THE HOLLOW GLOBE. By M. L. Sherman.
[The Theosophist, July 1884, pp. 251-4]
Leaving aside the question of the supposed origin of this book as a spirit
communication (the 'Spirit' may have been an 'Adept'), its central idea is
that this globe of ours is constructed in the form of a hollow sphere,
with a shell some thirty to forty miles in thickness, and that the
interior surface, which is a beautiful world, in a more highly developed
condition than the exterior, is accessible by a circuitous and spirally
formed aperture, that may be found in the unexplored open Polar Sea, and
this opening affords easy navigation by a broad and deep channel leading
from one surface to the other, and that the largest ships or steamers may
sail or steam either way, with as much facility, as they can pass through
any other winding or somewhat crooked channel.
As the author has not seen himself the interior of this inner world, but
depends in giving his details about the same on clairvoyant examinations,
and as no Polar expedition has yet reached the pole, although some
expeditions came very near to it, and there being apparently nothing to
prevent them from reaching it, unless indeed it may have been the exercise
of some occult power -- the author of course cannot positively prove that
the globe is hollow and inhabited, but he does this negatively by proving
that it cannot be otherwise.
He first shows that every noted event in history has occurred in exact
order, and in its proper time and place, in regular succession; so that it
could not have possibly occurred sooner, nor longer delayed. Each event
took place in exact accordance with man's condition at the period of its
occurrence. Gunpowder, steamships, printing presses, electric telegraphs
were inventions born of the time when necessity called them into
existence. When Catholic supremacy and intolerance overran all Western
Europe, an obscure young sailor was deeply impressed with an idea that
finally resulted in the discovery of what was termed a new world, new
western countries became settled in proportion as old eastern countries
became overpopulated, the ever surging tide of emigration has steadily
rolled on in its onward course from Central Asia through the continent of
Europe, then across the Atlantic to the Eastern shores of America, through
the wilderness and across the desert plains and precipitous mountain
ranges, until it finds itself opposed by the broad waters of the Pacific
Ocean, with a densely populated country on the other side.
Emigration like revolutions never moves backward if it can no more reach
forward to the West; it must spread to the North and South. The coming
emigration to the North has already been foreshadowed by the purchase of
the Russian Possessions in North America by the United States. Alaska
seems to be the future halfway station between America and the North Pole,
where the extensive steamship lines, which at no remote period will be
established, will take in their supplies of coal. At the present rate of
increase, in less than a hundred years from now, America will have a
population of over 400 millions and a new territory must be found to
accommodate them. Such a territory will be found by following the warm
Kuro Siva current of the Pacific ocean through Behring's Strait into the
open Polar sea.
Having once penetrated the frigid belt, we find there an ocean of some
1,200 miles in diameter with a temperate climate. Man seems to be
irresistibly attracted to it, for in spite of all the failures, caused
mostly by serious blunders of scientific men, Polar expeditions will be
continued, until we finally shall succeed in entering the charmed circle,
which is bordered by a frozen zone of some ten degrees latitude, generally
ranging from 70 to 80 degrees. Within this circle the climate cannot be
dependent for its temperature to any considerable extent upon those causes
that regulate the changes of the seasons south of the glacial belt, by
which it is surrounded. For if dependent upon such, it would for ever
remain locked in the frozen embrace of the vast fields of ice, that would
accumulate from year to year and from age to age. Those great formations
would have naturally encroached upon the temperate latitudes, thus
extending their area and depth, until all the waters upon the face of the
earth would have been attracted thither to swell the increasing glaciers
of the Arctic regions, and all the solar and other influences operating in
the temperate zones could not have prevented the catastrophe, had not the
great presiding mind ordered it differently, by arranging this globe so
that a temperate clime might also exist at this polar extreme. This makes
the open Polar Sea a necessity, and it seems rather strange that
navigators have never entered the same. Some of them declare that there
was nothing in view to hinder, for, as far as their eyes or glasses would
reach towards the North, all was open; no impediments in the way; but they
did not go on. Some inexplicable reason prevented those parties from
pursuing where the road lay open before them, and has prevented their
successors from finding any open pathway, and the great geographical
enigma of our globe still remains unsolved, waiting for a Columbus to
solve it.
Captain Parry in 1810 saw no visible signs of ice in the very highest
latitude he reached; Wrangle in 1820, far to the north and east of
Behring's Straits, saw no appearance of ice, but for some strange reasons
these navigators did not prosecute their explorations. Whalers and others
insist on having seen the open Polar Sea, and the Kuro Siva and Gulf
stream are positive proofs of its existence. Its temperate climate may be
attributed to the longitudinal electro-magnetic currents, converging into
a common focus at or near the pole and their entering the shell. These
converging activities, passing through water or the more solid earth to
the interior surface, must necessarily produce considerable heat,
doubtless sufficient to prevent the freezing of the waters of the entire
polar circle.
The defenders of the igneous theory of the interior of the earth describe
the same as an immense bombshell, filled brimful with intensely molten
lava, surrounded by a crust from twenty-five to sixty miles in thickness.
In support of their views, they tell us of the increasing temperature as
we go downwards into the earth, the igneous formation of granite, the
supposed action of hot water upon the lower sedimentary rocks, the large
extent of territory affected by earthquakes, the vast amount of lava
thrown from volcanoes and the continuous activity of the same.
The prominent argument for the existence of this scientific hell has been
the increase of temperature as we penetrate the earth, generally about one
degree in fifty or sixty feet; but it has been found that in deep
soundings of the ocean the water was colder as they approached the sea
bottom. The ocean has given us access to a point 37,000 feet nearer this
terrible imaginary furnace, but that tremendous depth failed to present
any indications of increasing temperature. Lately an artesian well was
sunk in the city of St. Louis, Missouri, to the depth of 3,843 1/2 feet,
and by so doing the question of increasing temperature has been settled
for ever. It not only did not support the theory of internal heat, but
proved exactly the opposite and established the theory of internal cold.
Instead of placing below our feet the most active and dangerous materials,
that would be constantly making disturbance, the controlling intelligence
has placed there the most inactive, that would lie still. It was found
that at the boring of that well the heat increased until they had measured
3,209 feet, where the temperature was 107 degrees F. It then began to
sink, and at 3,817 feet it showed a temperature of 106 degrees -- and at
3,827 the thermometer fell to 105 degrees. At this rate we would arrive at
a depth of about nine miles a temperature somewhat below zero, and
doubtless still farther below we should find the foundations of this globe
in that frozen negative condition that will induce them to lie still until
all the great destined changes can take place upon and near the surface,
that have been provided for in the vast programme of the world's past and
future history.
If we construct a sphere of eighty inches in diameter instead of 8,000
miles with a shell of four-tenths of an inch in thickness, we would have
the relative proportions of the earth's interior and its crust as given by
our fire-philosophers. We may now place within the interior liquid fire at
7,000 degrees -- which, says Prof. Hitchcock, is sufficient to melt all
the materials of the rocks; and no intelligent person could be found, who
would not arrive at the conclusion that the shell itself would soon become
a liquid mass as its entire contents are only one thirty-fifth part of the
fire within.
It is difficult to conceive of an idea more repugnant to our natures, or
one more horrible to contemplate, than that the vast interior of our
globe, which might easily have been fitted up so grandly and beautifully,
and subserve the glorious purpose of producing and sustaining human
intelligence, should have been so miserably ruined by being filled
brimming full of incandescent lava.
We pass for the present to a consideration of the supposed igneous
formation of the granite rocks, and come to that period where it is said
that in consequence of great internal heat the earth's surface produces a
wonderful prolific growth of vegetation of gigantic proportions, such as
enormous tree ferns, calamites, sigillaria and numerous varieties that
have left their fossil remains on top of the Devonian and immediately
below the coal formation. It appears that this immense flora was found
upon the top of a very extensive formation, which is still above another
of fossiliferous rocks that had been the residence of organic living
beings for untold ages before this growth existed. Now the difficulty
seems to be, not to produce the extensive growth of vegetation, but to
obtain the amount of heat from the internal source that would transform
these forests into bituminous and anthracite coal and still permit the
existence of vegetable and animal life to continue. A heat, sufficient to
produce even charcoal, would not be considered conducive to healthy growth
of such life, and it is evident that many ages previous to the coal period
these forms of life existed and flourished as all the paleozoic rocks
testify. After the crust has so cooled down as to produce vegetable and
animal life, it would be impossible many ages afterwards to get up a heat
that would make the world a universal coalpit. The causes of the great
coal fields that now supply our manufactories, steam engines and dwellings
with fuel, must be looked for in some other direction, which the author
explains, but which space does not permit us to examine.
Volcanoes are supposed to be vent holes or chimneys that reach from the
surface to the great fire within, contrived for the purpose of safety
valves that may permit any surplus gases or dangerous elements to escape.
