Article December 28, 1912 Issue

ORBITS

M. G. KAINS, M.S.

One of the greatest wonders that has ever filled the human mind is the discovery, with its positive proof, that the celestial bodies move in definite, determinable paths. For us today this fact requires only the most rudimentary knowledge of astronomical laws to understand, but to the men who first worked it out it was a difficult problem. These orbits, as the paths are termed in astronomy, are relatively fixed. In them there is no interference, conflict, or collision. The planets which describe them move with a precision that compels the exclamation, "Order is heaven's first law"! Mrs. Eddy says: "Nature voices natural, spiritual law and divine Love, but human belief misinterprets nature," and to this she adds: "Suns and planets teach grand lessons" (Science and Health, p. 240).

It is easy to realize that neither satellites, stars, suns, planets, nor comets move with a power of their own, though they may seem so to do. As determined by human reckoning, they move in obedience to universal laws which have been discovered, proved, and repeatedly verified by astronomers, physicists, and other scientists until the last vestige of doubt has been destroyed. But when it is declared that the celestial bodies move in obedience to these laws, only a single step has been taken toward the much more important realization that the laws did not come into existence of themselves. There must be a more remote, a basic cause, for nothing happens; there is no such thing as chance. All phenomena are but effects, manifestations, proofs of causes understood or not. These causes may be grouped and regrouped systematically until the primal cause has been reached, just as minor laws of astronomy have been grouped by Newton in the fundamental, universal law of gravitation.

But no matter how evident the effects may be, neither an immediate effect, a local cause, nor the primal cause is tangible to human sense in the present state of our understanding; their action is apprehended solely through their phenomena. If, therefore, a phenomenon or effect is inseparable from its cause, and it is; if immediate causes are directly traceable to the primal cause; and if causes are tangible to human understanding only by their effects, in other words are themselves mental, the conclusion is unavoidable that the prime cause can only be appreciated mentally because it is Mind. What though the atheistic "natural" scientist would like to brush aside such reasoning, the stars in their courses denounce him, for "an undevout astronomer is mad." David expressed this thought in the exquisite words, "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth his handiwork.... There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard." So true is this that we can readily agree with the psalmist in saying that the understanding of the law which governs God's ideas is more to be desired "than gold, yea, than much fine gold."

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