Глава первая Бог в природе

Traces of the wisdom and goodness of God, or expediency in inanimate nature, in the kingdom of living beings and especially in the structure of the human body.) Nowadays they consider that old, ancient argument, which declared it unthinkable that the twenty-four letters of the Greek alphabet could themselves produce the Iliad, to be empty and vulgar; and yet, one cannot help but see that it is precisely this hypothesis, this possibility that dogmatic materialists must accept and defend. In fact, the Iliad is only one, private act of the human mind, which, in addition to this act, performed thousands of other no less amazing ones, such as, for example, the discovery of the system of the world and its laws; art, science, craftsmanship and all human works in general are, in the last conclusion, nothing more than applications of reason. In order for these innumerable applications to be possible, it was necessary for whole millions of these living and sensitive cells, like the letters of a typography, obeying only physical and chemical laws and having absolutely nothing in common with what we call reason, to assemble and arrange themselves in such an order that not only the Iliad, but all the wonders of the human mind would become possible. Because if these cells, in their blind dance, took a different direction or movement, if, instead of moving in unison, the rhythm of their movements were against the beat, if even the slightest disorder occurred in their relative positions and influences, then the result would no longer be reason, but madness, as experience shows; for it is known that the slightest blow to the balance of the brain is enough to upset its springs and stop the game (see “Final Causes” by Paul Janet, ed. 1878). One Scottish philosopher, the wise Beatti, came up with the idea to instill faith in Providence in the soul of his little son, using such proof for this. The boy was five or six years old, and he had already begun to read, but his father did not want to talk to him about God yet, believing that at that age he would not be able to understand such lessons. To arouse this great thought in his mind, he came up with a method appropriate to his age. Without telling anyone anything about this, in one corner of his small garden, he drew on the ground with his finger the three initial letters of his son’s name, poured bruncrest seeds into the grooves and, covering these seeds with earth, leveled the place. “Ten days later,” he says, “the boy comes running to me and announces with surprise that he found his name inscribed in the garden. I laughed at these words and pretended that I did not attach any importance to his story. But he insists that I definitely go and see what happened. Arriving at the place, I said to my son: “Your truth, I see that this is really your name, but there is nothing surprising here; this is a simple case,” and with that he began to leave. But he did not leave me behind and said with complete seriousness: “It cannot be that this was a simple case; someone must have prepared and sowed the seeds to produce this consequence.” Perhaps these were not his true words, but such was the essence of his thought. “So you think,” I said to him, “that nothing that seems to us as correct as the letters of your name can be a product of chance?” “Yes,” he answered firmly, “I think so.” “But if so,” I told him, “then now look at yourself, at your hands with fingers, at your feet and all your members - don’t they seem correct in form and useful in use to you?” “Oh, yes, of course,” was his answer. – Could all this be a consequence of chance? “Of course not, but someone certainly had to arrange all this for me.” - Who is this? – I asked. “I don’t know,” answered the boy. “Then I told him the name of the great Being who created this whole world, and told him some concepts about His nature, suitable for his age. This lesson was deeply etched into his soul, and he could never forget it, just as he did not forget the circumstance that gave rise to it” (see op. Paul Janet: “Final Causes”). 3. Traces of the wisdom and goodness of God, or expediency in the structure of the Earth If, from one of the stars shining above our heads, we looked at the globe, in silence and silence harmoniously running through the space intended for it by the Creator, it would seem to us nothing more than an insignificant ball, pale and barely worth attention among so many shining suns and huge comets and planets; Meanwhile, the Creator did not leave in oblivion, does not neglect this grain of sand in the boundless ocean of the universe. His Almighty Providence, with fatherly wisdom and goodness, prepared on earth a wondrous dwelling for man, completely proportionate to the needs of him and the animals created to serve him. Being in the space of heaven at the correct distance from the Sun, it receives from it illumination and warmth commensurate with the needs of the creatures living on it, and the correct succession of days, nights and annual changes. If these changes were not constantly directed by the watchful love of Providence, then each of them, continuing longer than it should, could devastate the earth with excess cold or heat. Further, although our Earth covers more than 17,000 miles every minute, we do not feel any movement, do not hear any noise; and while it spins with amazing speed in the space of heaven, a person calmly falls asleep or indulges in his activities as carefree as if he were living on a motionless ball. If the Earth were not sufficiently round, then for the most part it would be uninhabited, light, heat and coolness could not spread over it evenly, the flow of winds would be slow, rivers, and especially seas, rushing through the prominent edges would cause severe shocks and devastation, the air, not refreshed by the winds, would be deadly in many places, and terrible hurricanes would often devastate the fields. The surface of the globe is covered with many continents and seas, which occupy more space than all continents in complexity. They rest in vast storehouses, from which the beneficent hand of Providence daily extracts the moisture necessary to irrigate our fields; everything on them would have dried up and perished if the protective love of the Creator had not shed rain and kept the sources of rivers and streams in order. – It pushed the seas into the low-lying parts of the globe so that all the flowing waters would pour into them and compensate for the loss of moisture in the seas caused by daily evaporation. If the waters remained motionless on the earth, they would cause both infection and mortality. The continents are composed of many heterogeneous layers of earth and are so wisely arranged that