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The seeming creatures whichare now, throughout the universe, so perpetually springing into being,can only be considered as the mediate or indirect, not as the direct orimmediate results of the Divine creative power.
    OINOS. Among men, my Agathos, this idea would be considered heretical inthe extreme.
    AGATHOS. Among angels, my Oinos, it is seen to be simply true.
    OINOS. I can comprehend you thus far—that certain operations of what weterm Nature, or the natural laws, will, under certain conditions, giverise to that which has all the appearance of creation. Shortly beforethe final overthrow of the earth, there were, I well remember, many verysuccessful experiments in what some philosophers were weak enough todenominate the creation of animalculae.
    AGATHOS. The cases of which you speak were, in fact, instances of thesecondary creation—and of the only species of creation which has everbeen, since the first word spoke into existence the first law.
    OINOS. Are not the starry worlds that, from the abyss of nonentity,burst hourly forth into the heavens—are not these stars, Agathos, theimmediate handiwork of the King?
    AGATHOS. Let me endeavor, my Oinos, to lead you, step by step, to theconception I intend. You are well aware that, as no thought can perish,so no act is without infinite result. We moved our hands, for example,when we were dwellers on the earth, and, in so doing, gave vibrationto the atmosphere which engirdled it. This vibration was indefinitelyextended, till it gave impulse to every particle of the earth’s air,which thenceforward, and for ever , was actuated by the one movement ofthe hand. This fact the mathematicians of our globe well knew. They madethe special effects, indeed, wrought in the fluid by special impulses,the subject of exact calculation—so that it became easy to determine inwhat precise period an impulse of given extent would engirdle the orb,and impress (for ever) every atom of the atmosphere circumambient.Retrograding, they found no difficulty, from a given effect, under givenconditions, in determining the value of the original impulse. Nowthe mathematicians who saw that the results of any given impulse wereabsolutely endless—and who saw that a portion of these results wereaccurately traceable through the agency of algebraic analysis—who saw,too, the facility of the retrogradation—these men saw, at the sametime, that this species of analysis itself, had within itself a capacityfor indefinite progress—that there were no bounds conceivable to itsadvancement and applicability, except within the intellect of him whoadvanced or applied it. But at this point our mathematicians paused.
    OINOS. And why, Agathos, should they have proceeded?
    AGATHOS. Because there were some considerations of deep interest beyond.It was deducible from what they knew, that to a being of infiniteunderstanding—one to whom the perfection of the algebraic analysis layunfolded—there could be no difficulty in tracing every impulse giventhe air—and the ether through the air—to the remotest consequences atany even infinitely remote epoch of time. It is indeed demonstrablethat every such impulse given the air , must, in the end , impress everyindividual thing that exists within the universe; —and the being ofinfinite understanding—the being whom we have imagined—might trace theremote undulations of the impulse—trace them upward and onward in theirinfluences upon all particles of an matter—upward and onward forever in their modifications of old forms—or, in other words, in their creation of new —until he found them reflected—unimpressive at last —back from the throne of the Godhead. And not only could sucha thing do this, but at any epoch, should a given result be affordedhim—should one of these numberless comets, for example, be presentedto his inspection—he could have no difficulty in determining, by theanalytic