Page:Eureka; a prose poem (1848).djvu/67

 In looking carefully around me for rational objection to what I have advanced, I am able to discover nothing;—but of that class of objections usually urged by the doubters for Doubt's sake, I very readily perceive three; and proceed to dispose of them in order.

It may be said, first: "The proof that the force of irradiation (in the case described) is directly proportional to the squares of the distances, depends upon an unwarranted assumption—that of the number of atoms in each stratum being the measure of the force with which they are emitted."

I reply, not only that I am warranted in such assumption, but that I should be utterly unwarranted in any other. What I assume is, simply, that an effect is the measure of its cause—that every exercise of the Divine Will will be proportional to that which demands the exertion—that the means of Omnipotence, or of Omniscience, will be exactly adapted to its purposes. Neither can a deficiency nor an excess of cause bring to pass any effect. Had the force which irradiated any stratum to its position, been either more or less than was needed for the purpose—that is to say, not directly proportional to the purpose—then to its position that stratum could not have been irradiated. Had the force which, with a view to general equability of distribution, emitted the proper number of atoms for each stratum, been not directly proportional to the number, then the number would not have been the number demanded for the equable distribution.

The second supposable objection is somewhat better entitled to an answer.