumed as the other ; what

ever will apply to the one must be thoroughl y
applicable to the other ; and in conclusion what
, ,

ever principle will satisfactorily explain the one ,

cannot be qu estioned as an explanation of the

other .

In looking carefully aro und m e for a rational

objection to what I have advanced I am able to ,

discover n o thing ; b ut of that cla ss of obj ections

—
’
us u ally urged by th e doubters for D o ubt s sake I ,

very readily perce i ve thr ee; and proceed to dis

pose o f th em 1 n order .

It may be said first : Th at th e proof t hat the

,

force of irradiation (in the case described ) is di

r ec tly p roportional to the squ are s of t h e dis

tances dep ends upon an unwarranted assum p

,
 E U RE K A 65

tion— th at of th e number of atoms in each strat

um being the measure o f the force with which
they are emitted ”
.

I rep ly not on ly t ha I am warranted 1n su c h

,
t

a ssumpti on b ut that I sho ul d be utterly un war

,

ranted in any other What I a ssume is simply

.
, ,

i
that an e ffect is the mea su re of ts ca se thatu —

every exercise of the D ivine Will will be p rop or

tio n al to that which demands the exertion that —

the m eans of Omn ipotence or of Omnisc ience , ,

will be exactly adapted to its p urposes Neither .

can a deficiency nor an excess of cause bring to

pass any effect Had the force wh ich irr adiate d
.

any stratum to its position b een either more or

,

less th an was needed for the purpose that is to

—

sa y not d ir ectly p r op o r tio n a l to the p urpose

,

then to its position that stratum co uld not hav e

been ir r a diated Had th e force whi ch with a
w
,

view to general equ ability of distrib ution emit ,

ted the p roper n umber of atoms for each strat

um been not dir ec tly p r op o r ti o n a l to th e n um
,
~

ber then th e number woul d n o t h av e b e en the

,

n umber demanded for th e eq uable di s trib utio n .

The second s upposable obj ection is so mewhat

better entitled to an answer .

It is an admitted principle in D ynamics that

every body on receiving an imp ul se or disposi
, ,
‘

tion to move will move onward in a straight line,

,

in th e direction imparted by the impelling forc e .

until de flected or stopp ed by some other force

, , .

H o w then it may be asked is my fi rst or external

, ,

strat um of ato m s to be u nderstood as discontinu

in g their movement at the circumferenc e of the
IX 5
.
66 WORKS OF E D GAR ALL AN POE

imaginary gla ss sphere when no second force o f ,

more than an imaginary character app ears to , ,

a c co unt for the di scontin u ance ?

I rep ly that the obj ecti o n in this ca se actually
, ,
“
does arise out of an unwarranted assumption
o n the p art of th e objector th e a ssumption of
—

a principle in D ynamics at an epoch when n o

, ,
“ ”
principles ,
in an ything exi st — I use the
,
“
word principle ,
of cou rse , in the objector s ’

understanding of the word .

“ ”
In the beginning we can adm it— indeed we
can comprehend b ut one First Cause the truly
— —

l
u t imate P r in i
c ple — the Volition of God The .

cim ar — that of Irradiation from U nity

p y a c t
must have been inde p endent of all that which the
“ ”—
world now calls p rinciple beca use all that
we so designate is b ut a con sequ ence of t h e reao
“ ”
tion of that primary act —I say p rim ary act ;
for the creation of the ab sol ute material p article
is more prop erly to be regarded as a con cep tion
“
than as an ac t in the ordinary mean ing of the
term . Thus we must regard the p r im ary act as
, '

an act for the establishment of what we n ow call

“ ”
princip l es . B ut this primary act itself is to
be considered as co n tin uous V olition The .

Tho u ght of Go d is to be understood as o r igin at

in g the D iffusion — as proceeding with it— as reg
l
u t g
a i n it and finally as being withdra wn
—
, ,

from it upon its completion Then commences .

”
Reaction and thro ugh Reaction Principle as
, , ,

we employ the word . It will be advisable how ,

ever to limit the application of thi s word to the

,

two imm ediat e re sults of the di scontinuance of

 EUREKA 67

the D ivine Vo ition that

l — is to the two agents , ,

A ttra c tio n and R ep ulsio n E very other Natu ral .

a gent dep ends eit h er more or le ss immediately

, ,

upon these two and therefore wo uld be more

,

conveniently designated as sub - p rinciple .

It may be obj ected thirdly that in general , , , ,

the pec ul iar mode of distrib u tion w h ich I ha v e

“
suggested for the atoms is an h ypothesis and ,

nothing more .

Now I am aware that the word hypothes1 s i s

,

a pondero us sl edge -hammer grasped immediat e ,

ly if not lifted by all very diminutive th inkers

u pon the first appearance of any p r Op ositio ri
, , ,

wearing in any p artic ular the garb of a theor y

, ,
.

“ ”
B ut hypothesi s cannot be wielded her e to any
go od p urpose even by those who s uccee d in lift
,

ing it little men or great

— .

I maintain first that on ly in th e mode de

, ,
~

scribed is it conceivable that Matter co ul d have

been di ffused so as to ful fil at once the condition s
of irradi ation and of generally e qu able dis tr ib u
tion I maintain secondly that these condition s
.
, ,

the m selves have been imposed upon me as nec os ,

sities in a train of ratiocination a s rig o r ously

,

lo g ic a l as tha t which esta b lishes a n y dem o n str a

tio n in E u c lid; and I maintain thirdly that , ,
“ ”
even if the charge of hyp othesis were as fully
s ustained as it is in fact unsustained and unten
, ,

able still the validity and indisp utab ility of my

,

result wo ul d not ev en in the slightest partic ular

, ,

be disturbed .

To explain z— Th e Newtonian Gravity— a law m

o f Natu r e — a l aw whose existence as s uch n o o n e

68 WORKS OF EDGAR AL LAN POE

o ut of B edlam qu estion s— a l aw whose admiss ion

as such enables us to acco unt for nine - tenths of
the U niversal p haenomena— a law which merely ,

bec ause it does so enable us to account fo r th ese

phaenomena we are p erfectly will ing with out
, ,

reference to an y other co nsiderations to admit , ,

and cann ot he lp admitting as a l aw— a l aw nev

, ,

erthel ess of which neither th e principle nor the

,

m o dus op eran di of the principle has ever yet ,

been traced by the human analysis a law in —

,

short w hi ch neither l n its detail nor in i ts gener

, ,

ality has been fo und susceptible of explanation

,

a t a ll — is at length seen to be at every p oint thor

o ughl y explicable p ro vided we only yield o ur as
,

sent to — what ? To an hypothesis ? Why if an

hyp othesis — i f th e merest hyp othesis if an hy
—

th i f w h ass umption — as in th e case of

'

p o es s o r o se
that p u r e h ypothesis the Newtonian law itsel f no —
-
.

shadow o f a p rio ri reas on co ul d be as ig n ed

s if u

an hyp oth es is even so absolute as all this implies

, ,

would en able us to p erceive a p rinciple for the

Newto nia n aw would enable us to u nderstand
l —

as s atis fi ed ,
c o ndition s so mirac ulo u s ly — so in ef

fab ly complex and seemingly irreconcilabl e as

tho se involved in the relations of which Gravity
tells a s — wh at rational being could so expose his
,

fatuity as to c all even this absol ute hyp othesis an

—
hypoth s is any longer unle ss indeed he were
’

e , ,

to p ersi st in so c alling it with the understanding

,

t ha t h e did so simply fo r th e sake of consistency

,

in words ?
B ut what is the t rue st ate of o ur present c ase ?
Wh at is the fact? Not only that is not an b y
( »
70 WORKS OF ED GA R ALLAN P OE
— as when we say for instance that the wh ole is
, ,

i
greater than ts p art —
and thus again the prin , ,

c ipl e of the Log ic a l axiom— in other word s of an ,

axi o m in the abstract— is S i mply o b viousn ess of , ,

r ela tio n Now it is clear not only that what is

.
, ,

obvious to one mind may not be ob vio us to an

other b ut that what is ob vio u s to one mind at
,
-

one epoch may be anything b ut obvio us at an

, ,

other epoch to the same mind It is clear mor e

day is obviou s even to the ma -
, .
,

over that what to -

, , ,
r

jo r ity of mankind or to the majority of the best

,

intellects of mankind may to - morrow be to , ,

either majority more or less obvious or in no r e

, ,

spect obvious at all It is seen then that the ar .

, ,

iom a tic p rin cip l e itself is su sceptible of varia

tion and of course that axioms are s usceptible of
,
“ ”
s imilar change Being mutable the truths .
,

which grow o u t of them are necessarily mutable

too ; or in other words are never to be positively
, ,

depended upon as truths at all since Truth and

— ~

Immutability are one .

It will now be readily under sto o d that no axio

matic idea— no idea founded in the fluctuating
principle o b vio usness of rel ation— c an possibly
,

be so sec u re— so reliable a b asis for any stru cture

erected by the Reason as tha t idea (whatever it
'

—
,

is wherever we can fin d it or if it be practicable

, ,

to fin d it anywhere )— which is irrelative alto

gether— which not only presents to the under
standing n o o b vio usn ess of relation either great ,

er or less to be considered b ut subjects the intel

, ,

l e ct not in the slightest degree to the necessity

, ,

o f even looking at a n y r ela tio n a t all If such an .

 EUREKA 71

idea be not what we too heedles sly te rm an axi

om , it is at least preferable , as a Logical ba sis,
’

to any axiom ever propo unded or to all imagin ,

ab l e axioms combined — and such precisely is , ,

the idea with which my deductive p rocess so ,

thoroughl y corroborated by induction com ,

m en c es My p a r ticl e p r op er is b ut a b so lu te Ir r e
.

i
lat o n .To sum u p what has been advanced — As
a starting point I have taken it for granted sim ,

ply that the B eginning h ad nothing behind it or

,

before ih that it was a B eginning in fact that

— —

it was a begin ning and nothing di fferent from a

beginning— in short that th is B eginning was
,
“
tha t which it was If this be a mere assum p
.

” “ ”
tion then a mere assumption let it be .

To conclu de this branch of the subject -I am

,

fully warranted in anno uncing that the Law

which w e ha v e b een in the ha b it of c a llin g Gr av
i ty exists o n acc oun t of M a tter s havin g b een ir
’

r a dia ted, at its o rig in , in to a lim

a tom ica lly,

ited sp her e of Sp a c e, fr o m o n e, in dividual, un

*

c o n ditio n a l, irr ela tiv e, a n d a b so lu te P a r ticl e

P r op er , b y the so l e p r o c ess in which i t was p ossi
b le to sa tisfy, a t the sam e tim e, the two c o n di
tio n s, ir ra dia tio n , a n d g en era lly-
eq ua b le dis trib u

tion thr oug ho ut the sp her e— tha t is to say, b y a

fo rce va r yin g in dir ec t p r ep o r tion with the
sq ua r es of the d is ta n c es b etw een the ir r a dia ted
a tom s, r esp ec tively, a n d the P a r ticula r c en tr e of

Ir ra dia tio n .

I have already given my reasons for p r esum

i i t ed sp h e re — A sp h e r e i s n ecessa rily
L m lim i ted I
prefer t a utolo gy to a c h a n c e of m i s co n c ep t io n
.

.
72 WORKS OF ED GAR AL L AN POE

ing Matter to have been difi used by a determ in

a te rather than by a contin u o u s or infinitely con
tin ued forc e S upposing a cont inuo us force we
.
,

shoul d be u nable in the fi rst place to comp re

, ,

h end a reaction at all ; an d we sho uld be req uired ,

in the second place to entertain the imp ossible

,

conception of an infin ite extension of Matter .

Not to dwell upon the impossibility of the c o n cep

tion the infinite extension of Matter is an idea
,

which if not positively disproved is at least not

'

, ,

in an y respect warr anted by telescopic observa

tion of the stars— a point to be explained more
fully hereafter ; and this empirical reason for
believing in the original fin ity of Matter is un
e mpirical ly con fi rmed For example z Admit
—
.

ting for the moment the possib ility of under

, ,

st anding Space fil l ed with the irradiated a toms

that is to say a dmitting as well as we c an for
, , ,

arg ument s sake that the succession of the irra

’
,

diated at oms had absol utely o en d the n it is

n —

ab un dantly clear that even when the Volition of

,

Go d had been withdrawn from them and th us ,

the tendency to r eturn into U nity permitted (ah

'

str a c tly ) to be satisfi ed this permission wo ul d

,

h ave been nu gatory and inval id practic al ly val

—

uel ess and of no e ff ect whatever No Reaction .

c o uld have taken place ; no movement toward

U nity co uld have been made ; no Law of Gravity
c o uld have obtained .

To explain z Grant the a b stra ct tendency of

—

any one atom to any one other as the inevitable

r esult of di ffusion from the normal U nity — o r ,

what is the same th in g admit any given atom as,

 EUREKA 73

p p
r o o sin g to mo ve in any given direc tion it is —

clear that since there is an in finity of atoms o n

,

all sid es of the atom proposing to move it never ,

can actu ally move toward the satisfaction of its

tendency in the direction g iven on acco unt of a ,

precisely e q u al and co unter-

balancing tendency
in the direction diametrically opposite In other ,

words exactly as many tendencies to U nity are

,

behind the hesitating atom as before it ; for it i s

a mere sottic ism to say that one infi nite line IS
longer or shorter than another infinite line or ,

that one infinite number is greater or less than

another n umber that is infinite Thus the atom .
‘

in q u estion must remain stationary forever ‘

.

U nder the imp ossible circ umstances which we

have been merely endeavor ing to conceive for
argu ment s sake there could have been no a gg r e
’
,

g t
a io n of Matter no stars no worlds nothing
— — —

b ut a p erpetu ally atomic and inconsequential

U niverse In fact view it as we will the whole
.
, ,

idea of unl imited Matter is not only untenable ,

b ut impossible and p repostero us .

With the understanding of a Sp her e of atoms ,

however we perceive at once a sa tisfia b le ten

, , ,

den cy to union The general result of the ten

.

den cy each to each being a tendency of all to

,

the centre the g en era l process of condensation

, ,

or approximation com mences immediately by a

, ,

co m mon and simul taneous movement on with ,

dr awal of the D ivine Volition ; the in dividua l

approximations or coa lescence s— n o t coalitions
,
—o i atom with atom being s ubj ect to alm ost in ,

finite variations of time degree and co ndition , , ,

74 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

on acco unt of the excessive mul tiplicity of rela

tion arising from the di ff erences of form as
,

sumed as characteri zing the atoms at the momen t

of their qu itting the Particle Proper ; as well as
from the subseq u ent particular in equidistan c e ,

each from each .

Wh at I wish to impress upon the reader is the

certai nty of there arising at once (on with , ,

dr awal of the di ffusive force or D ivine Voli ,

ti on ) o ut of the condition of the atoms as de

,

scribed at innumerable points throughout the

,

U niversal sphere innumerable agglomerations

, ,

characteri z ed by innumerable speci fic differences

of form si z e essential nature and distance each
, , ,

from each The development of Rep ul sion (Elec

.

tr ic ity ) must have commenced of co u rse with , ,

the very earliest partic ular e ff orts at U nity and ,

must have proceeded constantly in the ratio of

Coalescence that is to say in tha t of Con den sa
—
,

again of Heterogeneity
,
.

the t wo Principles Proper Attra c tion ,

and Rep ulsion— the Material and the Spiritual

-accompany each other in the strictest fellow
,

ship forever
,
Thus the B o dy an d the So ul wa lk
.
,

han d in han d .

If n ow , in fancy ,
we select a n y o n e of the ag
glomerations considered as in their primary
stages throughout the U niversal sphere and sup ,

pose this incipient agglomeration to be taking

place at that point where the centre of o ur Sun
exists— o r rather where it did exist originally ;
for the Sun is perpetu ally shifting his position
we shall fin d ourselves met and borne onward ,
 EURE K A 75

for a time at least by the most magnificent of

,

theo r ies b y the Neb ul ar Co smogony of Laplace

fl

“
—altho u gh Cosm dg on y is far too com p r ehen
si v e a term for what he really disc usse s -wh ich
is the constitution of o ur solar system alone
of one among the myriad of similar system s
which make up the U niverse Proper that U n i
—

versal sphere— that all- inclusive and ab sol ute

K osm os which forms the subj ect of my pre sent
D is co u rs e .

Confi n in g himself to an o b viously limited r e

gion— that of our solar system with its compara
tively immediate vicinity— and m er ely ass uming
— that is to s a
, y ass umin g witho ut any basis
,

whatever either deductive or inductive— m uch

,

of what I have been j ust endeavoring to pla ce

u pon a more stable bas i s than ass umption ; as
sum in g for example matter as di ff used (witho ut
, ,

pretending to acco un t for the diffusion ) through

o ut and somewhat beyond
,
the space occ upied
,

by ou system diffus ed in a state of heterogene

r —

o us neb ul osity and obedient to that om n ip r eva

lent l aW o f Gra vity at whose principle he ven
'

tur ed to make no g u ess ; assuming all this (which

is quite true although he had no logical right to
,

its assumption ) Laplace has shown dyn amically ,

and mathematically that the results in such c ase

,

necessarily ensuing are those and those alone

,

which we fin d manifested in the actually existing

condi tion of the system itself .

To explain —Let us conceive that particular

agglomeration of which we have j us t spoken the —

one at th e point de signated by o ur Sun s centre ’

76 WORKS OF ED GAR ALL AN P OE ‘

— to h ave so far proceeded that a vas t quantity

of neb ul o us matter has here assumed a ro ughl y
globul ar form ; its centre being of course coin , ,

eident with what is n ow or rather was origi ,

nally the centre of o ur Sun ; and its periphery

,

extending out beyond the orbit of Neptune the ,

mo st r em b te of o ur planets — in other words let ,

us suppose the diameter of this ro u gh sphere to

be some 6000 millions of mil es For a ges thi s .
,

mass of matter has been undergoing condens a

tion until at length it has become reduced into
,

the bulk we imagine ; having proceeded gradu

ally o f cou rse from its atomic and imperceptible
, ,

state into what we understand of visible pal

, ,

p ab le or otherwis e appreciabl e neb ulosity

, .

No w the condition of this mass implie s a r o

,

tation abo ut an im aginary axis— a rotation

which commencing with the ab sol ute incipiency
,

of the aggregation has been ever si nce acquiring

,

v elocity The very first two atoms which met

.
,

approaching each other from points not diamet

r ic ally opposite wo ul d i n r ushing partially past
, ,

each other form a n ucleus for the rotary move

,

ment described H ow this woul d increase in

.

velocity is readily seen The two atoms are

,
.

joined by others an aggregation is formed

— .

The mass continues to rotate while condensing .

B ut any atom at the circ umference has of cou rse , ,

a more rapid motion than one nearer the centre .

The o uter atom however with its superior vel c e

, ,

ity approaches the centre ; carrying this sup er l or

,

velocity with it as it goes Thus every atom . ,

roceeding inward l y and finally attachm g 1 tsel f

p ,
78 WO RKS OF ED GAR ALLAN P OE

Now, admi tt i ng th e ring to h av e p ossessed , by

s ome seemingly accidental arrangement of its
h eterogeneo us materials a constitution nearly ,

un iform then this ring as suc h wo uld ne v er

, , ,

h a v e ceased revol ving abou t its primary ; b ut as ,

~

might have been anticipated there appears to ,

h ave b een enough irregul ar ity in the disposition

of t he materials to make them cl uster abo ut cen
,

tres of superior solidity ; and thus the ann ul ar

form was destroyed ) No doubt the band was
“
,

soon broken up into se v eral portion s and one of ,

these portions predominating in mass absorbed

, ,

th e other s into itself ; the whole settling spher i ,

cally into a planet That thi s latter as a planet

, .
, ,

continued the revol utionary movement wh ich

ch aracterized it while a ring is sufi cien tly clear ; ,

and that it took upon i tself also an additional , ,

movement in its n ew condition of sphere is re ad ,

ily explained The ring being understood as yet

.

unbroken we see tha t its exterior while the whol e

, ,

revolv es about the pare nt body mov es more rap ,

idly than its interior When t h e rupture o c .

c urred then some portion in each fragment must

, ,

h ave been mo v ing with greater v elocity than th e

others The superior mo vement prevailing must
.
,

h ave whirl ed each fragment roun d that is to

—

say hav e ca us ed it to rotate ; and the direction of

,

the rotation m ust of course h ave been the dir ec

, ,

La pl a ce a ssum ed his n ebu lo s i ty h e te rog e neo us m e re ly tha t ,

he m ig ht b e th us e n a bl ed to a cco un t for th e brea k in g up o f

the r i n g s ; f o r h a d the n e b ulo s i ty b e en h o m og en eo u s th ey ,

wo uld n o t h av e brok e n I r ea c h the s am e resul t— h e te rog en e ~

ity of th e sec o n d a ry m asse s i m m edi a te ly r es ul tin g f ro m the

.

a to m s— p u re ly fro m a n a p r iori co n s id era t io n of th e i r g en e ra l

d es i gn — R ela tio n .
 E UREKA 79

tion of th e revolution wh ence it arose All the .

fragments h aving b ecome s ubj ect to the rotation

‘

described must in coalescing have imparted it

, , ,

to th e one planet c onstituted by their coalescence .