No one will deny that a globe of molten lava, that has an area of nearly
200,000,000 square miles, and a heat of over 7,000°F. and only enclosed by
a frail crust of about forty miles in depth, would require at least all
the open chimneys that are known to exist in the shape of active volcanoes
upon the globe. But these active volcanoes are neither numerous nor
regularly distributed, and the disturbed and explosive elements might some
day be found unwilling to go very far out of the way to accommodate any
portion of the outside world. A certain able but eccentric geologist tells
us that a large portion of the active volcanoes have been extinguished by
the sea running into the crater and extinguishing the fire, and, to show
that he is serious, he intimates that there are men in New England who,
for a suitable compensation, would undertake to construct a subterranean
tunnel from the Mediterranean to Mount Vesuvius, to let in a stream of
water of sufficient magnitude to quench that infernal monster. He thus
resembles the incompetent engineer, sitting on the safety valve of his
engine, to increase the pressure of steam, and if the igneous theory is
correct, we may expect to see our globe torn to pieces at any time by some
blundering scientist.
But fortunately we are not in such a precarious situation. There are other
and better reasons to explain the causes of the existence of volcanoes and
earthquakes. We are told that volcanoes belch forth volumes of dense smoke
with lurid flames and ashes in enormous quantities, cinders, scoria and
mud, steam, sand, lapilly, rocks of various dimensions, and lava; and it
is somewhat remarkable that the lava is not very thoroughly melted. These
materials must have come from reservoirs where they severally had an
existence; they could not have been brought from any place where they did
not exist, and we often see that when such reservoirs have become
exhausted, the mountain is swallowed up in the vacancy thus produced.
Moreover many of the substances thrown out are combustibles. Why have they
not been consumed at a heat that may be 10,000°? Smoke and cinders are the
result of the combustion of organic substances, and certainly no organic
substance can have existed at a temperature that will melt granite rock.
These substances must have been the results of evolution after granite was
formed. Neither could there have be any water or mud. The force which
throws out rocks at the distance of 6,000 feet above the summit of
Cotapaxi, which is nearly 18,000 feet high, must necessarily be backed by
something more permanent than a liquid globe of molten granite, as the
explosive force in a volcano must act in the same manner as it does in a
gun; it must have a solid resisting basis to receive the recoil. It is
therefore clear that the origin of volcanoes must be looked for amongst
the great fires that are kindled in cavities in the interior of earth's
crust, and such cavities have been discovered. But these cavities have a
solid bottom, and far below them is the region of undisturbed repose. The
causes of volcanoes can be found in the oil-bearing rocks, which,
according to Prof. Denton, are of great thickness and vast extent, and
some of the petroleum shales are so rich, that sixty gallons of oil may be
distilled from a single ton.
As the igneous theory does not explain the existence of volcanoes, so does
it not account for the phenomena of earthquakes. If earthquakes are caused
by the quaking of an interior globe of molten lava, why do they not extend
simultaneously all over the earth's surface? How can they be limited in
extent? Space forbids us to go into a detailed account of the supposed
causes of earthquakes, given by various authors, and which, on account of
their absurdity, are more amusing than instructive. Some say that vast
cavities exist between the rolling fiery mass and the superincumbent
crust, and, from some impending cause, large rocks weighing millions of
tons, become detached and fall into the boiling flood below, where they
sink to the centre because the specific gravity of solid granite rock is
greater than that of a homogeneous molten mass of the same material. But
if so, how could the solid granite crust ever have been formed, and would
not in such a case the interior of the globe be solid, and the outside
liquid fire? But without entering into the details of such absurdities, we
find in the exterior shell sufficient inherent powers to explain all the
superficial tremblings and vibrations that ever occurred, and when the
electro-magnetic currents of our earth are better studied the causes of
earthquakes will also be understood, just as the causes of thunder and
lightning in the atmosphere are no longer unknown.
The author then proceeds to speak about the positive and negative, male
and female, material and spiritual elements and forces. He shows that they
pervade the mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms of our world. He says
that there exists another force, more powerful than electricity, which he
calls Aura, and which we suppose to be identical with the Akasa of the
Occultists. If it were not for a continuation of these forces, the
revolutions of our world would cease and motion be changed into
inactivity. We must keep in view that these counter elements diffuse
themselves throughout all things, and have done so from all eternity. The
forces which pre-existed and gave form to the accretions of materialized
particles, being invisible to us, may be properly termed the spiritual
essences (elementals) that exist in all forms of matter, through which
they express themselves to our vision, and if such forces may exist
separate and independent of the visible material forms, then it follows
that such forms or aggregated atoms do not add to the original power of
the pre-existing spiritualized forces. Thus all forms or aggregations of
matter must have had a spiritual (elemental) essence, which acted as a
preordinate cause for the production of form, and if so there must have
been a spiritual essence or form to the globe we inhabit, containing all
the forces that now exist in the structure; and the particles which
compose our world have taken their respective places in accordance with
these pre-existing forces, and these forces have been governed and
directed by an intelligent power in a spiritual condition, exercising
Will.
