Page:The Philosophy of Creation.djvu/242

 duces fruits and seeds; it forms the material bodies of animals, and operates their organs; in the earth it forms minerals; it gives every atom its properties, and imparts to matter an effort to vegetate. The florescence on windows and arborescence in dendrite are from that effort. This effort, which is from the Divine in ultimates, acts in seeds and in the roots of plants, whence they grow.

With this general description of the origin of natural forces, we may pass to the discussion of some of their forms in particular, which will also illustrate the general law.

Gravity is the force exerted by the activity of that interior atmosphere of the earth, which has been named aura. The offices performed by the sun necessitate that there be within and about it a purer atmosphere of higher character than the atmospheres that come down to the earth. The astronomer sees tongues of flame shooting out from the sun. These do not come down to nature; but they impart their activity to atmospheres that reach to the earth, and then subside. The intense agitation of the sun's immediate atmosphere is due to the sun being constituted of so rarefied and pure matter that it is nature's first clothing