— Thi s planet was Nept une Its m ater ial con .

tin uin g to undergo condensation and th e cen ,

tr ifug al force generated in its rotation getting , ,

at length the better of the centripetal as before

, ,

in the case of the p arent orb a ring was whirled ,

al so from the equ atorial s urface of this planet :

thi s ring having been uniform in its con stitu
,

tion was br oken up and its several fragment s

, , ,

being ab sorbed by the most massive were col ,

l ectively spher ified into a moon Sub sequ ently .

,

the operation was repeated and a second moon ,

was the result We thus acco unt for the planet

.

Neptune with the two satellites which aecom

,

pany h im
In throwing o ff a ring from its equat or the
.

Sun r e established that equilibri um between its

centripetal and centrifugal force s which had been
disturbed in the process of condensation ; b ut as
this condensation still proceeded the equilibrium ,

was again immediately disturbed thro ugh the ih

crease o f rotation By the time the mass had
,

so far shrunk that it occ upied a spherical space

j ust that circ umscribed by the orbit of U ran us ,

we are to understand that the centrifugal force

h ad so far obtained the ascendency that new r e
lief was needed : a second equ atorial band was ,

consequently thrown o fi which proving un un i

, , ,

form was broken u p as before in the c ase of

, ,

Neptune ; the fra gments settlin g into the planet

80 WO RKS OF ED GAR AL LAN POE

U ranus ; th e velocity of wh ose actual re volution

ab out the Sun indicates, of course, the rotary
’
spe ed of that S un s eq u atorial s urface at t h e mo
ment of the separation U ranus adopting a rota
.
,

tion from the collective rotations of the frag

ments composing it as previously explained n ow
, ,

threw o ff ri ng after ring ; each of which b ecom ,

ing brok en p settled into a moon

u ,
— three
moons at difi er en t epoch s having been formed
, , ,

in this manner by the ruptu re and general

,

Sp her ific ation of as many distinct un uniform

rin gs .

B y the time the Sun had shrunk until it o ccu .

p ied a space j ust that circ u mscribed by the orbit

of Saturn the balance we are to suppose b e
, , ,

tween its centripetal and c on tr ifug al forces h ad

again b ecome so far disturbed thro ugh increase ,

of rota ry velocity the result of condensation

, ,

that a third e ffort at equilib rium became n ec es

sary ; and an annul ar band was therefore whirled
o ff as twice before ; which on ru pture thro u gh
, ,

un un iformity became consolidated into the

,

planet Satu rn This latter threw OK in the first

.
,

plac e seven uniform bands which on rupture

, , , ,

were sp her ifi ed respectively into as many moons ;

b ut s ubsequently it appears to have discharged
, , ,

at three distinct b ut not very distant epochs ,

three rings whose equability of constitution was ,

by apparent accident so considerable as to pre

,

sent n o occasion for t h eir ru pt ure ; thus they

continue to revolve as rings I use the p h rase .

“
app a r en t accident ; for of accident l n th e ordi
nary sense there was o f co urse nothin g : — the
, ,
 E UREKA 81

term is properly applied o nl y to the result of

in distl n gu ishab l e o r not i mm ediately traceable
law .

Shrinking still farth er until it occ upied j ust

,

the space circ umscribed by the orbit of J upiter ,

the Sun n o w found need of farther efi o r t to r e

store the co unterbalance of its two forces con ,

tin ually disarranged in the still continu ed ih

crea se o f rotation J upiter accordingly was n o w
.
, ,

thrown o fi passing from the annul ar to the

planetary con ditio n ; and on attaining this lat
,

ter threw OK in its turn at fou r di fferent epochs

, ,
'

fo ur rings which finally resolved themselves into

,

so many moons .

Still shrinking until its sphere occupied j ust

,

the Space defined by the o rbit of the A steroids ,

the Sun n o w discarded a ring which appears to

h ave had eig ht centres of superior solidity and , ,

o n breaking u p to have separated into eight

,

fragments no one of which so far predominated

,

in mass as to absorb the others All therefore .

,

as distinct although comparatively small plan ets ,

proceeded to revolve in orbits whose distances ,

ea ch from each may be considered as in so m e de

,

gre e the measure of the force which drove them

as under — all the orbits nevertheless be ing so
, ,

closely coin cident as to admit of o ur calling them

o n e in view of the other planetary orbits
, .

Continuing to shrink the Sun on becoming

, ,

so small as j ust to fi ll the orbit of Mars n o w dis ,

, ch arged this planet — o f co u rse by the process

repeate dly described Having no moon however
.
, ,

M ars co ul d h ave th ro wn o fi no ring In fact .

,

IX 6 .
82 WO RK S OF E DGAR ALLAN P O E

an epoch had n ow arrived in the ca reer of th e

parent body the centre of the system The de
,
.

crease o f its neb ulosity which is the in crease of ,

its density and which again is the decrease of its

,

condensation o ut of which latter arose the con

,

stant distu rbance of eq uilibri um — must by this ,

period have attained a point at which the efi or ts

,

for restoration would have been more and more

in efi ec tual j us t in proportion as they were less
frequently nee ded Thus the p rocesse s of which .

we have been speak ing wou ld everywhere sho w

signs of exhaus tion in the planets first and sec
—
, ,

o n dl y in the original mass

,
We m ust not fall .

into the error of supposing the decrease of inter

val observed among the p lanets as we approach
the Sun to be in any respect indicative of an in
,

crease o f frequ ency in the periods at which they

were d iscarded Exactly the converse is to b e
.

understood The longest interval of time must

.

have occ u rred between the discharges of the two

interior ; the shortest between those of the two ,

ex terior planets The decrease of the interval

,
.

of space is nevertheless the measu re of the den

, ,

sity and thus inversely of the condensation

,
of ,

the Sun thro ughout the processes detailed

, .

Having shru nk however so far as to fil l only , ,

the orbit of o ur E arth the parent sphere whirled ,

from itself still on dother body— the Earth— in a

condition so neb ul o us as to a dm it of this body s ’

discarding in its tu rn yet another which is o ur

, , ,

Moon — b ut here terminated the l un ar form a :

tions .

Finally subsiding to the orbits first of Ven us

,
 E UREKA 83

an d th en of Mercury the Sun discarded these

,

two interior planets ; neither of which has given

,

birth to any moon .

‘

Thus from his original b u l k— o nt o speak more

acc u rately from the con di tion in which we fi rst
,

considered h im from a partially spher ified

—

neb ular ma ss c er tain ly much more than

,

millions of miles in diameter the great central

—

orb and origin of ou r solar- planetary- l unar sys

tem h as gradually descended by condensation
, , ,

in obedience to the l aw of Gravity to a globe ,

o nly miles in diameter ; b ut it by no

mean s follows either that its condensation is yet
,

complete or that it may not still posses s the c a

,

p ac ity of whirling from it self another planet .

I have here given in o utline of co urse b ut

—
,

still with all the detail neces sary f ) I distinctnes s

'

-a v iew of t he Neb ul ar Theory as its a uthor

him self conceived it From whate v er point We
.

regard it we shall fin d it b eautifully tru e It is

,
.

by far too bea utiful indeed n o t to possess Truth

, ,

as its e ssentiality and here I am very profo un d

—

ly serio us in what I say In the revol ution of the

.

satellites of U ran us there does appear something

,

seemingly inconsistent with the a ssumptions of

Laplace ; b ut that o n e inconsi stency can in v al i
date a theory constructed from a million of in
tricate con sistencies is a fancy fit o nl y for the
,

fantastic In proph esying confidently that the

.
, ,

apparent anomaly to wh ich I refer will sooner , ,

or later be found one of th e strongest possible

,

corroborations of th e general hypothe sis I pre ,

tend to no especial spirit of divination It is a .

84 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN P OE

matter wh ich the only diffic ul ty seems n ot to

“
fo r eseefi
The bo dies whirled ofi in the processe s de
scrib ed wo ul d exchange it has been seen the su
, , ,

p er fi c ia l r o ta ti
‘
o n of the orb s w hen c e they origi
n ated for a r evo lu tio n of equal velocity abo ut
,

these orb s as distant centres ; and the revol ution

thus engendered must proceed so long as the cen ,

tr ip etal force or that with which the discarded

,

body gravitates toward its parent is neither ,

greater nor le ss than that by which it was dis

carded ; that is than the centrifugal o r far more
, , ,

properly th an the tangential velocity From the

, , .

unity however of the orig in of these two force s

, , ,

we might have expected to fin d them as they are

fo und the one acc u rately co unterbalancing the
—

other It has been sho wn indeed that the act of

.
, ,

whirling- o ff is in every case merely an act for

’

, ,

the preservation of the co unterbalance .

After referring however the centripetal force

, ,

to the omniprevalent l aw of Gravity it has been ,

the fashion with astronomical treatises to seek ,

beyond the limits of mere Nature— tha t is to say ,

of Seco da ry Caus e a solution of the phaen om e

n —

non of tangential v el ocity This latter they at .

trib ute directly to a Fi r s t Ca use to Go d

— The .

force which carrie s a steller body aro und its pri

mary they assert to h ave originated in an im
l i immediately by the fin g er — thi s is
pu se g v
fi
e n
th e ch ildish p h raseolo gy employed — b
y the fi nger
I am pr e p ared t o sh ow th a t the a n o m a lo us r ev ol ut ion o f
the sa t e lli t e s of U r a n u s i s a s i m ply p e r s p e c t i v e a n m a l y a r ir
q
in g from the i n cl in a t io n of the a x i s of the pl an e t .
86 WORKS OF E D GAR AL LA N P O E ’

at once so timoro us so idle and so awk ward

, ,
.

T h ey belong to the veri est cowar dice of tho ugh t .

That Nat ure and the Go d of Nat ure are distinct ,

no thinking being can long doubt B y the .

former we imply merely the laws of the latter .

B ut with the very idea of Go d omnipotent o m , ,

nisc ien t we entertain also the idea of the in fa l

, , ,
~

libility of his laws With Him there being

.

neither Pa st nor F uture with Him all being

—

N o w do we not ins ult him in s upposing his

—

laws so contrived as not to pro vide for every

possible contingency l— o r rather what idea can
, ,

we have of an y possible contingency except that ,

it is at once a result and a manifestation of his

laws ;2 He who divesting hims elf of prej udice
‘
, ,

shall have the rare co urage to think ab solutely

for himself cannot fail to arrive in the end at
, , ,

the condensation of laws into Law— cannot fail

of reaching the conclusion that each law of Na
tur e is dep en den t a t a ll p o in ts up o n a ll o ther
laws, and that all are b ut consequ ences of one
primary exercise of the D ivine Volition S uch .

is the principle of the Cosmogony which with all ,

necessary deference I here venture to suggest

,

and to maintain .

In this view it will be seen that dismissing as

, ,

frivolo us and even impious the fancy of the

, ,

tangential force having been imparted to the

“
planets immediately by the fin ger of Go d I ,

consider this force as originating in the rotation

of the stars —
th is rotation as bro ught abo ut by
the in -rushing of the primary atoms towar ds
'

their respecti v e centres of aggregation - thi s ih

 EUREKA 87

rush ing as th e consequ ence of the la w of Grav

ity — this law as b ut the mode in which is meces
sar ily manife sted the tendency of the atoms to
return into im p ar ticul ar ity z this tendency to —

return as b ut the inevitable reaction of the first

A
and most sublime of cts that act by which a
—

Go d self-
,
existing and alone existing became all ,

things at once thro ugh dint of his volition

, ,

while all things were thus con stituted a portion

of Go d .

The radical assumptions of this D isco urse sug

gest to me and in fact imply certain important
, ,

m o difica tio n s of the Neb ular Theory as gi ven by

Laplace The e fforts of the rep ulsive power I
.

h ave considered as made for the p urpose of pre

venting contact among the atoms and thus as ,

made in the ratio of the approach to contact

th at is to say in the ratio of condensation
x
,
*
In .

other words E lec tricity with its invol ute ph ae

, ,

n o m en a heat light and magnetism is to be un

, , ,

der sto o d as proceeding as condensation proceeds ,

and of co u rse inversely as destiny proceeds or

, , , ,

the c essa tion to con den se Th us the Sun in the .

,

process of its aggregation must soon in develop , ,

ing rep ulsion have become excessively heated

,

perh ap s incandescent : and we can p erceive how

the operation of discarding its rings must hav e
been materially assisted by the slight incrusta
tion of its surface consequ ent on cooling An y .

common experiment shows us how readily a

crust of the character su ggested is sep arated
”

, ,

th rough h eterogeneity from th e interior m ass, .

Pa g e 74
88 WORKS OF ED GAR AL LAN POE

B ut, on every successive rej ection of the crus t ,

t he n ew surface woul d appear incand escent as

before ; and the p eriod at which it wo u ld again
b ecome so far incr usted as to be readily loosened
a n d dis charged may well be imagined as exactly
,

coincident with that as which a n ew effo r t wo ul d

be needed by the whole mass to restore the
, ,

e q u ilibri u m of its two forces disarranged ,

thro u gh condensation In other wor ds .

— b y the
time the electric influ ence (Rep ulsion ) has pre
pared the surface for rej ection we are to under ,

s tand that the gravitating infl u ence ( A ttraction )

is prec isely ready to rej ect it Here then as .
, ,

everywhere the B o dy a n d the So ul wa lk ha n d in

,

han d .

These idea s are empirically confi rmed at all

points Since condensation can never in any
.
,

body be considered as absolutely at an end we

, ,

are warr anted in anticipating that whenever ,

we have an opportunity of testing the matter ,

we shall fin d indications of resident luminosity

in a ll the stellar bodies— moons and planets as
well as s uns That o ur Moon is strongly self
.

l umino us we see at every total eclips when if

,
e
, ,

n ot so she wo uld disappear On the dark p ar t '

.
,

o f the satellite too d u ring her phases we often

, , ,

o bserve flashes like o ur own Au roras ; and that

the se latter with ou r various other so -
,
called elec
t r ic al phaenomena witho ut reference to any more
,

s te a dy radia n ce m ust give o ur E arth a certain

,

appearance of luminosity to an inhabitant of the

Moon is qu ite evident In fact we should r e
, .
,

g ard all t h e p h aenomena referred to as mere ,

 EUREKA 89

manifestations, di fferent moods and degrees

1n ,

of the E arth s feebly-

’
continu ed condens ation .

If my views are tenable we should be prepared

,

to fin d the newer planets— that is to say those

'

nearer the Sun more lumino us than those olde r

—

and more remote —and the extreme bri lliancy

of Ven us (on whose dark portions during her ,

pha ses the Au roras are frequently visible ) does

,

not seem to be altogether accounted for by her

mere proximity to the central orb She is no .

-
do ubt vividly self l umino u s altho ugh less so
,

than Merc ury : while the l uminosity of Neptune

may be comparatively nothing .

A dmitting what I have u rged it is clear that , ,

from the moment of the S un s discarding a ring

’
,

there must be a contin uous diminu tion both o f

h is heat and light on account of the continuo us
,

incrus tation of his s urface ; and th at a period

wo ld arrive the period immediately previous
u —

to a n ew discharge- When a very m a ter ia l de

crease o f both light and heat must become ap ,

p arent Now we know that tokens of such

‘

.
,

changes are distinctly recognisable On the Mel .

ville islands to adduce merely one o ut of a hun

—

dred examp l es we fin d traces of ultra tr op ica l

—

v egetation o f plants that never co uld hav e

—

flo urished without immensely more light an d

h eat than are at present a fforded by o ur Sun to
an
y port ion of the s urface of the Earth Is s u ch .

v egetation referable to an epoch immediately

subsequ ent to the whirl ing off of Ven us ? At
th i s epoch must have occ u rred to us o ur greatest
access of solar i nfluence ; and in fact thi s in ,
90 WORK S OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

fl uen c e must then h a v e attained its maximum

leavin g o ut of v iew of cou rse the period wh en
, ,

the Earth itself was discarded— the p eriod of its

mere organi zation .

Again —
we know th at th ere exi st n o n -lum i
n ous sun s— th at is to say suns wh os e exi stence ,

we determine thro u gh the movements of others ,

b ut who se luminosity is not suffi cient to impress

us . Ar e th ese s un s in visible merely on account
of th e length of time elapsed since their dis
c harge o f a planet ? And yet again — may we
not — a s -
t lea t in certain case s account for the
sudden appearances of suns wh ere none had been
previo usly suspected by the hypothesis that , ,

having rolled with incrusted surfaces th roughout

the few thousand years of our a stronomical his
tory each of the se sun s in whirling o ff a n ew
, ,

secondary has at len gth been enabled to display

,

the glories of its still incandescent interior

To the well - ascertained fact of the proportional
increa se of heat as we descend into the E arth I \
,

need of course do nothing more than refer —it

,

c ome s in the strongest possible corroboration of

all that I hav e said on the topic n ow at issu e .

In speaking not long ago of the rep ulsive or

, ,
“
electrical influence I remark ed that the im
,

portant phaenomena of vitality con sciousness , ,

a n d tho u ght whether we observe them generally

,

or in detail seem to proceed a t least in the r a tio

, ,

’
o f the heter og en eo us I mentioned too that
.
, ,

I woul d rec ur to the suggestion —

and this is the
proper p oint at wh ic h to do so Looking at the .

P ag e 38 .
 EUREKA 91

matter first in detail we perce 1 v e th at not mere

, , ,

ly the m a n ifesta tio n of vitality b ut its impor ,

tance consequ ence and elevation of characte r

,
s
, ,

keep pace very clo sely with the heterogeneity

, , ,

or complexity of the animal stru ctu re Looking

, .

at the qu estion n ow in its generality and r e

, , ,

ferring to the first movements of the atom s to

wards mas s- constitution we fin d that hetero ,

g en eo usn ess b rou ght abo ut directly through con

,

densation is proportional with it forever We

, .

thus reach the propo sition that the imp o r tan ce of

the dev elop men t o f the ter r es tr ia l vita lity p r o
c eeds eq ua b ly with the ter r estr ia l co n den sa tio n .

Now thi s is in precise accordance with what

we know of the succession of an imals on the
Earth As it has
. proceeded in its condensation ,

superior and still superior race s have app eared .

Is it impossible that the successive geological

revolution s which have attended at least if not , ,

immediately caused these su ccessive elevati on s

,

of vitalic character is it im p r ob ab le that these

—

revolutions have themselves been produced by

the successive planetary discharges from the Sun
— in other words by the successive variations in
,

the solar influence on the Earth ? Were thi s

idea ten able we sho ul d n ot be unwarranted in
,

the fancy that the di sch arge of yet a n ew planet ,

interior to Merc ury may give rise to yet a n ew

,

modification of the terrestrial surface— a m o difi

cation from wh ich may spring a race both ma
teriall y and spiritu all y superior to Man These .

thoughts impre ss me with all the forc e of t ruth

92 WO RKS OF E D GAR ALLAN P OE

b ut I throw them of course , merely in th eir

o ut,

o bvio us character of su ggest ion .

The Neb ul ar Theory of Laplace has lately r e

c eiv ed far more con fi rmation than it needed at ,

the han ds of the philosopher Comte ,

These .

t wo have thus together shown n o t to be sure

—
, ,

that Matt er at any period actually existed as de

s cribe d in a state of neb ul ar di ffu sion b ut that
, , ,

a dmitting it so to have existed thro ugho ut the

s pace an d much beyond the S pace now occ upied
by o ur sol ar system an d to have com m en ced a
,

m o vem en t to wa r ds a cen tr e— it must gradu all y

have assumed the vario us forms and motions
whic h are n ow seen in that system to obtain A
, , .

demonstration such as this a dynamical and

—

mathematical demonstration as far as demon ,

st at o
r i n can b e— unqu estionable and un q ues
tio n ed— unl ess i ndeed by that unpro fitable and
’

, ,

d isrep utable tribe the profess ional qu estioners

,

the me r e ma h en who deny the Newtonian law

of Gravity on whi ch the results of the French
mathematicians are based— a demonstration I ,

say s uch as this wo uld to most intellects be con

, ,

l
e u sive — and I con fe ss that it is so to min e — of
the vali di ty of the nebular hypothesis u pon
which the demonstration depends .

That the demon stration does not p rove the hy

p o th esis ,according to the common u nderstand
“
ing of the word proof I admit of course To , ,
.

sh ow that certain existing res ul ts — th at certain

es tabli s h ed facts — may be even mathematically
, ,

a cco unted for by the ass umption of a certain

hyp othe sis is by no me ans to establish th e h)
,
“
94 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

time the sole hypothesis by means of which the

,

hum an intellect has been ever enabled to account

for them a t a ll .

A most u n fo un ded opinion h as been latterly

c urrent in gossiping and even in scientific circles
— -
the opinion that the so called Neb ul ar Co s
m o g o n y has been o verthrown This fancy has .

arisen from the report of late observations made ,

among what hitherto have been termed the

“ ”
neb ul ae throu gh the large telescope of Cin
,

c inn ati and the world -

,
renowned instrument of
Lord Rosse Certain spots in the fir m am en t
.

which presented even to the most powerful of

,

the old telescopes the appearance of nebulosity

, ,

or haz e had been regarded for a lon g time as

,

con firming the theory of Laplace They were .

looked upon as stars in that very process of con

densation which I have been attempting to de
“
scribe Thus it was s upposed that we had o cu
.

” —
lar evidence an evidence by the way whic h , ,

has always been fo und very qu estionable — o f the

truth of the hypothesis ; and altho ugh certain ,

telescopic improvements every n ow and then , ,

enabled us to perceive th at a spot here and there , ,

which we had b een classing among the neb ul ae ,

was in fact b ut a clus ter of stars deriving its

, ,

nebular character only from its immensity of dis

tance— still it was thou ght that no do ubt co uld
exist as to the actu al neb ul osity of numerous
other masses the strong - holds of the n eb ul ists
, ,

biddin g defi ance to every efi ort at segregation .

Of these latter the most interesting was the great

neb ul a in the constellation Orion — b t thi s
p
z ,
 E UREKA 95

with inn u merable

other miscalled neb ul ae ,

when viewe d thro u gh the magnificent modern

telescopes has become resolved into a simple col
,

lection of stars Now this fact has been v ery

.

generally understood as conclu sive against the

Neb ular Hypothesi s of Laplace ; and on an ,

n o un c em en t of the discoveries in qu estion the ,

most enthusiastic defender and most eloquent

pop ul ari z er of the theory D r Nichol went so ,
.
,
“ ”
far as to admit the necessity of abandoning
an idea which had formed the material of his
most praiseworthy b o o k fl ‘

Many of my readers will no doubt be inclined

to say that the resul t of these n ew investigations
has at least a strong ten den cy to overthrow the
hypothesis ; while some of them more thought ,

f ul will suggest that althou gh the theory is by

, ,

n o means disproved thro u gh the segregation of

“ ”
the partic ular nebul ae allu ded to still a fail ,

ur e to segregate them with suc h telescopes , ,

might well have been understood as a tri umphant

co rr o b o r a tio n of the theory : and thi s latter clas s

will be surprised p erhaps to hear me say that

, ,

even with them I disagree If the propositions .

of this D isco u rse have been comprehended it will ,

be seen that in my view a failu re to segregate

, ,

V ie ws of c c
th e Ar hi te tu r e o f the H ea v en s A l ett e r ”
p u rport i n g t o N ic h ol t o a fri en d in Am eric a w e n t
.
,

b e f ro m D r
t h e ro un d s of o u r n e w s p a p e r s a bo u t t wo y ea r s a g o I th i n k
.
,

a d m it t i n g th e n e c e ss i t y to w h ic h I r e fe r In a sub seq u en t
, , ,

L e c tur e, h ow ev e r D r N a pp ea rs in s o m e m an n e r t o h a v e
, . .

g ott e n th e b e tt e r of th e n e c e s s i t y a n d do e s n o t q u i t e r e n o un c e
,

t h e th eo r y a l th o ug h h e s e e m s t o wi sh t h a t h e co uld s n ee r a t
Wh a t e l se was the L aw
,

it a s a p ure ly h ypo th e t ic al o n e ”

of Gr a v i ty b e fore th e Ma sk e lyn e e xp e r imen ts a n d who q ues

.

ti o n e d the L aw o f Gra v i t y ev en th en ? ,
96 WORKS OF E D GAR ALL AN POE
”
the neb ulae would have tended to the refuta
.

tion rather than to the c o n firm ation of the N eb

,
~
,

ular Hypothesis .

Let me explain -The Newtonian Law of

Gravity we may of cou rse assume as demon , ,

str ated This l aw it will be remembered I h ave

.
, ,

referred to the reaction of the first D ivine Act

—
to the reaction of an exercise of the D ivine
Volition tempo rarily overcoming a di fficu lty .

This di ffi culty is tha t of forcing the normal into

the abnormal o f impelling that whose original
—

ity and therefore whose rightful condition was

,

On e to take upon itself the wrongful c ondition

,

of M an y It is only by conceiving this difficulty

.

as temp o r a rily overcome that we can compre ,

hend a reaction There co uld have been no re

.

action had the act been infinitely continu ed So .

long as the act lasted no reaction of course , , ,

could commence ; in other words no g r avita tion ,

cou ld take place for we have considered the one

—

as b u t the manifestation of the other B ut grav .

itatio n has taken place ; therefore the act of

Creat ion has ceased ; and gravitation has long
ago taken place ; therefore the act of Creation
has long ago ceased We ca n no more / expect .
,

then to observe the p rim ary p r o cesses of Crea

,

tion ; and to these primary processes the con

dition of neb ulosity has already been explai n ed
to belong .

Through wh at we know of the propagation of

light we have direc t proof that the more remote
,

of the star s have existed under the forms in ,

wh ich we n ow see them for an inconcei vable ,

,
98 WORKS OF ED GAR AL LAN POE

dition b ut a condition completed long in the

,

Past ; so that my argument drawn from the r ela

“ ”
tiv e condition of the stars and the neb ul a ,

is in no manner distufi ad Moreover those who

.
,

maintain the existence of nebul a do n o t refer the ,

neb ulosity to extreme distance ; they decla re it a

real and not merely a perspective nebulosity .

That w e may conceive indeed a nebular mass

, ,

as visible at all we must conceive it as very n ear

,

us in comparison with the condensed stars

bro u ght into view by the modern telescopes In .

m aintaining the appearance s in qu estion then , ,

to be really neb ulous we maintain their compara

,

tive vicinity to o ur point of view Thus their

.
.
,

c ondition a s we see them n o w must be referred

, ,

to an epoch far less r em o te than that to whi ch

we may refer the n o w- observed condition of at
least the majority of the stars In a word
—
“
sho uld Astronomy ever demons trate a neb ul a ,

in the sense at present intended I shoul d con ,

sider the Neb ular Cosmogony— n o t indeed as , ,

corroborated by the demonstration b ut as there

—

by irretrievably overthrown .

By way however of rendering un to C a sar n o

, ,
’
m o r e than the things that are C a sar s let me ,

here remark that the assum ption of the hypo

thesi s whi ch led him to so glorious a result seems ,

to have been suggested to Laplace in great me as

u e
r by a misconception — b
y the very mis
conception of which we have j us t been sp eaking
- b y the generally prevalent misunderstanding
of the character of the n ebul a so mis- named ,
.

These h e supposed to be in reality what their

i , ,
 EUREKA 99

desi gnation im plies The fact is this great man

.
,

had very properly an inferior faith in his own

, ,

merely p ercep tive powers In respect therefore

.
, ,

to the actual existence of nebulae— an exi stence

so con fidently maintained by hi s telescopic con
temporaries— he depended less upon what he saw
than upon what he heard .

It will be seen that the only v al id obj ections to

his theory are those made to its hyp o thesis a s
, ,

u — s u i
s ch to what ggested t not to what it sug
—

gests ; to its propositions rather than to its r e

sults . H is in o st unwarranted assumption was
that of giving the atom s a movement towards
a centre in the very face of his evident under
,

standing that these atoms in unl imited succes

,

sion, extended thro ughout the U niversal space .

I have already shown that un der such circum

,

st an c es there co uld have occ urred no movement

,

at all ; and Laplace , consequ ently assume d one

,

o n no more philosophical gro und that that some

thing of the kind w as necessary for the estab
l lShIn eIl t of wh at he intended to e stablish .

His original idea seems to have been a com

pound of the tru e Epicu rean atoms with the
false nebula of his contemporaries ; and thus his
theory presents us with the singu lar anomaly .

of absolute truth deduced as a math ematical r e

,
sult from a hybrid datum of ancient ima inatio n
, g .

intert angled with m odern in acum en Laplace s .

’
.

real strength lay in fact in an alrnost miracu

, ,
~

lous mathematical instinct — o h th i s he relied;

and m no instance did it fail or deceive h im
—1 n
th e case of th e Nebular Cosmogony it led ,
 1 00 WO RKS OF E D GAR AL LAN POE
'

h im , blindfolded , throu gh a labyrinth of Error,

into one of the most luminous and stupendo us
t emples of Truth .

Let us n ow fancy for the moment that the

, ,
‘

,
ring fi rst thrown o ff by the Sun — that is to say ,

the ring wh ose breaking- up constituted Neptun e

”

— did not in fact break u

, , p until the throwing
o fl of the ring o ut of which U ranus aro se ; that

this latter ring again remained perfect until the

, ,

discharge of that o ut of which sprang Satu rn ;

that this latter ag ain r em ain ed entire until the
, ,
.

d ischarge of that from which ori g inated Jup iter

a n d so on Let us imagine in a word that no dis
.
, ,

is o lu tio n occ u rred among the rings until the fi nal

r ej ection of tha t which gave birth to Merc u ry .

We thus p aint to the eye of the mind a series

of coex istent concentric circles ; and looking as
well at them as at the proc esses by which accord ,
’
ing to Laplace s hypothesis they were con ,

stru cted we p erceive at once a very singular

,

analogy with the atomic strata and the process

of the original -irradiation as I have described
it . It is impossible that on measu ring the ,

for ces respectively by which each su ccessiv e

, ,

planetary circle was thrown o fi that is to say

—
,

on measu ring the s uccessive excesses of rotation

over gravitation which occasioned the su ccessiv e
di sc h arges— we should fin d the analogy in ques
tion more decide dl y confirmed ? Is it im p ro b
a b le tha t we sho uld discov er these fo r ces to have
va ri ed— as in the o rig a i di i p r op o r tion
n l r a a t o n—

a lly to the sq ua r es o f the distan ces ?

O ur solar system , consisting , in ch ief , o f o n e
1 02 WORK S OF '
ED GAR AL LAN P OE

th en as merely a loos e or general typ e of all we

, ,

ha v e so far tirpceeded ingotar subj ect as to survey

“
the U niverse under the a pect of a spherical
s
(

space thr ough put:

,
wh i nin
g d is pe rsed with merely
general eqii iab ilityi e xist ia nunib er of b ut g ener
' ‘
'

ally similar system s .

Let us n o w exp anding o ur conceptions loo k

, ,

upon each of these systems as in itself an atom ;

which in fact it is when we con sider it as b ut ,

one of the countless myriads of systems which

constitute the U niverse Regarding all then .
, ,

as b ut colossal atoms each with the same in er ad ,

icab l e tendency to U nity which characteri z es the

actu al atoms of which it consist s we enter at —

once upon a n ew order of aggregations The .

smaller systems in the vicinity of a larger one , ,

wo ul d inevitably be drawn into still closer vicin

, ,

ity A thousand wdul d assem ble here ; a million

.

there— perhaps here again even a billion— leav , ,

ing thus immeasurable vacancies in space An d

, ,
.

if n ow it be demanded why in the case of the se

, , ,

system s o f these merely Titanic atoms I speak

— —
,
“ ”
simply of an assemblage
,
and not as in the , ,

case of the actual atoms of a more or less con ,

ol
s i dated agglomeration — if it be asked for in ,

stance why I do not carry what I sugge st to

,
~

its legitimate conclusion and describe at once , , ,

these assemblages of system- atoms as rushing to

c onsolidation in spheres — as each becomi ng con
den sed into one magnifi cent sun m y reply is —

that ”N orm r a fir a *—
I am b ut pausing for a ,

‘
A q uo t t io n fro m th aAn tigo n of S op ho cl es m ean in g
e e ,

T h es e th i n g s a re of th e f utur e .
” —E D IT O R .
 EUREKA 1 03

moment o n th e awful threshold of the Futur e

, .

“
For the p resent calling these assemblages cl u s
,

ters we see them in the incipient stages of t heir

,

con solidation Their a b so lute consolidation is to

.

c om e .

We have n ow
reached a point from which we
behold the U niverse as a spherical space inter ,

spersed un eq ua b ly with c luster s

, ,It will be .

noticed that I here prefer the adverb uh

” “
equ ably to the phrase with a merely general
equ ability ”employed before It is evident in
, .
,

fact that the equ ability of di stribution will di

,

minis h in the ratio of the agglomerative p ro

cesses— that is to say as the things distrib uted
d immish in number Thus the increase of in
,

equ ability an increase whic h must continu e um

—

til s o oner o r later an epoch will arrive at which

, ,

the largest agglomeration will absorb all the

others— should be viewed as simply a corrobora , ,

tive indication of the ten den cy to On e .

An d here at length it seems proper to in

, ,

quire whether the ascertained fa c ts o f As tron

o m y con fi rm the general arrangement which I
have th us deductively assigned to the Heav en s
, ,
.

Thorou ghly they do ,

Telescopic observ ation
.
,

gu ided by the laws of perspective enables us to ,

understand that the perceptible U niverse exi st s

as a cluster of clusters ir r eg ula rly disp osed , .

“ ” “
The cl usters of wh ich this U niversal clus
”
ter of clusters
.

co n sists are merely what we ,

“
have been in th e practice of designating neb u
”— “ ”
la and of the se neb ul a
, o n e is o f p ara , ,

mo unt interest to mank ind I allude to the .

1 04 WORKS OF ED GAR AL LAN POE

Galaxy, or Milky Way . This interests us, first

and most obviou sly on account of its great su
,

p er i o r ity in apparent siz e not o nl y to any one

,

other cl uster in the firm am en t b ut to all the ,

other clusters taken to gether The largest of

.

these latter occupies a mere p oint comp aratively , ,

and is distinctly seen only with the aid of a tele

scop e . The Galaxy sweep s thro ughout the
Heaven and is brilliantly visible to the naked
eye B ut it interests man chiefly al tho u gh le ss
.
,

immediately on account of its bein g his home ;

,

the h ome of the E arth on which he exists ; the

h ome of th e Sun abo ut which this E arth r e
“ ”
v olves ; the h ome o f that system of orbs of
.

w hich t h e S un is th e centre and primary — the

E arth one of sixteen secondaries or planets the —
,

Moon one of seventeen tertiaries or satell ites ,

.

The Galaxy let me rep eat is b ut one of the clus

, ,

te s which I have been describing b ut one of the

r —

-
m is called neb ul a ”
revealed to us b y the tele
—

scop e a l one sometimes

,
— as faint ha zy spots in
w

vario u s qu ar ters of the sky We have no reason .

to suppose the Milky Way r eally more extensive

“ ”
than the l east of t hese neb ula Its vast su.

p e r io r i ty in s i z e is b u t an apparen t s uperiority
arising from o ur position in regard to it— that is
to say from o ur position in its midst However
, .

strange the a ssertion may at fi rst appear to those

unversed in Astronomy still the a stronomer him

,

self has no hesitation 1 n asserting that we are in

the m idst of that inconceivable hos t of stars— o f
suns— o f systems which constitute the Galaxy .

Moreover not onl y have we— not o nl y has our

,
1 06 WORKS OF ED GAR ALL AN POE

thickness Fancying ourselves thus placed we

.
,

shall no longer fin d diffic ul ty in account ing for

the p ha n o m en a presented — which are p er sp ec
tive altogether When we look upward or d o wn
.

ward— that is to say when we cast o ur eyes in ,

the direction of the letter s thickn ess we l o ok

—
’

throu gh fewer stars than when we cast them in

the direction of its l en g th or alon g either of the ,

three component lines Of co urse in the former .

,

case the stars appear scattered— in the latter

, ,

crowde d To reverse th is explanation

— — An in
habitant of the E arth when looking as we com , ,

m on ly exp re ss o urselves a t the Galaxy is then , ,

beholding it in some of the directions of its 1

length is looking a long the lines of the Y — b ut

—

when looking o ut into the general Heaven he

, ,

tur ns his eyes fr om the Galaxy he is th en sur ,

v eyin g it in the direction of the letter s thick

’

ness ; and on this acco unt the st ars seem to him

scattered ; wh il e in fact they are as clos e to
, ,

gether on an average as in the m ass of th e clus

, ,

ter No considera tion coul d be better adapted to

.

convey an i dea of this cl uster s stupendo us ex ’

tent .

If with a telescop e of high sp ace -

,
penetratin g
power we c areful ly inspect the firm am en t we
, ,

shall b ecome aware of a b elt o f c lusters— o f wh at

“ ”—
we h ave hitherto called neb ul a a b an d of ‘

varying breadth stretching fro m horiz on to hori

,

z on at right angles to the general course of the

,

M ilky Way Thi s band is the ul tim M e cluster

.

o f clusters This belt is The U n iv erse Our

.

Galaxy is b ut one and p erhap s one of the most ,

 EUREKA 1 07

inconsiderable of th e clusters which go to the

,

con stitution of this ultimate U niversal b elt or ,

b an d . The app earance of this cl uster of cl us

ters to o ur eyes as a belt or band is altogeth er a
, , ,

p ersp ective phaenomenon of the same character

as that which cau se s us to beh old o ur own indi
vidu al and ro ughl y spherical cluster the Galaxy , ,

u nder g u i se also of a belt traversing the Heavens

,

at right angles to th e U niversal one The shape .

of the all incl usive cl uster i s of course g en er a lly

, ,

that of each individu al cluster which it incl udes .

J ust as the scattered stars which on looking ,

fr om the Galaxy we see in the general sky are

, , ,

in fact b ut a portion of that Galaxy itself and

, ,

a s closely intermingled with it as any of the tele

scopic poin ts in what seems the densest portion of

“ ”
its mas s— so ar e the scattered neb ul ae which ,

on c asting o ur eye s fr om the U niversal b elt we ,

p erceive at all p oints of the fir m am en t —so I say , ,

“ ”
are these scattered neb ulae to be understood as
onl y p erspectively scattered and as p art and ,

p arcel of the one supreme and U niversal sp her e .

N o a stronomical fallacy 1 s m ore untenable and ,

none h as been more pertinaciously adhered to ,

than that of the absolute tllimtta tton of the U n i

verse o f Stars T h e rea sons for limitation as I
.
,

have already assigned them a p rio r i seem to m e

, ,

u nanswerable ; b ut not to speak of these o b ser

, ,

v a tio n ass ures us that there is in n umero us di ,

rection s around us certainly if not in all a po si

, , ,

tive limit o r at the very l east a ffords us no

—
, ,

basis whatever for thin king otherwise Were the .

succ ession of stars endle ss then the backgro und

,
1 08 WORKS OF ED GAR AL L AN POE

of the sky wo ul d present us a uniform l um in os

ity like that displayed by the Gal axy sin c e
,
—

ther e co uld be in a ll tha t

a b so lu tely n o i
p n t,
o
b ac kg r oun d, a t whic h wo uld n o t exis t a s ta r .