Magnetism and Electricity are the two great positive and negative powers
in nature. They are contained in all substances and are evolved from the
mineral kingdom. The original granite contains all that there is in the
universe. Hence it will be difficult to find the dividing line between
matter and force; for both are one and the same indivisible element (the
positive and negative poles of one eternal principle). Aura is evidently
an element that bears a very close relationship to the above named forces,
and being far more sublimated in its character, it acts in various
capacities, where the magnetic and electric fluids would be powerless. The
latter act on a lower plane, but there are higher duties which call for
more refined and etherealized powers, and it has long been understood that
the human organization was pervaded by an element variously called nerve
aura or odylic force, which occupies the brain and extends to the remotest
corners of the physical body. This etherealized essence is the offspring
of the Electro-magnetic fluid, and frequently displays its glories in the
polar regions of this hemisphere and is known as the Aurora Borealis.
The author discusses these various forces and their correlations at
length, and gradually introduces us into the realm of life. He shows that
wherever effects have been produced, there must have been causes adequate
to produce them. He shows that the law of eternal progress pervades all
nature, and that in the course of ages our material globe will become more
refined and be the fit abode for a superior race. He examines the nature
of gravitation, and shows that it is only the feeble arm of those
universal Electro-magnetic forces that pervade all nature. Gravity is no
traveller, rushing from planet to planet, to draw heavenly bodies from
their predestined courses. It is only an inferior force inherent in matter
and a condition of the same, changed, counteracted and superseded by
superior forces, as we see every day in the growth of plants and animals,
the rising of vapour, etc. Each material aggregation and molecular
organization has a pre-existing elemental form, and each elemental form
has within itself the inherent forces to attract the grosser materials, by
which it manifests itself to the eyes of men. Matter attracts matter, and
a sympathetic cord exists between the orbs of space; but the powers which
have been ascribed wrongly to gravitation belong to Electro-magnetic
influences, and gravitation cannot exist until there is a mutual
relationship established between two material bodies, one apparently
exerting power over the other in consequence of superior size and density.
The larger body attracts the smaller one, and there can be no particular
geometrical centre of attraction with gravitation any more than with
cohesion, but that force lies in the general direction of the largest
accumulation of particles, as is proven by pendulum experiments in the
vicinity of mountains. All ponderable substances will be held upon the
surface of our globe, whether it may be a solid globe and have but one
exterior surface, or a spherical shell with both convex and concave
surfaces. If you are on the inner surface of the spherical shell of our
globe, you are so far as gravity is concerned, as much upon the upper side
as you would be upon the exterior of a solid globe. There can be found
nothing attached to the geometrical centre of our globe, that should make
it a central moving point, from which gravity should proceed, any more
than there is to any other point in space. Neither can the supposed
gravity of the Moon be the cause of the tides, as the author explains.
The author next enquires into the nature of the sun, and demonstrates that
the sun cannot be a fiery mass of molten matter. He enquires into the
sources of light and proves that the emanation theory is wrong, and that
the theory of undulations can only hold good within the limits of our
atmosphere. All these theories present innumerable difficulties, but when
we fall back upon the development theory, we find a harmonious
explanation. All globes must have commenced their career in a feeble,
infantile condition, as regards light and heat, very gradually developing
out of that condition to a more advanced state, and hence it is that all
globes or planets in all their several situations, are receiving just the
amount they need, and no more than will correspond with their several
circumstances.
The development of their inherent powers are such as to modify the solar
influences, and these solar influences are simply caused by the
Electro-magnetic relations existing between these globes and the sun. In
the sun we behold an unfolding of those inherent powers that we possess,
and always have possessed in a latent condition, that will ultimately
render us less dependent upon the great orb of day, because we are
developing the same powers that exist in the sun in all their magnificence
and glory. And if it is conceded that we have unfolded in any sense of the
word, that we have travelled a portion of the journey from the electric
condition of the new formed moon, to the resplendent magnetic glory of the
full grown sun, what shall hinder us from accomplishing the entire
distance and becoming like the sun entirely dependent upon our own
resources for light and heat? There can be no doubt, but the wisdom and
power, that contrived the machinery of the solar system, can ultimately
furnish the means for lighting and warming each planet independently,
because we have the very same elements that are contained in the sun.
