|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 2
The object of writing this series of papers about applications of
powers to the service of man, their designed king, is manifold. I
desire all my readers to see what marvelous provision the Father has
made for his children in this their nursery and schoolhouse. He has
always been trying to crowd on men more helps and blessings than they
were willing to take. From the first mist that went up from the Garden
the power of steam has been in every drop of water. Yet men carried
their burdens. Since the first storm the swiftness and power of
lightning have been trying to startle man into seeing that in it were
speed and force to carry his thought and himself. But man still
plodded and groaned under loads that might have been lifted by physical
forces. I have seen in many lands men bringing to their houses water
from the hills in heavy stone jars. Gravitation was meant to do that
work, and to make it leap and laugh with pearly spray in every woman's
kitchen. The good Father has offered his all-power on all occasions to
all men.
I desire that the works of God should keep their designed relation to
thought. He says, Consider the lilies; look into the heavens; number
the stars; go to the ant; be wise; ask the beasts, the fowl, the
fishes; or "talk even to the earth, and it showeth thee."
Every flower and star, rainbow and insect, was meant to be so
provocative of thought that any man who never saw a human book might be
largely educated. And every one of these thoughts is related to man's
best prosperity and joy. He is a most regal king if he achieve the
designed dominion over a thousand powerful servitors.
It is well to see that God's present actual powers in full play about
us are vastly beyond all the dreams of Arabian imagination. It leads
us to expect greater things of him hereafter. That human imagination
could so dream is proof of the greatness of its Creator. But that he
has actually surpassed those dreams is prophecy of more greatness to
come.
I desire that my readers of this generation shall be the great thinkers
and inventors of the next. There are amazing powers just waiting to be
revealed. Draw aside the curtain. We have not yet learned the A B C
of science. We have not yet grasped the scepters of provided dominion.
Those who are most in the image and likeness of the Cause of these
forces are most likely to do it.
THE MAN WHO NEEDED 452,696 BARRELS OF WATER
A man once had a large field of wheat. He had toiled hard to clear the
land, plow the soil, and sow the seed. The crop grew beautifully and
was his joy by day and by night. But when it was just ready to head
out it suddenly stopped growing for want of moisture. It looked as if
all his hard work would be in vain. The poor farmer thought of his
wife and children, who were likely to starve in the coming winter. He
shed many tears, but they could not moisten one little stalk.
Suddenly he said, "I will water it myself." The field was a mile
square, and it needed an inch of water over it all. He quickly figured
out that there were 27,878,400 square feet in a square mile. On every
twelve square feet a cubic foot of water was needed. A cubic foot of
water weighs sixty-two and a third pounds. Hence it would require
74,754 tons of water. To draw this amount 74,754 teams, each drawing a
ton, would be required. But they would tramp the wheat all down.
Besides, the nearest water in sufficient quantity was the ocean, one
thousand miles away over the mountains. It would take three months to
make the journey. And, worse than all else, the water of the ocean is
so salt that it would ruin the crop.
[Illustration: Breaking Waves.]
Alas! there were three impossibilities--so many teams, so many
miles, so long time--and two ruins if he could overcome the
impossibilities--trampling down the wheat and bringing so much salt.
Alas, alas! what could he do but see the poor wheat die of thirst and
his poor wife and children die of hunger?
Suddenly he determined to ask the sun to help him. And the sun said he
would. That was a very little thing for such a great body to do. So
he heated the air over the ocean till it became so thirsty that it
drank plenty of water, choosing only the sweet fresh water and leaving
all the salt in the ocean. Then the warm air rose, because the heat
had expanded it and made it lighter, and the other air rushed down the
mountains all over that side of the continent to take its place. Then
the warm air went landward in an upper current and carried its load of
water in great piles and mountains of clouds; it lifted them over the
great ranges of mountains and rained down its thousands of tons of
sweet water a thousand miles from the sea, so gently that not a stalk
of wheat was trampled down, nor was a single root made acrid by any
taste of brine.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|