The onl y mode therefore in which under s uch a

, , ,

state of afi air s we coul d comprehend the voids

,

which our telescopes fin d i n innumerabl e dir ec

tion s woul d be by supposing the distance of the
,

invisible backgro und so immense that no ray

from it has yet been able to reach us at all That .

thi s m ay be so who shall ventu re to deny ? I

,

maintain simply that we have not even the

, ,

shadow of a re ason for believing that it is so

'

Wh en speakin g of the vul gar p ropensity to

regard all bodies on the E arth as tending merely
’ “
to t h e E arth s centre I observed that with cer , ,

tain exception s to be sp ecifi ed hereafter every ,

body on the E arth tended not only to the E arth s ’

centre b ut in every conceivable direction b e

,
“ ”
The exceptions refer to tho sle fr e
qu ent gaps in the Heaven s where our utmost ,

scr utiny can detect not only no stellar bodies ,

b ut no indications of their existence — where

yawning chasms blacker than Ereb us seem to , ,

a fi o r d us glimpses thr o u gh the bo undary walls,

of the U niverse of Stars into the illimitable ,

U niverse of Vacancy beyond No w as any body ,

.
,

exi sting on th e Earth chances to pass either , ,

’
thro ugh its own movement or the E arth s into a ,

line with any one of these voids or cosmical ,

abysses it clearly is no longer attracted in the di

,

r ec tion of tha t v oid and for the moment co use , ,

P a ge 4 2 .
1 10 WORKS OF E D GAR ALLAN POE

Have we any right to inferen ce s— h ave we any

g ro un d whatever for visio n s such as t h e se ? If
we hav e a right to them in a n y degree we have a
,

right to th eir infin ite extension .

The hum an brain has obvio usly a leaning to

“ ”
the Infinite, and fondles the p h antom of the
idea It seems to long with a p assionate fervor
.

for this impossible conception with the hop e of

,

intellectually believ ing it when conceived Wh at .

is g eneral among the wh ole race of M an of ,

co urse no individual of that race c an be warrant

ed in con sidering abnormal ; neverthele ss there ,

may b e a class of superior intelligenc es to wh om ,

the h uman bias all uded to may wear all the char
acter of monomania .

My question h owever remains un answered

, ,

Have we any right to infer— let us say rather to , ,

imagin e — an interminable succe ssion of the

“ ” “ ”
cluster of clusters or of U niverses more
,

or les s similar ?
I reply that the right in a c as e su ch as th i s
, ,

dep ends ab solutely up on the hardih ood of that

imaginatio n which ventures to claim the right .

Let me declare onl y that as an indi vidual I m y

, , , ,

self feel impelled to fa n cy — witho ut daring to

call it more that there does exist a lim itl ess suc
—

c ession of U niverse s more or le ss similar to th at

,
—
of wh ich we have cogniz anc e to that of which
a lo n e we shal l ever have cogni anc e
z — at the ve ry

least until the return of o ur o wn partic ular U n i

v erse into U nity If su ch cl usters of cl usters ex
.

ist,
however — a n d th ey d o— it is ab undantly
cle ar that having had no p art in o ur origin they
, ,
 EUREKA 111

h ave no portion in laws They neither at o ur .

tract us nor we them

,
Their materi al — the ir .

spirit is n ot o urs i not that which obtains in

—
‘

any part of our U niverse They could not im .

pres s o ur senses or o ur soul s Among them and .

us— considering all for the moment collectively

, ,
— there are no infl u ences in common E ach ex
‘

ists apart and independently in the b o so m of its

, ,

p r o p er a n d p a r tic u l a r Go d .

In the conduct of this D isco urse I am aiming ,

l ess at physical than at metaphysical order The .

clearness with which even material ph aenomena

‘

are presented to the understanding dep ends very ,

little I have long since learned to p erceive upon

, ,

a merely natural and almost altogether up on a

,

moral arrangement
,
If then I seem to step
.

somewhat too disc ursively from point to point of

my top ic let me su ggest that I do so in the hope
,

of thus the better keep ing unbroken that chain of

g r a du a ted im p r essio n by which alone the intel
lect of Man can exp ect to encomp ass the grand
eur s of which I speak and in their maj estic to , ,

tality to comprehend them

,
.

So far o ur attention has been directed alm ost

, ,

excl usively to a general and relative gro uping of

,

the stel l ar bodie s in space Of sp ecifi cation there .

has been little ; and whatever ideas of q ua n tity

h ave been conveyed— that is to say of n umber , ,

magnitu de and distanc e— have been conveyed

,

incidentally and by way of prep aration for more

definite conceptions T h ese latter let us now a t
.

tempt to entert ain .

Our solar system as h as been already men ,

112 WORKS OF EDGAR ALL AN P OE

tio n ed, cons ists in c hief o f one sun and sixteen

'

, ,

p l anets certainl y b ut in all probability a f ew

,

others revolving aro und it as a centr e and at

, ,

tended by seventeen moons of which we know ,

with possibly several more of which as yet we

kn ow nothing These variou s bodies are not tru e
.

spheres b u t oblate s pheroids— spheres flattened

,

at the p oles of the imaginary axes abou t which

they rotate —
the flattenin g being a consequ ence
of the rotation Neither is the Sun absolutely the
.

centre of the system ; for this Sun itself with all ,

the planets revolves abou t a perpetu ally shifting

,

p oint of space which is the system s general cen

,
’

tre of gravity Neither are we to consider the

.

paths thro u gh which these diflferen t spheroi ds

'

move the moons about the planets the planets

—
,

about the Sun or the Sun abo ut the common c en

,

tre as circles in an acc u rate sense They are in

—
.
,

fact ell p ses o n e of the fo ci b ein g the p oin t

,
i —

ab o ut which the r evo lutio n is m a de An ellipse .

is a c urve returning into itself one of whose di

, ,

a m eter s is longer than the other In the longer ”

diameter are two points equ idistant from the ,

middl e of the line and so situated otherwise that,

if from each of th em a straight line be drawn to

,

any one p oint o f the c urve the two lines take n , ,

together will be equ al to the long diameter itself

, .

No w let us conceive s uch an ellipse At one of .

the p o m ts mentioned which are the fo ci let us , ,

fasten an orange By an elastic thread let us .

connect th is orange wi th a p ea ; and let us place

this latter on the circ umference of the ellipse
“
.

Let us n o w mo ve the pea contin uo usly aro und

1 14 WORKS OF ED GAR AL LAN POE

mortal laws g uessed by the M agmative K ep1 er , .

and b ut subsequ ently demonstrated an d ac

counted for by the patient and mathematical
Newton Among a trib e of philosophers who
.

pride themselves excessively upon matter- o f-

fact ,

it is far too fashionable to sneer at all specula

“
tion under the comprehensive so b riq uet guess ,

wor The point to be considered is who -

,

gu esses In guessing with Plato we spend o ur

.
,

time to better p urpose now and then than in , ,

harkening to a demonstration by Al cmaeon .

In many works on Astronomy I fin d it dis

tin ctly stated that the laws of Kepler are the
b asis of the great principle Gravitation T hi s ,
.

idea must have arisen from the fact that the su g

gestion of these laws by Kepler and his proving ,

them a p osterio ri to have an actual existence l ed ,

Newton to account for them b y the hypothesis

of Gravitation and fin all y to demonstrate them
, , ,

a p r io r i as nece ssary consequ ences of the hypo

,

thetical principle Thus so far from the laws

.

of Kepler being the basis of Gravity Gravity ,

is the basi s of these l aws— as it is indeed of , ,

all the laws of the material U niv erse wh ic h ar e

,

not referable to Rep ul sion alone .

The mean distance of the E art h from the

Moon that is to say from the heavenl y body
—
,

in o u r close st vicinity— is mil es Mer .

c ury th e planet nearest the Sun is di stant from

,
‘

him 3 7 mi llions o f miles Venu s the next r e

'

.
, ,

6
volves at a distance of 8 millions — the E arth
which comes next at a di stance of 9 5 millions
,
— Mars then at a distance of 1 4 4 millio ns
, , NOW .
 EUREKA 115

c ome th e eight Asteroids (Ceres Juno Vesta , , ,

,
-
P allas Astrai a Flora Iris and Hebe ) at an
, , ,

average distance of abo ut 2 50 mi llions Then we .

have Jupiter distan t 4 90 millions ; then Saturn

, ,

9 00 millions ; then U ran us 1 9 hundred millions ; ,

finally Nept une lately discovered and revolving

, ,

a t a distance say of 2 8 hundred millions

,
Leav .

ing Neptune out of the accoun t o f which as yet

—

we know little accu rately and whi ch is possibly , ,

o n e of a system of Aste roids — it will be seen that ,

within certain limits there exists an o r der of

,

in ter va l among the planet s Speaking loo sely .

,

we may say that each outer planet is twice as

far from the Sun as is the next inner one May .

not the o r d er here mentioned m ay n o t the law

—

o f B o de —
b e deduc ed fr om con sider atio n of the
a n a lo gy sugg es ted b y m e as havin g p lac e b etween
the so la r dischar g e o f r in g s an d the m o de o f the
a tom ic ir r a dia tio n ?
The numbers hurriedly mentioned in thi s sum
mary of distance it is folly to attempt compre
,

h ending unless in the light of abstract ar ithm et

,

ical facts They are not practically tangible

.

o nes. They convey no preci se ideas I have .

stated that Nep tune the planet farthest from

,

the Sun revolves about him at a distance of 2 8

hun dred millions of miles
,
— I
So far good .

have stated a mathematical fact ; and without ,

comprehending it in the least we may p ut it to ,

use— mathematically B ut in mentioning even

.
, ,

that the Moon revolves about the E arth at the

c omparatively trifling distance of miles ,

I entertained no expectation of giving any one

 WORK S
’

116 o r ED GAR AL LAN P OE

to understand to know to feel how far from

— — —

the Earth the Moon actually is miles " .

There are p erhaps few of my readers who hav e

, ,

not crossed the Atlantic ocean ; yet how many of

them have a distinct idea of even the mile s
intervening between shore an d sh ore ? I doubt ,

indeed whether the man lives who can force into

,

his brain the most remote conception of the in

terv al between one milestone and its next nei gh
bor upon the turn pike We are in some mea sure.

aided however in o ur consideration of distance

, , ,

by combining this consideration with the kin

dre d one of velocity S ound passe s throu gh
.

1 1 00 feet of space in a second of time No w .

were it possible for an inh abitant of the E arth

to see the flash of a cannon discharged in the
Moon and to hear the report he woul d have to
, ,

wait after perceiving the former more than 1 3

, ,

entire days and nights before getting any inti

mation of the latter
‘

However feeble be th e impression even thus ,

conveyed of the Moon s r eal distan ce from the

,
’

Earth it will nevertheles s efl ect a good obj ect

, , ,

in enabling us more clearly to see the futility

of attempting to grasp such interval s as that
of the 2 8 hundred mi ll ions of miles between our
Sun and Neptune ; or even that of the 9 5 mil
lions between the Sun and the E arth we i nh abit .

A cannon - ball flying at th e greate st v elocity with

,

whi ch such a ball has ever been known to fly ,

could not travers e the latter interv al in less th an

2 0 years ; wh il e for the former it wo ul d require ,

59 0 .
118 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

us suppose it in a state of quiescence ; and n ow

let us endeavor to conceive a mechanical force
s ufli c ien t to set it in motion "Not the strength

of all th e myr iads of beings whom we may con

c lude to inhabit t h e planetary worlds of o ur sys

tems not the combined physical strength of a ll

—

—
these being e ven admitting all to be more p o w
s
e r fu l than man— wo uld avail to stir the ponder
o us mass a sin g le in ch from its position .

What are we to un derstand then of the force

, , ,

whi ch under similar circum stances would be r e

,

quired to move the larg est of our planets Jup i ,

ter ? This is miles in diameter and woul d

,

inclu de within its perip h ery more than a th ou

sand orbs o f the magnitu de of our own Yet .

thi s stupendo us body is actually flying around

the Sun at the rate of miles an hou r— that
is to say with a velocity forty times greater than
ball "The thou ght of such a
,

that of a cann ot- i

p haenomenon cannot well be said to star tle the

'

— i
mind t palsies and app al s it . Not un fr e
quently we task o ur imagination in picturing the
capacities of an angel Let us fancy such a b e
.

ing at a distance of some hundred miles from

Jup ter a close eye -
i — witness of this planet as it
speeds on its annu al revolution Now can we I
.
,

demand fashion for ou rselves any conception so

,

distinct of thi s ide al being s spiritu al exaltation

’
,

as tha t involved in the supposition that even by ,

this immeasurable mass of matter whirled imme

,

diately before his eye s, with a velocity so un

utterable he— an angel— angelic though he b e
,
 EUREKA 119

is not at once Struck into nothingness and over

whelmed ?
3 At thi s poi nt h owever it seems proper to sug, ,

gest that in fact we h ave been speaking of com

, ,

fl
p ar ativ e tr i es
-
O ur Sun the central and con
.

trolling orb of the sy stem to which Jupiter b e

longs is not only greater than Jupiter b ut
—

F
,

g r ea te r by far than all the planets of the system

taken together This fact is an essential con .

; dition indeed
, of the stability of
, the system
itself The diameter of Jupiter has been men
.

tio n ed : it is miles that of the Sun is —

miles An inhabitant of the latter

.
,

travelling ninety miles a day would be more than ,

eighty years in going ro und a great circle of its

circumference It occ upies a cubical space of 68 1
.

quadrillions 4 7 2 trillions of miles The Moon

, .
,

as ha s been stated revolves abo ut the E arth at ,

a distance of miles— in an orbit cou se ,

qu ently of nearly a million and a h alf Now

, .
,

were the Sun placed u pon the Earth centre over ,

centre the body of the former woul d extend in

, ,

every direction not only to the line of the Moon s

,
’

orbit b ut beyond it a distance of

,
mi les , .

An d here once again let me suggest th at in

, , ,

fact we have s till been speaking of comparative

,

tr ifl es . The distance of the planet Neptune

from th e Sun has been stated : it is 2 8 hun dred
millions of miles : the circ umference of its orbit ,

ather ef o r e is abo u t 1 7 billions Let this be borne

, .

in mind while we glance at some one of the

brightest stars Between this and the star of
.

S
o ur system (the Sun ) there is a gulf of space ,
, ,
1 20 WORKS OF ED GAR AL LAN POE

to convey any idea of which we should need ,

the tong ue of an ar changel From o ur system .

,

then and from our Sun or star the star at

, , ,

whi ch we suppose our selv es glancing is a th in g

altogether apart — still for the moment let us
, ,

M agine it placed upon o ur Sun centre over ,

centre as we j ust now imagined this Sun itself

,

placed upon the E arth Let us n ow conceive the

.

partic ul ar star we have in mind extending in , ,

every di rection beyond the orbit of Mercu ry

,

of Venus— o f the E arth — still o n beyond the ,

orbit of Mars o f Jup iter o f Uranus until

— — —
,

finally we fancy it filling the circle — s even teen

,

b illio n s of m iles in cir cum fer en c e— which is des

c r ib ed by the revol ution of Lev err ier s planet
’
.

When we have conceived all this we shall have ,

entertained no extravagant conception There .

is the very best reason for believing that many

of the stars are even far larger than the one we
have imagined I mean to say that we have t he
.
,

v ery best emp irica l basis for su ch belief — and ,

in looking back at the original atomic arrange ,

ments for diver sity which have been assumed as

,

a part of the D i vine plan in the constitution

of the U niverse we shall be enabled easily to
,
(

unde rstand and to credit the existence of even

, ,

far vast er disproportions in stellar si z e than any

to which I have hi therto allu ded The l arg est .

orb s of course we must expect to fin d rolling

, , ,

through the widest vacancies of Space .

I remarked j ust n ow that to convey an idea

, ,

of the in te rval between our Sun and any one of

the other stars we should require th e eloqu ence j
,
1 22 WORKS OF ED G AR AL L AN POE

ment of the case only the 528 0 th p a r t of that dis

,

tance which is the least dis tan ce p ossib le at which

it c an actu ally lie .

To proceed z— Howe ver di stant a mere p lan et

is yet when we look at it throu gh a telescope we
,

s ee it under a certain form — o f a certain app r e

c iab l e si z e No w I h ave already hinted at the

.

probable b ul k of many of the stars ; nevertheless ,

when we view any one of them even throu gh ,

the m ost p ower ful telescope it is fo und to pre

'

s ent us with n o f o rm and co n sequ ently with n o ,

m ag n itude whatever We see it as a point and .

,

nothing more .

A gain — Let us suppose o urselves walking at ,

night on a highway In a fi eld on one side of the

,
.

road is a line of tall objects say trees th e fi gur es

, , ,

o f which are distinctly de fined again st the back

ground of the sky This line of obj ects extend .
s

at right an gles to the road an d from the road to ,

the h ori z on No w as we proceed along the road

.
,
.

we see these obj ects changing their positions r e ,

s p ec tiv ely in relation to a certain fixed point in

,

that portion of the fi r m am en t which forms the

background of the view Let us suppose this fixed .

—
point su c e t y xed for our p rpose to be
ffi i n l fi u —

th e rising moon We become aware at once

.
,

tha t while the tree nearest us so far alters its ‘

p osition in respect to the moon a s to seem flying ,

behind us the tree in the extreme distance has

,

s carcely changed at all its relati v e position with

the satelli te We then go on to perceive that the
.

farther the objects are from us the less they ,

a lter their positions ; and the converse Then .

 EUREKA 1 23

we begin un wittingly to estimate the distances

, ,

of in di vidual trees by the degrees in which they

evince the relative alteration Finally we come .
,

to unders tand how it might be poss ible to asoer

tain the actual distance of any given tree in the
line by using the amo unt of relative alteration
,

as a basi s in a simple geometrical problem No w .

,
“
this relative alteration is what we call paral
lax and by parallax we calc ulate the distance s
.

of the heavenly bodies Applying the principle.

to the trees in qu estion we shoul d of cou rse be

, , ,

very much at a lo ss to comprehend the distance

of tha t tree which howev er far we proceeded
, ,

along the road should evince n o p arallax at all

, .

This in the case de scribed is a thing impossible ;

, ,

b ut impossible only because all distance s on o ur

E arth are trivial indeed -
in comparison with
the vast cosmical qu antities we may speak o f ,

them as absol utely nothing .

No w let us supp o se the star Alpha Lyra

,

directly overhead ; and let us imagine that in ,

stead o f standing on the E arth we stand a t on e ,

end of a straight road stretching thro ugh Space

to a distance equalling the diatneter of the "
’
E arth s orbit — that is to say to a distance o f ,

o n e hun dr ed an d n in ety millions of miles Hav .

ing ob served by means of t h e mo st delica te mi

,

cr o m etr ical instr ument s the exact position of the

,

star ,
l et us n ow pass along thi s inconceivable
road until we reach the o ther extremity N ow
, .
,

once again let us look at the star It is p r ecisely

, .

where we left it Our instruments however deli

.
,

cate assure us th at its relative position is ab so

,
1 24 WORKS OF E D GAR ALLAN POE

l te y
u l — is identically the same as at the com ,

men cemen t of our un u tterable j ourney N0 p ar .

all ax —n o ne whatever— has been fo und .

Th e fac t is that in re gard to the d istance of

, ,

the xe sta rs o f any one of the myriads of

fi
d
.
—

suns glis tening on the farther side of tha t awf ul

‘

chasm whi c h separates our system from its broth

ers in the cluster to which it belongs — as tronomi
cal science until very lately could speak only
, ,

with a negative certainty Ass uming the bright .

est as the nearest we co uld say even of them

, , ,

only that there is a certain incomprehensible dis

tance on the hither side of which they cannot be
-how far they are beyond it we h ad in no c as e
been able to asce rt ain We perceived for exam .
,

ple that Al p h a Lyra cannot be nearer to us than

,

1 9 trillions 2 00 billions of miles b ut for all we

, , ,

knew and indeed for all we n ow know it may

, ,

be dist ant f rom us the squ are or the c ube o r any , ,

other po wer of the number mentioned B y dint .

,

h owever o f wonderf ul ly minute and cautious o h

,

serv atio n s continued with novel instruments

, ,

for man y laborious years B essel not long ag o , ,

deceased haslately succeeded in determining the

,

distance of six or seven stars ; among others that ,

of the s ta r n umbered 61 in the constellation of

the Swan The distance in this latter instance
.

ascertained is 670 000 tim es that of the Sun ;

, ,

which las t it will be remembere d is 9 5 millions ,

of miles The star 61 Cygni then is nearly 64

.
, ,

trillions of miles from us o r more than three

—

times the distance assi gned as the leas t possib le,

, ,

for Alpha Lyra .

1 26 WORK S OF ED GAR ALLAN P OE

speaking of tr ifles (leasing to wonder at th e

.

space between star and star in o ur own or in any

particul ar cluster let us rather t urn our thoughts
,

to the intervals between cluster and cluster in ,

the all comprehensive cluster of the U niverse .