Electricity is expressive of coldness and inactivity. Magnetism is a
synonym of life, heat, and activity. When the negative element becomes
permeated to any extent with the positive, it becomes subject to change
and becomes progressive; for the positive and negative, being male and
female, reproduce themselves or their likeness, and whenever the two
elements come into contact, from that moment change and progress commence.
So if worlds in an infantile condition are almost purely electric and
negative, then there can be very little magnetic or positive element
within them with which the great fountain and head of these powers can
affinitize, in order to produce those activities and frictionizing
processes, that result in heat and light. Hence we perceive that Mercury
being younger and less developed, is, of course more electrical and has
more of cold, darkness and inactivity, and less positive active elements
to assimilate with those contained in the sun; but she has some advantage
in point of distance, and that fact assists in modifying her light and
heat to suit her condition, and the quantity and quality of light, as well
as heat depends almost exclusively upon the conditions of the several
planets.
The only reason why darkness
arises upon that side of our earth which is opposite the sun, is simply
because the positive active elements of magnetism and aura, are not sufficiently elaborated to produce the
necessary activities independently of the energizing influences of the
powers contained in the sun; but in a billion or more years, when our
orbit is extended beyond the one in which Jupiter now travels, and the
annual revolution of the earth shall equal twelve of our years instead of
one, the feeble light producing elements upon this globe shall be
developed to that condition, in which they will possess the power to
furnish the necessary illumination upon every side and in all latitudes.
This is already the case with other higher developed planets. Uranus and
Neptune, according to the conditions existing on earth, could experience a
change of season only once in respectively 84 and 164 years, and these
changes must therefore occur on those planets independent of solar
influences.
If all the elements of light and heat exist upon our earth, and if it is
shown by reasoning from analogies of nature, that the interior of the
shell of our earth is in a more developed condition than the exterior, the
question of lighting and warming the interior surface of this shell will
find its natural solution. Furthermore, light and darkness as appreciable
conditions upon our earth are rendered so to us by the peculiar character
of the construction of our eyes and are only relative, and a future race
in a higher state of development will be dependent on higher conditions
which we cannot comprehend, because we have not experienced the same;
while they may exist all the same in that beautiful world yet unexplored
by mortal man.
Our entire physical organization is inherited from this earth; the earth
is our parent, both male and female, father and mother, and there can
exist nothing in our physical organisation that does not exist upon earth.
We may therefore properly consider the earth in some sense of the word an
animal organization of vast dimensions. She has functions analogous to the
animal race, the same inherent powers of locomotion around her axis and
another around the sun. We have a net-work of electric wires in our
system, constituting our nervous system; the earth has Electro-magnetic
currents travelling in all directions. We have a circulation of blood, and
so has the earth a circulation of waters by rivers and tides, and the
winds are active agents to assist in the continual change. There are
currents in the ocean as well as in the interior of the earth. In the
animal organization there are constant currents passing to and from the
interior, through apertures prepared for that purpose, and the great
parent must have an analogous organization, and be suppled with it in the
interior, and the same elements and forces which exist here, must exist
there. We generate the power by which we perform our movements within
ourselves, and so does the earth; and she did not require the arm of an
omnipotent being to start the machine by applying some peculiar kind of a
force, that is not recognised within the realms of the natural universe,
for the genius and wisdom, that could contrive and keep in operation a
perpetual motion for so many long ages by natural causes, must have been
abundantly competent to have brought to bear forces that would have
started the machine within the range of natural causes also.
The interior surface of the earth, being in a more highly developed
condition than the exterior, has become capable of generating its own
light upon the same principle as the more developed planets, and the
displays of aural light that are so frequently beheld emanating from the
arctic circle, have thus far baffled all attempts of scientific minds to
unfold their mysteries; while an aperture at the pole through which this
light radiates to our exterior surface fully explains the phenomenon.
The author's views about the sun spots, of the invisible planets existing
beyond the orbit of Uranus and of the world's builders have recently been
to some extent corroborated in some of the 'Fragments of Occult Truth' and
other teachings given in the Theosophist, and they bear internal evidence
of having been derived from the same source. Whether this view is correct
or not, they show certainly a high grade of intelligence, and their
conclusions are perfectly logical; but, like other works of a similar
character this book has appeared, before the world was wise enough to
understand it, and it is therefore known and appreciated by only
comparatively few. The author is now an old man but he still confidently
expects (so we are told) to be one of the first ones to enter the interior
of the earth through what is known as Cpt. Syme's hole, and we hope he
will do so, if not in his present incarnation, then in the next, as a
member of the sixth race, forerunners of which have already made their
appearance upon this, the exterior surface of our hollow globe.