their surface presents the most varied locations: in one place vast valleys lie, in another there rise hills or tower rocky mountains, the tops of which are lost in the clouds. In the depths of the mountains, springs, streams and rivers themselves originate, which, having irrigated many countries, pour their excess water into the seas. The all-wise Creator gave the mountains a commensurate elevation; if they were higher, the water, falling from them with impetuous aspiration, would spill over the earth in devastating streams; on the contrary, with a greater lowland of the mountains, it would not have the proper swiftness, would irrigate the fields only for a short space and would form many motionless lakes or unhealthy swamps. Some mountains are designed in such a way that they serve as outlets for flammable substances filling the bowels of the earth, and thereby protect it from frequent earthquakes. Under the layers of earth, at a shallow depth, a person finds stone and marble for the construction and decoration of dwellings and metals for his everyday needs; but of all the layers that make up the continent of the globe, the most useful, the richest and the most fruitful is the one that we trample under our feet. It consists of aquatic silt, grains of sand blown by the wind, and the remains of plants and animals; everything decays in it and everything rises from it, it is the cradle and tomb of all vegetation. This solid surface of our earth received from the wise Creator all the qualities necessary for someone living and vegetating on it. If it were even denser, then delicate plants could not take root in it; and if it were softer, then the trees would not be able to hold firmly in it, and animals and people would wallow in it as if in mud. - Notice, further, with what fertility the generous right hand of the Father of all blessed the earth; this despicable dust, this insignificant dust, which we trample under our feet, is transformed into thousands of objects that delight our senses. Every year it is covered with herbs, trees, flowers, fruits and countless grains for the use or enjoyment of man and animals; it is inexhaustible: the more you rend its bowels, the more generous it is, and - what is most amazing of all - after many millennia it has not weakened, become exhausted, or become outdated, but is always young and from its bosom is ready to show us its treasures. While everything on her wears out and grows old, she, on the contrary, becomes younger and renewed every year, every year she puts on new, most magnificent clothes. Plants, in particular, are scattered over the earth in countless numbers, from the tops of mountains to the depths of the seas; they spread across it like a magnificent carpet, woven with marvelous grace and inimitable beauty. They fill with themselves even places in which one would not even imagine them, but in which, however, the eye opens them with the help of a microscope. In three classes of plants (i.e. trees, shrubs, grasses) there are up to 500,000 species alone, and from time to time new, hitherto unknown species are discovered. The industry carefully takes care of their preservation; Each plant, before it dies, leaves hundreds, thousands of seeds behind. These plants provide extensive food supplies for animals; man, in addition, uses some of them to build his own home, to prepare food, etc., from others he extracts fabrics for clothing or prepares tools for his work; in a word: not a single plant exists without use. To this huge and luxurious feast of the vegetable kingdom, the loving Creator summoned many animate creatures; millions of them cover the earth, countless numbers fill the seas and the very air; in a lump of earth, in a stem of a plant, in a drop of water, the armed eye of a natural scientist reveals entire separate kingdoms of creatures that move and feel the sweetness of life. The organization of animals, their form, instincts, habits proclaim the wisdom and goodness of their almighty Creator. They animate the silent nature and decorate it; many of them serve as food for man, others help him in his labors. The watchful eye of Providence from the heights of heaven watches over everyone equally - from a huge hippopotamus to a small sparrow, it does not allow the excessive spread of some genera, nor does it allow the weakest animals to be exterminated through the strongest, but it shows each kind its boundaries, as if saying: “until this you will come and you will not pass” (Job 38:11). But the beauty and crown of all God’s creatures on earth is man. The slender and straight position of his body, the importance of his movements, his elevated brow, his gaze turned to the sky and reaching to the distant horizon - everything shows in him a higher being, to whom the Creator bequeathed kingdom and dominion over the earth. Although he is born naked, weak and defenseless, he is clothed in silk and gold, carries terrible weapons and, if he wants, throws lightning and thunder from his hands. The fiercest animals flee from his presence, the strongest obey his laws, the most useful meekly serve him. As a homeowner, all parts of the land are available to him; he runs through seas and land, lives in all climates, if he wants, he penetrates into the air regions or descends into the bowels of the earth and the abysses of the ocean. Replacing force with art, he rules over everything, knows how to humble both the lion roaring in the desert and the eagle soaring under the sky. All nature brings tribute to him as its king, and he alone, of all God’s creations on earth, recognizes and comprehends its beauty and order. While other animals blindly obey only their sensual attractions, reason illuminates for man the omnipotence, goodness and wisdom of the Creator in all parts of the universe; one man brightly contemplates His beneficent Providence, one bows down and rationally glorifies the Father of all: at the same time he is both the ruler and the high priest on earth. This vast dwelling was built for man with all the care of a loving Father. Above him stretches the blue vault of heaven, studded with millions of luminous lamps; under his feet is spread the most magnificent carpet of greenery, decorated with a bright variety of flowers that delight the eye and spread fragrance in the air; rich harvests are stirring in the fields; thousands of fragrant fruits hang on the trees; countless birds, dressed in beautiful flowery feathers, fill the air with pleasant singing; obedient animals offer man the strength of their strength or their clothes, milk and the body itself; the sun sheds light and warmth into his home every day; air changes dilute and refresh the air necessary for its nutrition... O God, Father of men, