The Works of Edgar Allan Poe Volume 9

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1895 edition. Excerpt: ... and less, come down at length to the central point; and the diffusive matter, simultaneously with the diffusive force, is exhausted.1 We have now the sphere filled, through means of radiation, with atoms equably diffused. The two necessary conditions--those of radiation and of equable diffusion--are satisfied; and by the sole process in which the possibility of their simultaneous satisfaction is conceivable. For this reason, I confidently expect to find, lurking in the present condition of the atoms as distributed throughout the sphere, the secret of which I am in search--the all-important principle of the modus operandi of the Newtonian law. Let us examine, then, the actual condition of the atoms. They lie in a series of concentric strata. They are equably diffused throughout the sphere. The atoms being equably distributed, the greater the superficial extent of any of these concentric strata, or spheres, the more atoms will lie upon it. In other words, the number of atoms lying upon the surface of any one of the concentric spheres is directly proportional with the extent of that surface. But, in any series of concentric spheres, the surfaces are directly proportional with the squares of the distances from the centre. Therefore the number of atoms in any stratum is directly proportional with the square of that stratum's distance from the centre. But the number of atoms in any stratum is the measure of the force which emitted that stratum--1 Here describe the whole process as one instantaneous flash. Poe' s Manuscript Note. 2 Succinctly--The surfaces of spheres are as the squares of their radii. that is to say, is directly proportional with the force. Therefore the force which radiated any stratum is directly proportional with the square...