WE are always on the top; so that our friends down in the Antipodes are the people who mostly need gravitation

 ...for we have not, like flies, been provided with secretions in our feet, to enable us to stick on to a whirling ball ! How necessary some such a force would be, if we hang head downwards, or stick out as radii at various hours of the day and night ; for these m ust be our positions at different times during the twenty-four hours, if the earth has any axial motion. But somehow or other WE are always on the top;so that our friends down in the Antipodes are the people who mostly need gravitation. They cannot be on the top too, else it would be a queer shaped globe. This universal law (?) according to Sir R. Ball, affirms that “ every body in the universe attracts every other body, with a force which varies inversely as the square of the distance.”

If this be so, I should like to know what is the nature of the pulling tackle ? Is it solid, liquid, or gaseous ? Is no one able to explain this mystery? It would be interesting to learn something definite about it. But when we are told of a “ something " which we are unable to feel, see, taste, or smell, and which does not show any results for its universal pulling operations, what else can we reasonably call it but " nothing”?

At a recent debate in Leicester, upon this subject the gentleman who represented the Astronomers' position, confessed that “no one can tell what gravitation is ; no, not even an angel from heaven ”! The question naturally arises; did they get the theory from some angel in the other place?

Sir Isaac never made it clear w hat this law is ; but I find that he himself confessed it was a “ great absurdity."

In a letter to Dr. Bentley. Feb. 25th, 1692, Kewton says ;— “ That gravitation should be innate and inherent in matter, so that one body can act upon another at a distance—is to me SO GREAT AN A BSURDITY, that I believe no man who has, in philosophical matters, a competent faculty of thinking, can ever fall into it.” Yet many have fallen into this “great absurdity.” Such men therefore—according to Newton—have not " a competent faculty of thinking ” in philosophical matters. I am happy to be in agreement with Sir Isaac on this important point.

Sir Robert Ball says :— “ The law of gravitation . . . underlies the whole of Astronomy.” (Story of the Heavens, p. 122). It does not speak very well for the Astronomy, if it is founded on an acknowledged “great absurdity.”

Perhaps some reader may kindly inform me how the planet Jupiter can pull “our earth ” without any chain or rope between ; or how a fly in my room could manage to attract a stone on the beach at Douglas, Isle of Man ; and this, too, without any "pulling tackle ”? It would be rather hard upon the poor fly ! The idea of “ universal attraction ” is foohsh in the extreme, it is an absurd theory foisted upon the credulous crowd.

C. Vernon Boys, F.R.S., A.R.S.M., M.R.I., in his paper.
The Newtonian Constant of Gravitation.” says :—
“ It is a my sterious power which NO  MAN  CAN EXPLAIN. OF ITS PROPAGATION THROUGH SPACE ALL MEN ARE IGNORANT”— Proceedings of the Royal Institution of Great  Britain, p. 355. March, 1895.

Is not this an honest and authoritative confession of Astronomical ignorance of their fundamental position?
Professor W. B. Carpenter, in his paper. “Nature and Law,” says ;— “ We have no proof, and in the nature of things can never get one, of the ASSUMPTION of the attractive force exerted by the earth, or by any of the bodies of the solar system , upon other bodies at a distance.

. . . The doctrine of universal gravitation then is A PURE ASSUMPTIONS.—Published in Modern Revietv,
October, 1890.

This “ absurd ” law, or “ mysterious power which no man "can explain,” the existence of which has never been proved, and of which its supposed operation through space “ all men are ignorant,” amounts therefore to nothing but an empty assumption.

Bodies by their own weight will either fall or rise, until they have found their equilibrium ; consequently Newton's apple fell to the ground simply because it was heavier than the atmosphere.

Successful attraction operates in the case of sweethearts separated by long distances, though I am not sure whether it is “ inversely proportional to the square of their distance"
How cleverly Sir Isaac guessed—“ discovered ”— I should state— From an apple falling to the ground by its own proper weight.

That atoms, million miles apart, and stars down to a straw , Can pull each other without ropes, by merely “ Natural Law!” —From “ The Evolutionist,” by “ Zetetes.”

The famous German philosopher and poet, Goethe, regard­ing the Newtonian system, said ;— “ It may be boldly asked where can the man be found possessing the extraordinary gifts of Newton, who could suffer himself to be deluded by such a hocus pocus, if he had not in the first instance wilfully deceived himself ? . . . To support his unnatural theory Newton heaps FICTION UPON FICTION, seeking to dazzle where he cannot convincc.”— Proceedings of the Royal Institiition. vol. 9, p art 3, P- 353-

Is the Earth a Globe WHIRLING IN SPACE? AS IS ASSUMED AND TAUGHT BY MODERN ASTRONOMICAL “ SCIENCE.”
The Su b j e c t  Se r io u s l y,  Sc i e n t i f i c a l l y, AND
S a c r e d l y  Co n s id e r e d.
BY
KARL A. SMITH.