e 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, the
immediate handiwork of the King?

'Agathos.'

Let me endeavor, my Oinos, to lead you, step by step, to the
conception 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 we gave
vibration to the atmosphere which engirdled it. This vibration was
indefinitely extended till it gave impulse to every particle of the
earth's air, which thenceforward, _and forever_, was actuated by the
one movement of the hand. This fact the mathematicians of our globe
well knew. They made the special effects, indeed, wrought in the fluid
by special impulses, the subject of exact calculation--so that it
became easy to determine in what precise period an impulse of given
extent would engirdle the orb, and impress (forever) every atom of the
atmosphere circumambient. Retrograding, they found no difficulty; from
a given effect, under given conditions, in determining the value of
the original impulse. Now the mathematicians who saw that the results
of any given impulse were absolutely endless--and who saw that a
portion of these results were accurately traceable through the agency
of algebraic analysis--who saw, too, the facility of the
retrogradation--these men saw, at the same time, that this species of
analysis itself had within itself a capacity for indefinite
progress--that there were no bounds conceivable to its advancement and
applicability, except within the intellect of him who advanced 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 infinite
understanding--one to whom the _perfection_ of the algebraic analysis
lay unfolded--there could be no difficulty in tracing every impulse
given the air--and the ether through the air--to the remotest
consequences at any even infinitely remote epoch of time. It is indeed
demonstrable that every such impulse _given the air_, must _in the
end_ impress every individual thing that exists _within th