I h ave alre ad y said that light proceeds at the

rate of 1 67 00 0 ,
— -
miles in a second r th at is about ,

1 0 million s of miles in a min ute or abou t 600

millions of miles in an hour yet so far removed
,
—

from us are some of the neb ul a that even

light speeding with this velocity coul d not and
, ,

does n o t reach us from tho se mysterious regions

, ,

in less than 3 m illion s of yea rs This calcul a

‘

tion moreover is made by the elder Herschel

, , ,

and in reference merely to those comparativ ely

p r ox im M e cl usters within the s cope of his own
“ ”
telescope There a r e nebul a ; however wh ich
.
, ,

throu gh the magical tube of Lord Ro sse are thi s ,

instant whispering in our ears the secrets of a

m illion of ag es b y- gone In a word the events .
,

which we behold n o w— at this moment— in those

worlds are the identical events which intere sted
—

their inh abitants ten hun dr ed thousan d cen turies

ag o. In intervals— in di stances such as th is sug
gestion force upon the soul — rather than upon
the mind we fin d at length a fitting climax
—
, ,

to all hitherto friv olous considerations of quan

tity .

O ur fancies thus occupied with the cosmical

di stance s let us take the opportunity of refer
,

ring to the difficul ty which we h ave so often ex

p er ien ced while p urs ui ng the b ea ten p a th of as
,

t r on om ic al reflection in ac co un tin g for the im

,
 EUREKA 1 27

measurable v oids a lluded to— in comprehending

why chasms so totally unocc upied and therefore
apparently so nee dl e ss hav e been made to inter
,

vene between star an d star between cl uster an d

—

cluster— in understanding to be brief a suffi

, ,

cient reason for th e Titanic scale in re spect of

,

mere Sp ace on which t h e U niverse is seen to be

,

con stru cted A rational cause for th e pha n om e

.

non I maintain that Astronomy has palpably

,

failed to assign - b ut the consideratio ns thro ugh

which in this Essay we have proceeded step by
, ,

step enable us clearly and immediately to per

,

c eive that Sp ace a n d D u r a tio n ar e on e That .

th e U ni verse might en dur e through out an a ra

a t all co mmen surate with the grandeu r of its
component material portion s and with the high
majesty of its spiritual p urpo ses it was n ec es
,

sary that th e original atomic difi usion be made

to so inconceivable an extent as to be only not
infinite It was required in a word that the
.
, ,

stars sho ul d be gathered into v i sibility from in

v i sible n eb ul osity p ro ceed from neb ul osity to
fl

'

consolidation and so grow grey in giving birth

—

and death to unspeakably n um erous and comple x

variations of vi talic development — it was r e
quired that the stars sh o ul d do all this— sho uld
have time thor ou bl y to accomplish all these
D ivine p urpose uri n g the p er iod m which all
things were efl ectin g their return into U nity
with a velocity acc um ulating m the inv erse pro
'

portion of the squares of th e distance s at wh ich

lay the inevitable End .

Thro ughout all t h is we h ave no diffi c ul ty in

'
1 28 WORKS OF E D GAR ALL AN POE

understan ding th e absolute accuracy of the

D i vine a da p ta tio n The density of the stars
.
,

respectively procee ds of co urse as their con den

, , ,

sa tion di mi nishes ; condensation and heterogen

city keep pace with eac h oth er th rou gh the lat ,

ter whic h is th e index of th e former we esti

, ,

mate th e vitalic and spiritual development .

T hus in th e density of the globe s we h ave the

, ,

me asure in which their p urposes are fulfilled .

As density proceeds— as th e D ivine intentions are

accomplished— as le ss and still less remains to b e
accomplish ed— so— in the same ratio— sho uld we
expect to fin d an acceleration of the E n d : — and
thus the philosophical mind will easily compre
h end that th e D ivine designs in constituting the
stars ,
advance ma thema tica lly to their fulfil
ment : and more ; it will readily give the a d
— '

vanc e a mathematical expression ; it will decide

that this advance is inversely proportion al with
the squares of the distances of all created thin gs
from the starting-
'

point an d g o al of their cre

ation .

Not only is th is D ivine adaptation however , ,

mathematically accurate b ut there is that about

,

it which stamp s it as divin e in distinction from

,

that which is merely the work of hum an con

str u c tiven ess I allude to the complete m utuality
.

of adaptation For example ; i n hum an co n struc

.

tions a p articul ar cause has a pa rticular e ff ect ;

a particul ar intention brings to pass a pa r tic ul ar
obj ect ; b ut th is is all ; we see n o r eciprocity
The eff ec t does not r e-
.

act upon the cause ; the

’

intention does not ch ange relations with th e ob

1 30 wo ux s or EDGAR ALL AN PO E

abo ut stars ; and the poetical instinct of hum an

ity— its instinct of the symmetric al if the sym ,

metry be b ut a symmetry of surface — this in

stin c t which the So ul not only of Man b ut of all
, ,

created beings took up in the beginning from

, , ,

the g eo m etr ica l basis of the U niversal irradiation

— impels us to the fancy of an endless extension

of this system of cyc les Closing our eyes equally

.

to deduction and in duction we insist upon im ag ,

ining a r evo lu tion o f all the orbs of the Galaxy

abo ut some gigantic globe which we t ak e to be
the central pivot of the whole Each cl us ter in .

the great cl uster of cl usters is imagined of ,

co urse to be similarly supplied and constructed ;

,
“ ”
while that the a nalogy may be wanting at no
,

point we go on to con ceive thes e clusters them

'

selves again as r evo lving a bout some still more

, ,

a ugus t sphere — this latter s till again with its , ,

encircling cl usters as b ut one of a yet more mag

,

n ific en t series of agglomeration s g yra ting about ,

yet another orb central to h t em — some orb still

more unspeakably s ublime— some orb let us ,

rather say of infin ite s ublimity en dlessly multi

,

plied by the infinitely sublime S uch are the .

conditions continued in perpetuity which the

, ,
“ ”
v oice o f what some people term analogy calls
upon the Fancy to depict and the Rea son to con
template if possible without becoming dissatis
, ,

fi ed with the picture S uch in g en er a l are the

.
, ,

interminable gyrations beyond gyration which

we have been instructed b y Philosophy to co m
prehend and to account for at least in the best ,

m an n er we c an Now and then howev er a phi , ,

 EUREKA 1 31

los o pher proper— one whose fren zy takes a very

determinate t urn whose geni us to speak more
—
,

reverentially has a strongly- prono unced washer

,

womanish bias doing every thin g up by the ,

-
do en enables us to see p r ecisely th at point o ut
z

of sight at which the revol utionary processes in

,

question do and of right o ught to come to an

, ,

end .

It is hardl y worth while perhaps even to sneer

,

, ,

at the reveries of Fo u rrier — b ut mu ch has been

said latterly of the hypothesis of M adler that
, ,
m

there exists in the centre of the Galaxy a stu

, ,

pendons globe abo ut which all the systems of the

cluster revolve The p er io d of o ur o wn indeed
.
, ,

h as been stated 1 1 7 million s of years

— .

That o ur Sun has a motion in space in depen d ,

ently of its rotation and revolution about the ,

syste m s centre of gravity has long been sus

’
,

p ec te d This .motion granting it to exist wo uld , ,

be manifested perspectively The stars in that .

firm am en tal region which we were leaving b e

hind us wou ld in a very l ong series of years
, , ,

become crowded ; those in the opposite qu arter ,

scattered No w by means of a stronomical His

.
,

tory we a scertain clou dily that some such pha

, , ,

n emena have occ u rred On this gro und it has .

been declared that o ur system is moving to a

point in the heavens diametrically opposite the
star Z eta Herculis —b ut th is inference is p er ,

hap s the maximum to which we have any logi

,

cal right M adler however has gone so far as

.
, ,

to designate a particular star Alcyone in the ,

1 32 WORK S OF E D GAR ALLAN POE

P leiade s, being at or about th e very spot

as
a round whic h a general r evo lu tio n is p erformed .

“ ”
No w since by
, analogy we are led in the ,

first instance to the se dream s it is no more than

, ,

proper that we should abide by analogy at le ast ,

in some me asure during their development ; and

,

that an alogy which su ggests the revolution sug ,

gests at the same time a central orb ab o ut which

it shoul d be p erformed —
so far the a stronomer
was consistent T his central orb howev er
.
, ,

should dynamically be greater than all the orbs

, , ,

taken together whi ch surround it

,
Of these .

there are about 1 00 million s Why then it ”

.
, ,
“
was of cou rse demanded do we not see thi s vast
,

central sun — a t least equal in mas s to 1 00 mil

lions o s ch sun as o rs why do we not see
f u s u —

it we esp ecially who occupy the mi d region

—
, ,

of the cluster the v ery lo cality n ear which at

—
,

all events must be situated this incomparable

,

star ? The reply was ready It must be non

lum inous as are our planets
,
Here then to , ,

suit a p urpose analogy is suddenly let fall

,
.

“
Not so ”
,
it may be said -we know that non
“
”
l uminous suns actually exist It is tru e that .

we have reason at least for s uppo sing so ; b ut we

have certainl y no reason whatever for suppos
ing that the min - luminous suns in question are
encircled by lum in o us sun s while these again are ,
-
s urrounded by non luminous planets — and it is
p recisely all this with which M adler is called
upon to fin d any thing analogous in the heavens
-for it is precisely all thi s which he imagines
in the case of the Galaxy Admitting the thing .
1 34 WORKS OF ED GAR ALL AN POE

prehension of a sweep so ine ffable "It wo uld

scarc ely be paradoxical to say that a flash of
lightning itself travelling fo r ever upon the cir
,

c um f er en c e of this un utterable circle wo uld still , ,

fo r ever be travelling in a straight line

, That .

the path of o ur Sun in such an orbit woul d to ,

any human perception deviate in the slightes t ,

de gr ee from a straight line even in a million ,

of years is a proposition not to be entertained

,
—
yet we are requ ired to believe that a c urva
tur e has become apparent during the brief period
of o ur astronomical history— du ring a mere point
d ring the utter nothingness of two or three
— u

tho usand years .

It may be said that Ma dl er has really as o er

tain ed a c u rvat ure in the direction of o u r sys
tem s now well-
’
established progress thro ugh
Sp ace Adm itting if necessary this fact to be
.
, ,

in reality such I maintain that nothing is there

,

by shown except the reality of this fact the fact

—

of a cu rvatu re For its tho r o ug h determination

.
,

a g es will be required ; and when determined it , ,

will be found indicative of some binary or other

multiple relation between o ur Sun and some one
or more of the proximate stars I ha z ard noth .

ing however in predicting that after the lapse

, , ,

of m an y centuries all e ff orts at determining the

,

path of o ur Sun thr ou gh Space will be aban ,

do n ed as fru itless This is easily conceivable

.

when we look at the in finity o f perturbation it

must experience from its perp etually-
,

,
shifting
relations with other orbs in the comm on ap ,

proa ch of all to the nucleus of the Galaxy .

 E U R E KA 1 35

B ut in examining other neb ul a t han t hat

of the Milky W ay in s urveying generall y the
—
, ,

clus ters which overspread the h eavens— do we

or do we not fin d confi rmation o f M adl er s hy
,
’

p o thesis ? We do n o t The forms of the clusters

“

ar e exceedingly diverse when casually viewed ;

b ut on close inspection throu gh powerful tele ,

scop es we recognise the sphere very di stinctly

, , ,

as at least the proximate form of all — their co n

stitutio n in general bein g at variance wi t h the
, ,

idea of revolution about a common centre .

“ ”
It is diffic ult says Sir John Herschel,
to ,

form any conception of the dynamical state of

such systems On one hand without a ro ta ry
.
,

motion and a centrifugal force it is h ardl y p os ,

sible not to regard them as in a state of p r ogr es

siv e c o llap se On the other granting such a
‘

.
,
,

motion and such a force we fin d it no less diffi ,

c ult to reconcile their forms with the rotation

of the whole system meaning cl uster aroun d
any single axis without which internal collision
" "
,
”
woul d appear to be inevitable .

Some remarks lately made about the nebul a '

by D r Nichol in taking qu ite a di fferent view

.
,

of the co smical conditions from any taken in th is

D iscourse— have a very pec ul iar applicab ility to
th e point n ow at issue He says .

“
When o ur greatest telescopes are brought to
bear upon them we fin d that tho se which were
,

thou ght to be irregular are not so ; they a p ,

proach nearer to a globe Here is one that .

’
looked oval ; b ut Lord Ro sse s tel escop e brou ght ‘

it into a circle Now there occ u rs a

.
1 36 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN P O E

very remarkable circumstance in reference to

th ese comparatively sweeping circul ar masses of
nebul ae We fin d they are not entirely circul ar
.
,

b ut the reverse ; and that all around them o n ,

.

every side there are volumes of stars stretchin g

, ,

o ut ap p a r en tly as if they wer e r ushin g towar ds

a g r ea t c en tr al m ass in co n seq uen ce of the ac tio n
o f som e g r ea t
Were I to describe in my own words what , ,

must n ece ssari ly be the exi sting con di tion of each

nebul a on the hypothe sis that all matter is as ,

I suggest n ow returning to its original U nity I

, ,

sh o ul d simply be going over nearly verbatim , ,

th e language here emp loyed by D r Nich ol with .

,

o ut th e faintest suspicion of that stupendous

tru th whic h is the key to these nebular phae
n om en a .

An d h ere let m e fo rtify my position till far

'

s
th er by the voice of a greater than M adler
,

of one moreover to whom all the data o f M adler

, , ,

h av e long been familiar things carefully and ,

th oroughly con sidered Referring to the elab .

orate calculations of Argelander the very r e

—

searc h e s wh ich form M dl e

a r s basis H um b o ldt
— ’
,

wh ose generali zing powers h ave never perh aps , ,

been equalled has the following observ ation

,
“
When we regard the real p roper or non , ,

p erspective motion s of the stars we fin d m an y ,

g ro up s o f them m e nen g m opp os zte dzr ec tzo n s ;

I m u st b e d e r st oo d a s d en yi n g e specia l ly o n ly the
un ,

o por t ion of M adl e r s h ypot h es i s O f co urs e if n o

,
’
r e v l u ti o na r y . ,

gr e a t ce n tra l orb e xi st s n o w in o ur cl ust e r suc h will e x i s t

h e r e a fte r Wh en ev e r ex i st i n g i t wil l b e m e rely the n uc leus
,

. ,

of th e co n so l id a tio n .
1 38 WORKS OF ED GAR ALL AN POE

mul titudi nous masses as each proc eeded o n its ,

own proper j ourn ey to the End .

I qu oted j ust n o w from Sir Jo hn Herschel

“

, , ,

the following words used in reference to the ,

“
cl uste rs On one hand without a rotary ,

motion and a centrifugal force it is hardly pos ,

sible not to regard them as in a s tate of p r og res

sive co llap se
’
The fact is that in surveying
.
, ,
“
the nebulae with a telescope of high power ,

we sh al l fin d it quite impo ssible hav ing once con ,

“ ”
c eiv ed thi s idea of collapse not to gather at , ,

all po ints corroboration of the idea A nucleus

, .

is al ways apparent in the direction of which ,

the stars seem to be precipitating themselves ;

nor can these nuclei be mistaken for merely p er
sp ectiv e phaeno mena -
the clusters are r ea lly
denser near the centre— sparser in the regions ’

"
more remote from it In a word we see every .
,

thing as we should see it were a collapse taking

plac e ; b ut in general it may be said of th ese
, ,

clusters that we can fairly entertain wh ile look

, ,

ing at them the idea of o r bitua l m ovem en t a b o ut

,

a c en tr e only by a dm itting th e p ossi b le exist

,

ence in the distant domain s of space of dynam

, ,

ical laws with which we are unacqu ainted .

On the p art of Herschel, however there is evi ,

den tly a r eluctan ce to regard the nebul ae as in

”
a state of progr essive collapse B ut if facts .

— if even appearance s j us tify the supposition of

their being in this state why it may well be , ,

dem an ded is he di sinclined to admit it ? Simply

'

on account of a prej udice -merely becaus e the

-
supposition is at war with a pre conceived and
 EUREKA 139

utterly baseless notion— that of the endlessness

— that of the eternal stability of the U niverse .

If the propo sitions of this D isco urse are ten

”
able the state of progressive collapse is p r e
,

cisely that state in which alone we are warranted

in considering Al l Things ; and with du e hum il ,

ity let me here confess that for my p art I am

, , ,

at a loss to conceive ho w any o ther understand

ing of the existing condition of afi air s co uld ever
have made its way into the human brain The .

” “
tendency to collapse and the attraction of
,
”
gra vitation are conv ertible phrases In u sing .

either we speak of the reaction of the Firs t Act

,
.

Never was n ecessity less obvio us than that of sup

posing Matter imb u ed wi th an ineradicable equa l
.

i ty forming part o f its material nat ure a qual

—

ity or instinct for ever inseparable from it an d

, , ,

by dint of which inalienable principle eve ry atom

is p erp etually impelled to seek its fellow- atom .

Never was neces sity less obvious than that of

entertainin g this unphilosophical idea Going .

boldly behind the vulgar thought we h av e to ,

conceive metaphysic ally that the gravitating

, ,

principle appertains to Matter tem p or arily

only while difi used— o nly while existing as Many
instead of as O n e — appertains to it by virtue of
its state of irradiation alone— app ertain s in a ,

word altogeth er to its condition and not in the

, ,

slightest degree to itself In this view when the

.
,

irradiation shall have retu rned into its source

— wh en th e reaction sh all b e completed— the
,

gravitating principle will no longer exist An d .

,

in fact astronomers without at any time reach

, ,
1 40 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

ing the idea here suggested seem to have be en ,

“
approximating it in the assertion that if there
,

we r e b ut one body in the universe it wou ld be ,

impossible to un derstand how the principle ,

”
Gravity could ob tain z t hat is to say from a
, ,

consideration of Matter as they fin d it they ,

reach a conclusion at which I deductively arrive .

That so pregnant a suggestion as the one quoted

shou ld have been permitted to remain so long n u
fruitful is nevertheless a mystery which I fin d
, , ,

it diffi c ult to fathom .

It is perhap s in no little degree however o ur

, , ,

propensity for the continuou s— for the analog

ical in the present c as e more particul arly for
—

th e symmetrical — which has been leading us

astray An d in fact the sense of the symm et
.
, ,

r ica l 1 s an instinct whi c h may be depende upon

d
with an almost blindf old relian ce It i s the .

poetical es ence of the U niverse oi the Un i

s —

vers e which in the supremeness of its symmetry

, , ,

is b ut the mo st sublime of poems Now sym .

metry and consistency are convertible terms

thus Poetry and Truth are one A thing is con .

i
s s nte t in t h e ratio of its tru th — tru e in th e ratio
of its consistency A p erfec t con sisten cy I r e
.
,

p ea t, ca n b e n o thin g b u t an a b so lute tr uth We .

may tak e it for granted then that Man cannot , ,

long or wi dely err if h e suffer h imself to be ,

gui ded by his poetical Wh ic h I h ave maintained ,

to b e his truthf ul in being his symmetrical in , ,

stin ct H e must h ave a care h owever lest in

.
, , ,

p ursuin g too h ee dl essly th e superficial symm etry

o f fo rms and motions h e leav e out of sigh t t h e ,
 WORKS OF ED GAR ALL AN POE

were nearly un ani mo us

in the opinion th at the
cause in q uestion was fo und — that a principle
was discovered s ufficient to acco unt physi ca lly , ,

for that fin al universal agglomeration wh ich I

, ,

repeat the analogi cal symmetrical or p oetical

instinct of man had pre -
, , ,

determined to under
st nd as something more than a simple hypoth
a
es1 s .

This cause— this sufficient reason for the final

ingathering was declared to exist in an exceed
—

in gly rare b ut still material medium p ervading ,

space ; which medi um by retarding in some de

, ,

gree the progre ss of the comet perpetually

, ,

weakened its tangential force ; thus giving a pre

dominance to the centripetal ; which of course , ,

dre w the comet nearer and nearer at each r evo lu

tion and wo ul d eventually p recipi tate it up on
,

the Sun .

All this was strictly logical- admittin g the

m edi um or ether ; b ut this eth er was a ssumed,
most illogically on the ground that n o o ther
,

mode than the one spoken of co ul d be discovered ,

of accounting for the ob ser v ed decrease in the

'

orbit of the comet — as if from the fact t h at we

coul d discover no other mode of accounting for
it it f o ll o wed in an y respect that no other mode
, , ,

of acco unting for it existed It is clear that in .

numerable causes might operate in combination , ,

to diminish the orbit withou t even a possibility

,

of our ever becoming acquainted with one of

them In the meantime it has never been fairly
,

shown p erhaps why the retardation occasioned

, ,

by the skirts of the S un s atmosphere thro ugh’

,
 EUREKA 1 43

wh ich th e comet p asses at perih elion is not ,

eno ugh to account for the phaenomenon That .

Encke s comet will be ab sorbed into the Sun is

’
,

probable ; that all the comets of the system will

be absorbed is more than merely po ssible ; b ut
, ,

in such case the principle of ab sorption must be

,

referred to eccentricity or orbit— to the clo se ap

proximation to the Sun of the come ts at their ,

perih elia ; and is a principle n ot aff ecting in any ,

degree the pondero us sp her es which are to be

, ,

regarded as the tr ue material constituents of th e

U niverse To uching comets in general let m e
.
,

here suggest in passing that we cannot be far

, ,

wrong in looking upon them as th e lightning

fiashes o f the cosmica l H ea ven .

The idea of retarding ether and th ro ugh it , , ,

o f a final agglo m eration of all things seemed at ,

one time however to be confirmed by t he o b ser

, ,

vation of a positive decrease in the orbit of the

solid moon B y reference to eclipses recorded
.

2500 y ea rs ago it was fo und that the velocity of

,
’
the satellite s revolution then was considerably
less than it is n ow; that on the hypothesis that
its motion in its orbit is uniformly in accordance
with Kepler s l aw and was acc u rately deter
’
,

mined then— 25OO years ago— it is n o w in a d

vance of the position it should occ upy by nearly ,

9000 miles The increase of velocity proved of

.
,

cour se a diminution of orbit ; and a stronomers

,

were fast yielding to a belief in an eth er as the ,

sol e m o de of acco unting for the p h aenomenon ,

wh en Lagrange came to th e rescue He showed .

th at owing to the confi gu rations of the sphe

,
1 44 WORK S OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

roids the sh o rter ax es of their ellip ses are sub

,

ject to variation in length ; the longer axe s b e

ing permanent ; and that this variation is con
tin u o us and v ibratory— so that eve ry orbit is in
a state of tran sition either from circle to ellipse
, ,

or from ellip se to circle In the case of th e moon .

, ,

where th e shorte r axis is decreasing th e orbit is ,

passing from ci rcle to ellipse and consequently , , ,

is decreas ing too ; b ut after a long series of ag es

, ,

the ultimate eccentricity will be attained ; then

the shorter axis will proceed to in crease until th e ,

o rbit become s a circle ; wh en the proce ss of short

e n in g w ill again take place -

and s o on forever .

In the c as e of th e E arth the orbit is p assing ,

f rom ellip se to ci rcle ;

The facts thus demon .

s tr ated do away of cou rse with all necessity for

, ,

supp osin g an eth er and with all apprehension

,
—
of t h e system s ins tability o n the ether s ac
’ ’

It will b e remembered that I h av e myself as

s umed what we may term an ether I h ave .

s poken of a subtle influen ce which we know to be

e ver in attend ance u pon matter altho u gh b e ,

’
comi n g manifest onl y thro ugh matter s hetero
To this i witho t d r m g to
gen eity .
n fl u en c e— u a

touch it at all in any e ffort at ex pl am m g 1 ts

,

awful n atureé —I have referred th e various p has

no me n a o f electricity heat light magnetism
, , ; ,

and more— o f v itality consciousness and , ,

a ord of pirit ality It W 11 be

’

thought — in w s ,
u 1 .

en at once t h en that the ether th u s c o n ce l v ed

se , , ,

radically di t inct from t h e ether of th e as tro n ~

is s
1 46 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

whi ch M adl er s hypothesis is b ut a p ar t— th e

’

idea of the vorticial indrawing of the orbs D is .

missing this nakedly physical conception th e ,

symmetry of principle see s the end of all t h in gs

met aphysically involved in the tho ugh t of a b e
gin ning ; seeks and finds in this origin of all
things the r udim en t of this end ; and percei ves
the impiety of supposing this end likely to be
bro ugh t abo ut less simply less directly— less
,
—

obvio usly— le ss artistically — than th ro ugh the r e

ac tio n of the o rigin a tin g A ct .

Rec urring then to a previo us suggestion let

, , ,

us un der stan d the system s

‘
— let us un derstand
,
i
each star with ts attendant planets as b ut a
—

Tit anic atom existing in space with precisely the

same inclination for U nity which characteri z ed ,

in the beginning the actu al atom s after their

,

irradiation thro u gho ut the U niversal sphere As .

th es e original atoms rushed towards each other

in generally straight lines so let us conceive as
,

at least generally rectilinear the paths of the

,

system - atoms towar ds their respective centres of

aggregation — and in this d irect drawing to g eth
er o f the systems into clusters with a similar and
,

simul taneo us drawing together of the cl us ters

th emselves whil e un dergoing conso lidation we ,

N w the
'

have at length at tained the great o —

awful Present— the Existing Condition of the

U niverse .

Of the still more awful F uture a not irra tional

analogy m ay g uide us in framing an hypothe sis .

The eq uilibri um between th e centripe tal and cen

tr ifug al force s of each system being nece ssarily
,
 EUREKA 147

destroyed upon attainment of a certain p rox im

ity to the nucleus of the cluster to which it b e
longs there must occ ur at once a ch aotic or
, , ,

seemingly chaotic precipitation of the moo ns ,

upon the plane ts of the planets upon the sun s

, ,

and of the suns upon the nuclei ; and the general

resul t of th is precipitation must be the gathering
of th e myriad n ow- existing stars of the firm a
ment into an almost infinitely less number of
almost infin itely s uperior spheres In being im .

measurably fewer the worlds o f that day will be

,

immeasurably greater than o ur o wn Then ih .

,

deed amid unfathomable abysses will be glaring

, ,

unimaginabl e suns B ut all this will be me rely

.

a cl im ac ic magnificence foreboding the gre at

End Of this End the n ew genesi s described can
.
,

b e b ut a very partial postponement While n u .

der go in g consolidation the cl us ters themselves

, ,

with a spe ed prodigio usly acc um ul ative have ,

been rushing to wards their o wn general centre

an d n o w with a thous and-
,
fold electric vel oci ty ,

commensurate only with their material grande ur

and with the spiritual pas sion of t h eir appetite
for oneness th e maj estic remnants of the tribe
,

of Stars flash at length into a common embrace

, , .

T h e inevitable catastrophe is at hand .

But th is catastro phe what is it ? We hav e

—

seen accomplished the inga thering of the orbs .

Henceforward are we not to understand on e m a

,

terial g lo b e of g lo b es as constituting and compre

h ending th e U niverse ? Such a fancy would be
altogether at war with every assumption and con
sideration of thi s D isco urse .
1 48 WORKS OF EDGAR AL L AN P O E

I h ave al re a dy all uded to that ab solute r eci

p ro city of a dap ta tio n which is the idiosyncrasy
A
of the divine r t s tamping it divine U p to
— .

th i s point of our reflections we have been regard ,

ing the electrical influence as a something by dint

of whos e r ep ulsion alone Matte r is enabled to ex
ist in that state of difl usion demanded for the
fulfil ment of its p urposes so far in a word we —
, ,

have been considering the influence in qu estion

’
as ordained for Matter s sak e to s ubserve the ob

jects of matter With a perfectly legitimate rec

.

iprocity we are n ow permitt ed to look at Mat

,

ter as c reated so lely fo r the sake of this influ

,

en ce— solely to serve the objects of this spiritual

Ether Thro ugh the aid b y the mean s thro ugh
.
— —

the agency of Matter and by dint of its h etero,

g en eity is th is Ether manife sted is Spirit in

— —

dividualized It is merely in the development

.

of th is Ether thro ugh h eterogene ity that partie

, ,

ul ar mas ses of Matte r beco me an imate — sensitive

- and in the ratio of th eir h eterogeneity —some
reaching a de gree of sensitiv eness involving what
we c all Thoug ht and thus attainin g Con scious
,

I ntelligence .

In this view we are enabled to percei v e M atter

,

as a M e ans— not as an End Its p urpos es are .

thus seen to h ave been compreh ended in its dif

fusion ; an d with the return into U nity th ese p ur
poses cease T h e absolutely consolidated globe of
.

globes wo uld be o bj ec tless— therefore not for a

moment co ul d it continue to exist Matter cre .
,

ated for an end woul d un questionably on ful fil

, ,

ment of th at end be M atter no longer Let us

,
.
1 50 , WORKS OF EDG AR ALL AN P OE

ing to a certain l aw Of co urse where there are .

— w
n o p arts — where there is ab ol te U nity
s u her e
the tendency to on en ess is satisfied there can
'

be no A ttraction -this has been ful ly shown ,

and all Philosophy admits it When on f ul fil .

,

ment of its p urposes then Matter shall have r e , ,

turned into its original condition of O n e— a con

dition which presupposes the exp ul sion of th e

separative ether whose province and wh ose ca ,

p a c ity are limited to keeping the atoms apart u n

til that great day when this ether being no longer ,

needed the overwhelming pressu re of the finally

coll ective Attraction shall at length j ust sum
,

c ien tly predominate

*
and expel it -
when I say , ,

Matter finally expelling the E ther shall have

, , ,

ret urned into absol ute U nity —it will then (to ,

speak paradoxically for the moment ) be Matter

without A ttraction and witho ut Rep ulsion— in
other words Matter witho ut Matter in other
,
—

words again M a tter n o m o r e In sinking into

, , .

U nity it will sink at once into that Nothin gness

,

whi ch to all Finite Perception U nity mus t b e

, ,

into that Material Nihility from wh ich alone we

can conceive it to have been evoked to h av e been
—

cr ea ted by the Volition of Go d .

49 I repeat then— Let us endeavor to compre

,

hend that the final globe of globes will instan

tan eo usly disappear and that Go d will remain ,

all in all .

B ut are we here to pause ? Not so On the .

U niversal agglomeration and dissolution we can ,

ra v i ty t h e r e fore m us t b e th e s tro n ge st of force s

G ”

p a ge 4 2 — P a r agr a p h co m m e n ci n g N o w t o w ha t
, , .
‘
”
Se e . .
 EUREK A 1 51

readil y conceiv e that a n ew and perh ap s totally

di ff erent series of con di tions m ay en sue— ano ther t

creation and irradiation returning into its el f ,

another action and r eaction of the D ivine Will .

Guidin g o ur im a g in atio n s by that omniprevalent

/

l aw of laws the l aw of periodicity are we not

, , ,

indeed more than j u sti fi ed in entertaining a b e

,

lief let us say rather in indulging a hop e

—
, ,

that the processes we have here ventured to con

template will be renewed forever and forever , ,

and forever ; a novel U niverse swelling into ex

isten c e and then s ubsiding into nothingness at
, ,

every throb of the Heart D ivine ?

—
,

An d now this Heart D ivine what is it ? It

—

is o ur o wn .

Let not the merely seeming irreverence of th e

idea frighten o ur so uls from that cool exercise of
conscio usne ss— from that deep tranquil lity of
-
self in spec tion— thro ugh which alone we can
hope to attain the presence of this the mo st sub ,

lime o f truths and look it leisurely in the face

, .

The p h en om en a on which our concl usions

mus t at this point depend are merely spiritual ,

shadows b ut not the less thoroughly sub stantial

,
.

We walk about amid the destinies of o ur ,

-
world existence encompassed by dim b ut ever
,

present M em or ies of a D estiny more vast— very

di stant l n the b y-gone time and in finitely awful ,
.

We live o ut a Youth peculiarly h aunted by

such dreams yet never mi staking them for
dreams As Memories we kn ow them D urin g
. .

o ur Y o u th the distinction is too clear to dec eive

us even for a moment .

 WORKS
'

1 52 O F E D GAR ALL AN P O E

So long as thi s Youth endures the feeling that ,

we exist is the most natu ral of all feelings

,
We .

und erstand it tho r oug hly That there was a .

p eriod at which we did n o t exist— o r that it ,

mi g ht so have happened that we nev er h ad ex

iste d at all— are the considerations indeed which , ,

dur in g this yo uth we fin d difficulty in under

,

standing . Why we should n o t exist is up to the , ,

ep o ch of o ur M a n hoo d of all qu eries the mo st

existence— exist
,

unan swerable . Exi tence self-

s —

ence from all Time an d to all Eternity— seems ,

up to the epoc h of Manhood a normal and un ,

qu estionable co dition z seem s b eca use it is

n —
, .

B ut n ow come s the period at whi c h a con v en

t io n al Wo r l -
d Reason awakens us from the truth
of our dream D oubt S urprise and In com p r e
.
,

hen sib il ity arri v e at the same moment They .

“
say — Y o u live a n d the tim e was when you
‘

r
,

lived not Y o u have been created An In telli

. .
«

gence ex ists greater than your own ; and it is

”
only thro u gh this In telligence you live at all .

Thes e th ings we stru ggle to c omprehend and can

not -can n o t because these thin gs being untrue
, , ,

are thus of necessity incomprehens ible

, ,
.

No thinking being lives who at some l uminous ,

po int of his life of thou ght has not felt himself ,

lost amid the surges of futile e ff orts at under

standing or believing that anything exists ,

t th n his o w n so ul The u tter im p ossi

g re a er a .

’
b il ity of any one s so ul feeling it self inferior to
another ; the intense overwhelming dissatisfac
,

tion and rebellion at the tho ght u — these with the ,

1 54 WORK S OF E D GAR ALLAN POE

solutely in finite sp "

It was not and is n ot
ace f
in the power of this Being— any more than it is
in yo ur own — to extend by actual increase the , ,

j oy of his Existence ; b ut j ust as it is in your

power to expand or to con centrate your pleas
ure s (the absolute amo unt of h appines s remain
ing always the same ) so did and does a simi lar
capability appertain to this D ivine B eing who ,

thus passes his Eternity in perpetual variation of

Concentrated Self and almo st Infinite Self- D if
fusion What you call The U niverse is b ut his
.

pr esent expansive existence He now feels his .

life thro ugh an in fin ity of imperfect pleasures

’

'

the partial and pain- intertangled pleasu re s of

tho se inconceivably numerous things which you
design ate as his creatures b ut which are re ally ,
.

b ut in finite individuali zations of Himsel f Al l .

these creatures — a ll— those which you term ani

mate as well as those to whom you deny life for
,

no better reason than that yo u do not behold it

in operation— a ll these creatures have in a ,

greater or less degree a capacity for pleasure

,

and for pain —b ut the g en eral sum of their sen ~

sa tio n s is p r ecisely tha t a mo un t of H app in ess

which ap p er tain s b y r ig ht to the D ivin e B ein g
when co n c en tra ted within H ims elf Thes e crea .

tures are all too , more or less co nscio us In telli

conscio
g en ces
; us fi rst of a proper identity ;
, ,

conscious secondly and b y f ain t indetermin ate

, ,

glimp ses of an identity with the D ivine Being of

,

w hom we speak— o f an identity with Go d Of .

See p ag es 1 1 0 an d 1 1 1 — P a r a gr ap h co mm en cin g I e r ply

th a t the ri ght a nd e n di n g p rop er a nd par tic ula r
,
‘‘
Go d
”
.
 E U R E KA 1 55

the two classes of conscio usness fancy that the

,

former will grow weaker the latter stronger

, ,

during the long succession of ages wh ic h must

elapse before these myriads of individu al In telli
g en ces become blended when the bright star s
—

become blended — into O n e .Think that the

sense of individual identity will be grad ually
merged in the general conscio usness— that Man ,

for example ceasing imperceptibly to feel him

,

self Man will at l e ngth attain that awfully tri

,

um phan t epoch when h e shall recogni se his exist

ence as that of Jehovah . In the meantime bear
in mind that all is Life— Life— Life within Life
—the less with in the greater and all withi n th e
,

Spirit Divin e .
 TH E PO WE R OF WORDS

"Pub l ished in the D emo cr a tic Review, Jun e,

Gin os Pardon Agathos the weakness of 8

a
—

Spirit n ew- fl edg ed with immortality "

.
, ,

Ag o tho s — Y o u h ave spoken nothin g

. my ,

O in es for which pardon is to be demand ed Not

, .

even here is kn owledge a thing of intuition For .

Wisdom ask of th e angels freely that it m ay be

, ,

0 in o s —B ut in thi s ex istence , I dreamed that

.

I shoul d be at once cogn izant of all thi n gs , and

thus a t once happy in being cogni z ant of all .

Ag a thos — Ah, not in knowledge is happiness ,

"
.

b ut in the acquisitio n of k nowledge In for ever

k nowing , we are for ever blessed ; b ut to k n ow
all , were the c urse of a fi end .

O i — B
ut does not The Most High know
'
n o s .

all ?
Ag a thbs ( ince he is The Most Happy )
.
— Tha t s r

must be still the o n e thing unknown even to

H IM .

Gin os — B ut, since we grow ho urly in knowl

.
'

edg e m ust not a t la st all things be kn o wn ?

,

Aga tho s — Look down int o the abysmal dis

tan ces —
attempt to force th e gaze down the m ul
156
1 58 WORKS OF E D GAR ALL AN POE

The seeming creature s which are n ow thro ugh ,

o ut the u niverse so perpetually springing into

,

being can only be considered as the m ediate or

,

indirect not as the direct or immediate resul ts

,

of the D ivine creative power .

0 in o s — Among men my A gathos this idea

.
, ,

would be considered heretical in the extreme .

Ag a thos — Among angels my O in os it is seen

.
, ,

to be simply true .

0 in o s — I can comprehend yo u thus far — that

'

m
.

certa in operations of what we term Nature or ,

the natural laws will under certain conditions

, , ,

give rise to that which has all the app ea ran ce

of creation Shortly before the final ov erthrow
.

of the earth there were I well remember many

, , ,

very successful experiments in what some phi

lo so p her s were weak eno ugh to denominate the
creation of animalcul ae .

Ag a tho s — The cases of which yo u speak w ere

.
,

in fact in tances of the secondary creation and

s ,
—

of the o n ly species of creation which has ever

b een since the first word spoke into existence the
,

fi rst law .

0 in os —Ar e not the starry worl ds that from

.
,

the abyss of nonentity b urst ho urly forth into ,

the heavens— are not these stars Agathos the , ,

im m ediate han diwo r k of the King ?

Ag a tho s —Let me endeavor my O in o s to l ead
.
, ,

yo u step by step to the conception I intend

, ,
.

Y o u are well aware that as no tho u gh t can per ,

ish so no act is withou t in fin ite resul t We

‘

.
,

moved o ur h ands for example when we were , ,

dwellers on the earth an d in so doing we gave , , ,

 TH E POWE R O F WORD S 1 59

vib r a tion to the atmosphere which engirdled it .

This vibration was indefinitely extended till it ,

’
gave i m p ulse to every p article of the earth s air ,

which thenceforward an d fo r ever was actuated

, ,

by the one movement of the hand This fact the .

m athematicians of o ur globe well kne w They .

made the sp ecial e ffects indeed wro ught in the , ,

fluid by special imp ulse s the subject of exact ,

calc ulation— so that it became easy to determine

in what precise period an imp ulse of given extent
w o ul d engirdle the orb and impress (for ever ) ,

every atom of the atmosphere circ umambient .

Retrogra di ng they fo und no diffic ul ty from a

, ,

given e ffect un der given conditions in determ in

, ,

ing the value of the original imp ul se No w the .

mathematicians who saw that the resul ts of a n y

given imp ulse were absolutely endless— and who
saw that a portion of these results were accurate
ly traceable thro ugh the agency of algebraic
analysis— who saw too the facility of the retro
, ,

gradation these men saw at the same time tha t

—
, ,

this sp ecies of analysis itself had within itself a ,

fi
cap acity for inde nite progress that there were
—

no bounds concei vable to its advancement and

applicability except within the intellect o f him
,

who advance d or applied it B ut at this po int .

o ur mathematicians p a u sed .

Gi n os .
-An d why A gathos sho uld they h ave
, ,

proceeded ?
Ag a thos —B ecause there were some considera
.

tions of deep interest beyond It was ded ucible

,
.

from what they knew that to a being of infin ite

,

understanding— one to wh om the p erf ec tio n of

 '

1 60 woa x s or E D GAR AL LAN r on

th e al gebraic analysi s lay un folded— there coul d

be no diffic ul ty in tracing every imp ulse given
the air— an d the ether throu gh the a ir— to the x

remotest con sequences at any even infinitel y r e

mote epoch o f time It is indeed demonstrabl e
.

that every such imp ulse given the a ir must in , ,

the en d impress every individu al thing tha t ex

.
;

ists within the un iv er se — and the being of in fi

‘

nite understanding— the being wh om we have

imagined might trace the remote undulations
—

of the imp ul se— trace them u pward and onward

in their influences upon all par ticles of all matter
— upward and on
ward for ever in their m o dific a
tions of old forms— o r in other words in their
'

, ,

c r ea tion of n ew —
until he found them r eflected
un impressive a t la st— back from the throne of
'

the Godhead An d not o nly could such a b eing

.

do th is b ut at any epoch shoul d a given resul t

, ,
,

be a ff orded him— shoul d one of these num berless

comets for example be presented to his insp ec
, ,

tion— he could have no diffic ul ty in determining ,

by the analytic retrogradation to what original ,

imp uls e was due This power of retrogradation

.

in its absol ute fulne ss and perfection thi s f acul

—

ty of referring at a ll epoch s a ll e ffects to a ll ,

causes— is of course the prerogative of the D eity

alone— b ut in every variety of degree sh ort of ,

the absol ute perfection is the power itself ex er

,

c ised by the whole host of the Angelic In tell i

gene ss.

0 in os — B ut yo u speak merely of imp ul ses

.

upon the air .

Ag a thos — In sp eaking of the air I referred

.
,
THE CO LLO "
U Y OF M ONOS AND U NA

"Pub l ished in Gr a ha m ’
s M a gazine , August,

o oc l es—
S ph An tia
These th in g s a re i n the futur e .

Un a . Born again ?
M on es — Y es, fair est and b est beloved U n a,
”
born again . Th ese were th e words upo n
whose mystical meaning I h ad so long ponde red ,

rej ecting the explanations of the p ri esthoo d un ,

til D eath himself resol ved for me the secret .

U n a
.
— D eath .

M o n os — H ow strangely sweet U n a yo u ech o

my words "I observe too a vacillation in yo ur
.
, ,

, ,

step— a j oyo u s inquietude m yo ur eye s Y o u are .

confused and oppressed by the maj estic n ove lty

of the Life Eternal Y es it was of D eath I sp oke
.
,
.

An d her eho w singularly soun ds that word which

of old was wont to bring terror to all h earts
throwing a mildew upon all plea sures "
Un a — Ah D eath the spectre wh i ch sate at all
, ,

feasts H o w often Monos did we lose o urselve s

in sp eculations upon its natur e "How mysteri
, ,

1 62
 COLLO Q U Y OF MONO S -
AND U NA 1 03

o usly did it act as a check to human bliss say —

ing unto it thus far and no farther " That

“
,
”

e arnest mutual love my o wn Monos wh ich

, ,

b urned within o ur bosoms— ho w vainl y did we

flatter o urselves feeling happy in its firs t up
,

springing that o ur happiness wo ul d strengthen

with its strength "Alas "as it grew so grew in
,

o u r hearts the dread of tha t evil ho u r which was

hurrying to separate u s forever "Th us in time , ,

it became p ainful to love Hate wo uld have been

.

mercy then .

fl M an es — Speak not here of these griefs dear

U n a mine mine forever n o w "
,
—
,

U n a — B ut the memory of pa st so rro w is it

—

not p resent joy ? I have much to say yet of the

things which have been Abov e all I b u rn to.
,

know the incidents of yo ur own passage thro ugh

the dark Valley and Shadow .

M an e s — An d wh en did th e radiant U n a ask

anythin g of her Mon os in vain ? I will be min ute
in relating all— b ut at wh at p o in t sh all th e weird
narrative begin ?
Una — At what po int ?
M o nos
.
—Y o u have s aid .

Un a — Monos I compreh end yo u In Death

, .

we h ave both learned the propensity of man to

defin e the in defin ab le I will not say then com
.
, ,
’
mence with th e moment of life s cessation— b ut
comm en ce with th at sa d sad insta nt when th e, ,

fever having abandoned you you sank into a ,

breathl ess and motionl ess torpor and I pressed ,

down yo ur pallid eyelids with th e p assionate fin

gers o f love .
1 64 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

M om s — One word first my U n a in regard to

, ,

man s general condition at thi s epoch Y o u will

’

'
.

remem b er that one o r two of the wis e among o ur

forefathers —w1 se in fact althou gh not in the,

world s esteem had ventur ed to doubt th e pro

’
—
“
p ety of the term
r i improvement as applied to ,

the progress of o ur civiliz ation There were p e .

r iods in each of the fiv e or six centuries 1 mm edi

ately preceding o u r dissol ution when arose some ,

vigoro us intellect boldly contending for those

,

principles whose t ruth appears n ow to o ur disen

'

franchised reason so utterly obvio us— principles

which sho ul d have taught o u1 race to submi t to
the guidance of the natura l laws rather than at ,

tempt their control At long intervals some mas

.

ter- mi nds appeared looking upon each advance

,

in practical science as a retro - g r a datl o n 1 n the

true utility Occasionally the poetic intellect
.

that intellect which we now feel to have been the

mo st exalted of all— s ince those truths which to
us were of th e most enduring importance o

c o ul d only be reached by that a n a log y which

speaks in proof- tones to the imagination alone ,

and to the unaided reason bears no weight

—occasionally did this poetic intellect proceed a

step farther l n the evolving of the vagu e ide a of

the philosophic and fin d i n the mystic parable
,

that tells of the tree of knowledge and of its for ,

bidden fruit death -

,
produc ing a distinct intima ,

tion that knowledge was not meet for man in the

infant condition of his soul An d these men .

the poets— l iving and perishing amid the scorn of

“
the utilitarians — o f ro ugh p edants who arro
’
,
1 66 WORKS OF ED GAR AL L AN POE

necessaril y from the leading evil Knowledge , .

Man co uld not both know and succ umb Me an .

time h uge smoking cities aro se innumerable ,

.

Green leaves shrank before the hot breath of fur

n aces The fair face of Nature was deformed as
.

with the ravages of some loathsome disease An d .

methinks sweet U n a even bur slumbering sense

, ,

-
of the forced and of the far fe tched might have
arrested us here B ut n ow it appears that wehad
.

worked out our own destru ction in the perversion

of o ur taste or rather in the blind neglect of its
,

c ulture in the scho ols For in truth it was at .

, ,

this crisi s that taste alone— that faculty which ,

holding a middl e po sition between the p ure intel

lect and the moral sense co uld never safely have ,

been disregarded— it was n ow that taste alone

coul d hav e led us gently back to B eauty to Na ,

ture and to Life B ut ala s for the p ure contem

p l ative spirit and majestic intuition of Plato "
.
,

Al as for the p ovo ucvj which h e j ustly regarded

-
as an all suffic ien t education for the so ul "Al as

for him and for it — sin ce both were mo st des

p e r a tely needed w h en both were m os t entirely
forgotten or
I t will b e har d to d iscover a b e tter " method o f ed uc a ti o n"
th an th a t wh ic h the exp e ri en c e of so m an y a ges has a l re ady
di sc ove re d ; a n d th i s ma y b e s umm ed up a s co n s i s ti n g in
gy m n as t ics fo r the body a n d musi c for the so ul — Rep ub lib
.

Fo r th i s r e a s o n i s a m us ic a l ed uc a t io n m o s t e ss en tia l ;
. . .

2.

s in ce i t c a u s es R h y th m a n d H a r m o n y t o P e n e t ra t e m o st i n
t im ate l y i n to the s o ul t a ki n g th e s t ro n g es t h old up o n i t fi ll
i n g i t with b ea uty a n d m a ki n g th e m an b ea uti fu l -
, ,

m i nd ed
H e will pr a i se a n d a d m ir e th e b ea utifu l ; will r e
.

ce iv e i t wi th j o y i n t o h is s o ul will f eed upo n i t a n d ass im i

,

l a te h is own co nd i ti on wi th i t I bid lib 3 Mus ic (u

,
” —
i) o v c nx r
h a d h ow e v e r a m o n g th e A th e n i a n s a f a r m ore co m pr e h e n si v e
. . . .

s i gn i fi c a t io n th a n wi th us I t in cl ud ed no t o n ly th e h a r m o n i es
, , ,

.
 COLLO Q U Y OF M O N O S AND U NA 1 67

Pascal a philosopher whom we both lo v e has

, ,

s aid ho w trul y q ue to ut n o tr e r aiso n n em en t

‘
,

se r é dm t a ceder a n s en tim en t;
’
’

and it is not
impossible that the sentiment of the natural had
t i me permitted it w
,

o uld have regained its old ,

a scendancy over the harsh mathematical reason

of the schools B ut this thing was not to be . .

Prematurely induced by intemperance of knowl

edge the old age o f the world drew on This
,
.

the mass of mankind saw not or living lustily , ,

althou gh unhappily afi ected not to see B ut , .

,
’
for myself the E arth s records had taught me to ,

look for widest ru in as the price of highest ci vil

iz atio n I had imbibed a prescience of our Fate
.

from comparison of China the simple and endur

in g with A ssyria the architect with E gypt the
, ,

astrologer with Nubia more crafty than either , , ,

the turb ulent mother of all Arts In hi story ? .

of these regions I met with a ray from the

F uture The indi vidual ar tificialities of the
.

three latter were local diseas es of the E arth and ,

in their individu al overthrows we had seen l o cal

remedies applied ; b ut for the infected world at
large I could anticipate no regeneration save in
death That man as a race should not become
.
, ,
“
b o r n ag ain
’
e x tinct I s aw that he must be .
,

An d n ow it was fairest and dearest that we , ,

wrapped o ur spirits daily in dreams No w it , ,

.

o rti m e a n d of t un e b ut the po et ic dict io n sen t i m e n t a n d

cr e a tio n e a c h in i ts wid e s t se n se T he s tudy of m usic wa s
, ,

wi th t h e m in fa ct the g en e r a l c ul t i v a t io n of th e t a s te -
.
,

o£
th a t w h ic h re cogn i ze s the be a ut iful— i n co n tra - d i s tinct io n
, ,

f ro m r e a son wh ic h d ea l s o n ly wit h th e t ru e
, .
“

1 h i s to ry t o con t em p l at e
”
f ro m i p t , a ro s v, .
1 68
‘

WORKS OF ED GAR AL L AN POE

was that in twilight we di scou rsed of the days

, ,

to come when the Ar t- , scarred s urface of the

E arth having undergone that p ur ificatio n
,
*

which alone coul d efi ace its rectangul ar ob sc en

ities shoul d clothe itself anew in the verdure and
,

u n -
the mo ntai slopes and the smiling waters of
Paradise and be rendered at length a fit
,
-
dwelling place for man — for man the D eath
—L -
p u rged for man to whose now exalted intellect
there shoul d be poison in knowledge no more
for the redeemed regenerated b lissful and n ow ,

immortal b ut still for the m ateria l man

, , ,

, , .

Una — Well do I remember these conversa

. ~

tions dear Monos ; b ut the epoch of the fi ery

,

overthrow was not so near at h and as we b e

liev ed and as the corru ption yo u in di cate di d
,

su rely warrant u s in believi ng Men lived ; and .

died individu ally Y ou you rself sickened and .

,

p assed into the grave ; and thither your constant

U n a speedily followed yo u An d tho ugh the .

century which has since elapsed and who e con ,

s

elusion brings us thu s together once more tor ,

tu r ed our slum bering senses with no impatience

of du ration yet my Mono s it was a centu ry still
, , ,
.

M an es — Say , rather a point in the vagu e in ,

’
fin ity U nqu estionably it was in the E arth s
‘

.
,

dotage that I died Wearied at heart with .

anxieties which had their origin in the general

turmoil and dec ay I succumbed to the fi erce
'

fever After some few days of pain and many

.
,

of dreamy deliri um replete with ecstasy the ,

The word c
p uri fi a ti n o s ee m s h e re t o b e use d wi th r efer
e n c e t o i ts r oo t in th e G e e r k m p, fi re .
 wo nx s
“

1 70 or ED GAR ALLAN P OE

which fell upon

the external retina or into the ,

corner of the eye producing a more vivid e ff ect ,

than those which stru ck the front or interior s ur

face Yet in the former i n stance this efi ect
.
, ,

was so far anomalo us that I appreciat ed it only

as s o un d so und sweet or discordant as the mat
—

ters presenting thems elves at my side were light

or dark in shade— c urved or ang ular in o utline .

The hearing at the same time although excited

, ,

in degree was not irregular in action— estim at

,

ing real sounds with an extravagance of pre

c isio n not less than of sensibility Touch had
, .

u ndergone a modi fication more pec uliar Its .

i mpression s were tardily received b ut p er tin a ,

c io us ly retained and resulted always in the

,

highest physical pleasure Thus the pressure of .

you r sweet fingers upon my eyelids at fi rst only ,

recognised throu gh vision at length long after , ,

their remov al filled my whole being with a sen

,

su al delight immeas u rable I say with a sensual .

‘

deligh t A ll my p erceptions were p u rely sen

.

su al . The materials f urnished the p assive brain

by the senses were not in the leas t degree
wro ught into shape by the deceased understand
ing O f p ain there was some little ; of pleasure
.

there was much ; b ut of moral pain or pleasure

none at all Thus your wild sobs floated into
.

my ear with all their mournfu l cadences and ,

were appreciated in their every variation of sad

tone ; b ut they were soft musical sounds an d
no more ; they conveyed to the extinct reason
no intimation of the sorrows which gave them
birth ; while the large and constant tears which
 C OLLO Q U Y OF M O NO S AND U NA 1 71

fell upon my face telling the bystan ders of a

,

h eart whi ch broke thrilled every fibre of my

,

frame with ecstasy alone An d this was in tru th .

the D ea th of which these bystanders spoke rever

-
ently in low whispers you sweet U n a gasp , ,
,

in gly with l ou d crie s

,
.

They attired me for th e c offin — three or fo ur

dark fi gures which fl itted b usily to and fro As .

these crossed the di rect line of my vision they

affected me as fo rms ; b ut upon passing to my
side their image s impress ed me with the idea
of shrieks groans and other di smal expressions
, ,

of terror of h orror or of woe Y ou alone hab

, ,
.
,

ited in a wh ite robe p as sed in all directio n s m usi

,

cally about me .

The day waned ; and as its ligh t faded away, ,

I bec ame po ssessed by a v agu e un easines s— en s

anxiety such as th e sleeper feels when sad real

so unds fall continuously within his ear— low dis
tant bell -to nes solemn at long b ut equ al in ter
, ,

vals and co m mingling with melancholy dreams

,
.

Night arrived ; and with its shadows a heavy dis

comfort It oppressed my limbs with the o p
.

pression of some dull weight and was palpable ,

.

There was also a moaning so und not unlike the ,

distant reverberation of su rf b ut more continu ,

o us which beginning with the fi rst twilight had

, , ,

gro wn in strength with the darkness S uddenly .

lights were bro ught into the roo m and this r e ,

v erberation became forthwith interrupted into

frequ ent unequ al bursts of the same sound b ut ,

less dreary and less distinct The ponderou s o p .

pres sion was in a great measure relieved ; and ,

1 72 wo n x s or ED GAR ALLAN P OE

issu in g from the flame of each lamp (for there ,

were many ) there flowe d u nbrokenly into my

,

ears a strain of melodious monotone An d when .

n o w clear U n a approaching the bed u pon which

, ,

I lay outstretched you sat gently by my side , ,

breathing o dor from your sweet lips and pre ss ,

in g them u pon my brow there arose tremulo u sly ,

within my bosom and mingling with the merely

,

physical sensations which circumstances had

called forth a something akin to sentiment itself
,
—a feeling that half appreciating half r e
, ,

sp o nded to yo ur earn est love and sorrow ; b ut

this feeling took no root in the p ulseles s heart ,

and seemed indeed rather a shadow than a real

ity and faded quickly away first into extreme
, ,

qui escence and then into a p urely sensu al pleas

,

u r e as before .

An d n ow from the wreck and the chaos of

,

the us u al senses there appeared to have arisen

,

within me a sixth all perfect In its exercise ,

.

I found a wild delight yet a delight still phys

—

ical inasmu ch as the understanding h ad in it

,

no part Motion in the animal frame had full y

.

ce ased No muscl e qu ivered ; no nerve thrill ed ;

.

no artery throbbed B ut there seemed to have .

sprung u p in the brain tha t of which n o words ,

coul d convey to the merely human intelligence

even an indistinct conception Let me term it .

a mental p endul ous p ulsation It was the moral .

x

embodiment of man s abstract idea of Tim e By ’

.

the ab so lute eq uali ation of this movement o r

z —

of such as this— had the cycles of the firm am en t

a" orbs themselves been adj usted B y its aid, .
1 74 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN P O E

an d in the one abiding sentiment of duration .

The mortal body had been at length stricken with

the hand of the dea dl y D ecay .

Yet had not all of sentience departed ; fo1

the consciousness and the sentiment remaining
supplied some of its fun ct ions by a lethargic in
tuition I appr eciated the direful change n o w
.

in operation upon the flesh and as the dreamer , ,

is sometimes aware of the bodily presence of

one who leans over him so sweet U n a I still , , ,

dul ly felt that yo u sat by my side So too when .

, ,

the n o on of the se cond day came I was not un ,

conscious o c those movements which displaced

‘
’

yo u from my side which confined me within the ,

coffin which deposited me within the h earse

, ,

which bore me to the gr ave which lower ed me ,

‘

within it which heaped heavily the mould upon

,

me and which thu s left me in blacknes s and cor

, ,

ruption to my sad and solemn slumbers with

,

the worm .

An d here in the prison - house which has f evs

,

s ecrets to disclose there rolled away days and ,

week s and months ; and the so ul watched nar

r owly each second as it fl ew and withou t efi o rt , , ,

took record of its flight without eff ort and with

—

o ut obj ect .

A year passed
,
The consciousness of b ein g
.

h ad grown hou rly more indistinct and that of ,

mere lo ca lity had in great measure usurped its

, ,

position The idea of entity was becoming

.

merged m that of p la ce The narrow space im .

mediately surrounding what h ad been the body ,

was n ow growing to be th e body itself At .

 C OLLO Q U Y o r MONO S A ND U NA 1 75

l ength, as often happens to the sleeper (by sleep

and its world alone is D ea th imaged )— at len gt h ,

as sometimes happened on Earth to the deep

slumberer when some fi tting light half startled
,

him into awaking yet left him half enveloped

,
,

in dreams— so to me in the strict embrace of the

,

Sha do w came tha t light which alone might have

,

had power to startle— the light of enduring Lo ve .

Men toiled at the grave in which I lay darkling .

They upthrew the damp earth U pon my mould .

ering bones there descended the coffin of U n a .

An d n ow again all was void That nebul ou s .

light had been extinguished That feeble thrill .

had vibrated itself into quiescence Many lustra .

had superven ed D ust had retu rned to dust The

. .

worm had fo od no more The sense of being had

.

at length utterly departed and there reigned in

,

its stead instead of all things— dominant and

—

p erp etual— the a utocrats P la ce and Tim e For .

tha t which was n o t— for that which had no form

—
for that which had no thought— for that which
had no sentienc e — f o r that which was soull e ss ,

yet of which matter formed no portion for all

—

this nothingness yet for all thi s immortality the

, ,

grave was still a home and the corrosive ho urs

, .

co-mates .
THE CONV E RSATION o r EIROS AND
CHARM ION

h
" Pub lished in B ur to n
er ,
’
s Gen tlem a n ’
s M a gazi n e, D ecem

IIiip 0 0 1. a
p oo o iow '

I wi ll b r in g fi re to th e e .

E uripi des— And re w .

E IR O S .

WH Y do yo u call me Eiros ?
CH ARM IO N .

So henceforward will you always be called .

Y o u mu st forget too m y earthl y name and

, , .

speak to me as Charmion .

E IRO S .

This is indeed no dream "

CH ARM IO N .

D reams are with u s no more b ut of these —

mysterie s anon I rejoice to see you looking

'

life -
like and rational The film o f the shad ow
.

has already p assed from o ff yo ur eyes B e of .

1 76
1 78 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN PO E

CHARM IO N .

Grapple not n ow
with such thoughts To .
~

morrow we will speak of this Your mind wa .

vers and its agitation will fin d relief in the ex

,

e r c ise of simple memories Look not aro und .

,

nor forward — b
ut back I am b urning with
.

anxiety to hear the details of that stupendous

event which threw you among us Tell me of it . .

Let us converse of familiar things in the old ,

familiar langu age of the world which has so fear

fully perished .

E IRO S .

Most fearfully fearfully ,

-
this is indeed no
dream .

CH ARM IO N .

D reams are no more . Was I muc h mourned ,

my E 1 ros ?

E IRO S .

Mou rned ,
oh deeply
Charmion 3 To that
‘
— .

last ho ur of all there hung a cloud of intense

,

gloo m and devout sorrow over your household .

CHARM ION .

And that last hour speak of it Remember

— .

that beyond the naked fact of the catastrophe

,

itself, I-know nothin g When coming o ut from

.
,

among mankind I passed into Night thro ugh the

,

G rave — at that period if I remember aright the

, ,

calamity which overwhelmed yo u was utterly

 E IRO S A ND CH ARM I O N 1 79

unan ticipated . B ut,

indeed I knew little of , the
spec ulative ph i losophy of the day .

E IRO S .

The individual cal amity was as you say en , ,

tirely un anticipated ; b ut anal ogo us misfort unes

had b een long a subject of disc ussion with as
tro n o m ers I need scarce tell you my friend
.
, ,

that even when you left us men had agreed to

, ,

understand those passages in the most holy writ

ings which speak of the final destru ction of all
things by fir e as having reference to the orb of
,

the earth alone B ut in regard to the imm edi

.

ate agency of the ruin specul ation had been at

,

fault from that epoc h in astronomical k n owledge

in which the comets were divested of the terrors
of flame The v ery moderate density of these
.

bodies had been well established They had .

b een observed to pass among the satellites of

Jupit er witho ut bringing abo ut any sensible al
,

ter ation either in the masses or in the orbits of

the se secondary planets We had long regarded
the wanderers as vapory creations of in con c eiv
.

able ten uity and as altogether incapable of do

,

ing inj ury to o ur substantial globe even in the ,

event of contact B ut contact was not in any

.

degree dreaded ; for the elements of all the

com ets were acc urately known That among .

them we shou ld look for the agency of the threat

ened fiery destruction had been for many years
con sidered an i n admissible idea B ut wonders .

and w ild fancies had be en of late days strangely

. .

rife among mankind ; and altho ugh it was only ,

1 80 WORKS OF ED GAR AL L AN POE

with a f ew of the ignorant that actual app r ehen

sion prevailed upon the anno uncement by as
,

tr o n o m ers of a n ew comet yet thi s anno uncement

,

was generally received with I know not what of

agitation and mistrust .

The elements of the strange orb were imm edi

ately calc ulated and it was at o nce conceded by
,

all ob servers that its path at perih elion would

, , ,

bring it into very close proximity with the earth .

T h ere were two or three astronomers of second ,

ary note who resolutely maintained that a con

,

tact was inevitable I can not very well express

.

to yo u the e ff ect of this intelligence upon the

people For a f ew short days they would not
.

believe an ass ertion which their intellect so long ,

employed among worldly considerations could ,

not in any m ann er grasp B ut the truth of a .

vitally importan t fact soon makes its way into

the understanding of even the most stolid Fin .

ally all men saw that astronomical k nowledge

,

l ied not and they awaited the comet Its a p

,
.

proach was not, at fi rst seemingly rapid ; nor ,

was its appearance of very un usual character .

It was of a dul l red and had little perceptible

,

train For seven or eight days we saw no ma

ter ial 1 n cr ease in its apparent diameter and b ut ,

a p artial alteration in its color Meantime the .

,

ordinary a ffairs of men were discarded and all ,

interests ab sorbed m a growing di scussion insti ,

tuted by the philosophic in re spect to the come

,

tary nature Even the gro ssly ignorant aroused

.

th eir sluggish capacities to such considerations .

T h e learned n ow gave their intellect— their so ul

1 82 WORK S OF ED GA R ALL AN r O E

hurled perstition from her throne

su T he .

feeblest intellect had derived vigor from ex ces

sive interest .

What minor evils might arise from th e contact

were points of elaborate question The learned .

spoke of slight geological distu rb a nces of prob ,

able alterations in cl imate and consequ ently in ,

vegetation ; of possible magnetic and electric ih

fl uen ces Many held that no visible or p erc ep ti
.

ble e ff ect would in any manner be produced .

Wh ile such discussions were going on their sub ,

j cet gradu ally approached growing larger in ap ,

parent diameter and of a more brilliant lustre

,
.

Mank ind grew paler as it came All human .

operations were suspended .

There was an epoch in the co urse of the gen

eral sentiment when the comet had attained at ,

len gth a si ze s urpassing that of any previously

,

recorded visitation The people n ow dismi ss ing

.
,

any lin gering hope that the astronomers were

wrong experienced all the certainty of e vil
,
.

The chimerical aspect of their terror was gone .

The h earts of the stoutest of our race bea t vio

l en tly within their bosoms A very f ew days .

sufli c ed h owever to merge even such feelings

, ,

in sentiments more unendu rable We could no .

longer apply to the strange orb any a ccusto m ed

thou ghts Its histo rical attrib utes had disap
.

pe e red It oppress ed us with a hideo us n ov elty

.

of emotion We saw it not as an astronomical

.

phenomenon in the heavens b ut as an inc ub us ,

u pon o u r h earts and a shadow u pon o ur brains

,
.

It had t aken with inconceivable rapidi ty the

, ,
 E I RO S AND CH ARM I O N 1 83

character of a gigantic mantle of rare flame ex ,

tendi ng from hori z on to hori z on .

Yet a day and men breathed with greater

,
”

free dom . It was clear that we were already

within the influ ence of the comet ; yet we lived .

We even felt an unusual elasticity of frame and

vivacity of mind The exceeding tenuity of the
.

object of our dread was apparent ; for all

he avenly Obj ects were plainly visible thro ugh it .

Meantime our v egetat i on had perceptibly al

,

ter ed ; and we gained faith from this predicted ,

circumstance in the foresight of the wise

,
A .

wild l uxu riance of foliage utterly unknown b e

,

fore b u rst o ut upon every vegetable thing

,
.

-
Yet another day and the evil was not alto (

gether up On us It was n ow evident that its

.

nu cl eus would fi rst reach us A wild change had

.

come over all men ; and the fi rst sense of pain

was the wild signal for general lamentation and
horror This first sense of pain lay in a rigorous
.

constriction of the breast and lungs and an in ,

suffe rab le dryness of the skin It could not be .

denied that o ur atmosphere was radically af

fected ; the conformation of this atmosphere and
the possible modifications to which it might be
subj ected were now the topi c s of disc ussion
‘

.
,

The result of investigation sent an electric thrill

of the intensest terror thro ugh the univ ersal
heart of man .

It had been long known that the air which en

cir cl ed us was a compo und of oxygen and nitro
g en ga s es in,
the proportion of twenty -
one meas '

ures of oxygen and seventy- ,

nine of nitrogen in ,
181 WORKS OF ED GAR ALL AN POE

every one hun dred of the atmo sphere Oxygen .

,

which was the principle of comb ustion and the ,

vehicle of heat was absolutely necessary to the

,

support of animal life and was the most power ,

f ul and energetic agent in nat u re Nitrogen on .

,

the contrary was incapable of sup po rtin g either

'

animal life or flame An unnatural excess of .

o xygen wo u ld res ult it had been ascertained in

, ,

j ust such an elevation of th e animal spirits as we

had latterly experienced It was the p urs uit .
,

the extension of the idea whic h had engendered ,

awe What would be the result of a to ta l ex tra c

.

tio n of the n itr og en ? A comb ustion irresistible ,

all- devo uring omni- prevalent immediate ;— the

, ,

entire fulfilment in all their minute and terrible

,

l fi -
de tai s of the ery and horror inspiring denun
,

c iatio n s of the prophecies of the Holy Book .

Why need I paint Charmion the n ew disen , ,

c hained fren z y of mankind ? That tenu ity in

the comet which had previo usly inspired us with
hope was n ow the sou rce of the bitterness of de
,

s pair In its impalpable ga seo us character we

.

clearly p erceived the consummation of Fate .

Meantime a day again passed bearing away

—

with it the last shadow of Hop e We gasped in .

the rapid modification of the air The red blood .

bounded t umultuously through its strict chan

nels .A furio us delirium possessed all men ;
and with arms rigidly o utstretched towards the
,

threatening heavens they trembled and shrieked,

alou d B ut the nucleus of the destroyer was n ow

.

up on u s —even here in Aidenn I shudder while ,

I speak Let me be brief b rief as the ruin that

.
—
 THE PHILO SO PHY OF FU RNITURE
"

" Pu b l ished in Bu r to n
1 8 4 04
’
s Ge ntlem a n ’
s M a gaz in e, M ay,

IN th e internal decoration if not in the ex; ,

ternal architecture of th eir residences the E n g ,

lish are supreme T h e Italians have b ut l ittle

.

sentiment beyond marbles and colors In .

France m elio ra p r ob an t, deterior a sequun tur

,
m

-
the p eople are too much a race of gad abo uts to
maintain these bea utiful proprieties of whi ch ,

indeed they h ave a delicate a ppreciation or at

, ,

least th e elements of a proper sense The Chi .

nese and most of th e E a stern races hav e a warm

b ut inappropriate fancy The Scotch are p o o r
.

deco r ists The D utc h have perh ap s an inde

.
, ,

terminate idea that a cu rtain is not a cabbage .

In Spain they are a ll c urtains a nation of hang

—

men The Russians do not furni sh The H ot

.
_
.

ten to ts and Kickapoo s are very well in their way .

The Yankees alone are preposterous .

How th i s happens it is not diffic ul t to see

,
.

We h ave no aristocracy of blood and h a ving ,

th erefore as a natural and indeed as an in evita

,

able thing fashioned for o u rselves an aristoc racy

,

of doll ars t h e disp lay o f wea l th has h er e to tak e

,
ass
 P HILO SOPHY OF F U RNIT U RE 1 87

th e place and perform the o ffice of the heraldic

display in monarchial co untries By a transi .

tion readily understood and which might have ,

been as readily fo r eseen we have been bro ught , ‘

to merge in simple show our notions of ta st e

itself
.

To speak less abstractedly In England for

‘

.
,

example no mere parade of costly app u rtenances

,

wo uld be so likely as with us to create an im

, ,

pression of the beautiful in respect to the ap

p urtenances themselves o r to t aste as regards
—

the proprietor —this for th e reason first that , ,

wealth is not in England the loftiest obj ect of

, ,

ambition as con stituting a nobility ; and sec ,

o n dly that t h ere the tru e nobility of blood con

, , ,

fining itself within the strict limits o f legitimate

taste rather avoids than a ff ects that mere c o stli
,

ness in whic h a p a r ven u rivalry may at any time

be successful ly attempted The people will imi .

tate the nobles and the resul t is a th oro ugh dif

,

fusion o f the proper feeling B ut in America .

,

th e coins current being th e sole arm s of the aris

toc racy their display may be said in general
, , ,

to be the so le means of ari sto cratic di stinction ;

and the pop ulace looking always upward for
,

m od els are insensibly led to confound th e two

,

entirely separate idea s of ma gnificence and

bea uty In sho rt th e co st of an article of fur
.
'

n iture has at lengt h come to be wit h us nearly , ,

th e sole test of its merit in a decorativ e point of

view— and th i s test once es tabli sh ed has led th e
, ,

way to m an y analogous erro rs readily traceable ,

to the o n e primitive folly .

1 88 WORKS OF ED GAR ALLAN P OE

Th ere co ul d be nothing more directly o ffen e

si v e to the eye of an artist than the interior of

wh at is termed 1 n the U nited State s— that IS to
say in Ap p allachia— a well fu rni shed apart
,

ment Its most usu al defect is a want of keep

.

ing We speak of the k eeping of a room as we

.

woul d of the k eeping of a picture — for both the

pict ure and the r o om are amenable to those un
'

'

deviating principle s whic h regul ate all varieties

o f art ; and v ery nearly the same law s by whic h
we decide on the h igher merits of a paintin g ,

suffice f o r decision on the ad j ustment of a

chamber .

A want of k eeping is ob serv able sometimes in

th e character of the several pieces of furniture ,

b ut generally in t heir colors or modes of adap

tatio n to use V ery often the eye is o fl en ded
.

by their inartistical arrangement Straight

.

lines are too prevalent too uninterruptedly con

—

tinned— o r cl umsily interrupted at right angles .

If c urved lin e s occ u r they are repeated into un

,

p lea sant u ni formity By un d.u e prec i sion the ,

appearance of many a fin e apartment is utterly

spoiled .

C urtains ar e rarely well disposed or well ,

c h o sen in respect to other decoration s With

,
.

formal furniture c urtains are out of place ; and

,

an extensive v ol ume of drapery of any kind is ,

under any circ umstances irreconcilable with

,

go od tast e — the proper quantum as well as th e ,

proper adj ustment depending upon the ch arac

,

ter of th e general e ffect .

Carp ets are bette r un derstood of late than o f

1 90 WORKS o r ED GAR ALL AN P O E

wicked invention of a race of time -

savers and
-
money lovers c hildr en of Baal and worshippers
—
l

of M amm om B enthams who to spare thou ght

—
, ,

and economi z e fancy fi rst cruelly invented the ,

K al eidoscope and then established j oint -

,
stock
companies to twirl it by steam .

Gla r e is a leading error in the philo sophy of

American ho usehold decoration— an error easily
rec o gni z ed as deduced from the perversion of
taste j ust specified We are v iolently ena m ored
.

of g as and of glass The former is totally inad

.

missible within doors Its harsh and un .

steady light o fl en ds No one havin g both

’

brains and eyes will use it A mild or what .

,

artists term a cool light with its consequent

, ,

warm shadows will do wonders for even an ill

,

f urni shed apartment Never was a more lovely .

thoug ht than that of the a stral lamp We mean .

,

of co urse the astral lamp proper the lamp of

,
—

Argand with its original plain ground -

,
glas s
sha de and its tempered and uniform moonlight
,

rays The cut-

. glass shade is a weak invention
of the enemy The eagerne ss with which we
.

have adopted it partly on acco unt of its flashi

,

n ess, b ut principally on account of its g r ea ter

c o st, is a good commentary on the propo sition
with wh ic h we began It is not too mu ch to say
that the deliberate employer of a cut-
.
,

glass sh ade ,

is either radically de ficient in ta ste, or blindly

sub servient to the caprices of fashion The light .

pro ceeding from one of these gaudy abomina

ti ons is unequal broken and painful It alone
, ,
.

is suflicien t to mar a world of good e ff ec t in the

‘
’
 PHIL OSOPHY OF F U RNIT U RE 1 91

f urnitu re subj ected to its influ ence Female .

loveliness in especial is more than on e half dis

, ,

enchanted beneath its evil eye .

In the matter of glass generally we proceed , ,

upon false principles Its leading featur e is

“

g li tte r— and in t h at one word h o w mu ch of all

that is detestable do we express "Flickering
‘

m m
unquiet lights are so e i es pleasing
t -,
to chil
,

dren and idiots always so— b ut in the embellis h

ment of a room they should be scrup ulously
avoided In truth even strong steady lights a r e
.
,

inadmissible The hu ge and unmeaning glass

chandeliers prism-
.

cut gas - lighted and without

, , ,

shade which dangle in o ur most fashiona ble

-
,

drawing rooms may be cited as the quintessen ce ,

f all t h at is false in ta ste or prepo stero us in

golly .

The rage of g litter— because its idea has b e

come, as we before observ ed confo und ed with ,

that of magnificence in the abstract has l ed us —

,

a lso to the exaggerated employment of mirrors

, .

We line o ur dwellings with great British plates ,

and then ima gine we have don e a fin e thing .

No w the slightest tho ught will be suifi c ien t to

convince any one who has an eye at all of the ,

ill e ff ect of numero us looking- glasses and esp eci ,

ally o f large ones Regarded apart from its r e .

fl ectio n the mirror presents a continu ous flat

, , ,

colorless unrelieved surface - , a thing a lways ,

and obviously unplea sant Considered as a r e .

fl ecto r it is potent in producing a monstro us and

,

odious uniformity ; and the evil is here a gg r a

vated not in merely direct proportion with the
,
1 92 WORKS OF ED GAR ALL AN P OE

a ugm entation of its sources b ut in a ratio con ,

stan tl y increasing
~
In fact a room with four or
.
,

five m irrors arranged at random is for all p ur , ,

po ses of artistic show a room of no shape at all

, .

If we add to thi s evil the attendant glitter upon

,

glitter we have a perfect farrago of discordant

,

and displeasing efifects The veri est b umpkin on .

,

enterin g an apartment so b edizz en ed would be ,

instan tly aware of something wrong altho ugh he ,

might b e altogether unable to assign a cause fo r

his dissati sfaction B ut let the same person be
.
'

led into a room tastefully fu rnished and he ,

would b e startled into an exclamation of pleas

ur e and surprise .

It is an evil growing o ut of ou r rep ublican in

stitution s that hei e a m an of large p u rse has
,

usua lly a very littl e soul which he keeps i n it .

T h e corru ption of taste is a portion or a pendant

of the dollar- man ufacture As we grow rich .
,

o ur ideas grow r usty It is therefore not among

.
, ,

o ur ari stocracy that we m u st look (if at a ll in ,

App all achia ) for the spiritu ality of a British

b o udoir B ut we have seen apartments in the
.

tenure of American s of moderate means which , ,

in negative merit at least might vie with any of ,

the ar- m o lu d cabinets of o ur friends across the

’

water E ven now there is present to o ur mind s

’
.
,

eye a small and not ostentatious chamber with

whose decorations no fault can be fo und The .

proprietor lies asleep on a sofa the weather is

'
—

co ol— the time is near midnight : we will make a

sketch of the room d uring his sl um ber .

It is oblong— so m e thirty feet in length and

1 94 WO RKS OF ED GAR ALLAN POE

su rface of th e g roun d, and th rown upon it in

suc h a manner as to form a succession of short
irregu l ar c rv e
u s— one occa sionally o verlying the
oth er T h e wall s are prepared with a glossy
-
.

paper of a ilver gray tint spotted With small

s ,

Arabesque de vices of a fainter hue of the prev

al en t crimso n Many paintings relieve the ex
.

pans e of the paper These are c hiefly landscapes

.

of an imaginativ e cast such as the fairy grottoes

—

of St an field or the lake of the D ismal Swamp of

‘

Chapman There are nev ertheless three or

.
, ,

four female h eads of an ethereal beauty— por

,

traits in the manner of S ul ly The tone of eac h .

picture is warm b ut dark There are no bril

,
.

”
liant efi ects Rep ose speaks in all
. Not one .

is of small si z e D iminutive paintings give that

.

sp o tty look to a room Which is the ble mi sh of

,

so many a fin e Work of Art overto uched The .

fram es are broad b ut not deep and richl y ,

carv ed Without being dul led or fil ag r eed They

, .

h av e the Whole lustre of burnished gold They .

lie flat on the walls and do not h ang o ff With

,

cords The designs th ems elves are often seen

.

to th e better advantage 1 n this latter position b ut ,

the general appearance of the chamber is in

j ured B ut one mi rror and this is not a v ery
.
—

large one— is visible In sh ape it is nearly cir

.

on lar— and it is hung so that a reflection of the

p erson can be obtained from it in none of the

ordinary sitting- places of the room Two large .

l ow sofas of rosewood and crimson silk gold ,

flowered form th e onl y seats With the exception

, ,

of two light conversation chairs also of rose ,

,
 P H IL O SO PH Y OF F U RNITU RE 1 95

wood There is a pianoforte (ro sewood al so )

.
, ,

without cover and thrown open An octagonal

,
.

table formed altogether of the richest gold

,
‘

threaded marble is placed near one of the sofas

,
.

-
This is also without cover the drapery of th e
c urtains has been thought sufficient Four large .

and gorgeous S evres v as es in which bloom a pro

,

fusion of sweet and vi vid flowers occ upy the ,

slightly ro un ded angles of the room A tall .

candelabrum bearin g a sm all antique lamp with

,

h ighly perfumed oil is standing near the head

,

of my sleeping fr1 end Some light and graceful

.

h anging shelves with golden edges and crims on

,

silk cords with golden tassel s sustain two or ,

three hundred magnificently bound books B e .

yond these things there is no furniture if we

, ,

except an Argand lamp with a plain crimson ,

u n -
tinted gro d glass shade wh ich depends from ,

the lofty v aul ted ceiling by a single slender gold

chain an d throws a tranq uil b ut magical radi
,

ance o ver all .

 l O AN DEPT .

o td t t
T his b o k is du e o n the las d ow
a e s am p e b el
or d t to w h c r w d w o ly
,

o n t he i h en e e Re n e a ls n :
-
a e .

T e l N o 64 2 3 4 0 5
d y r od to d t
. .

4 a s p i a e due .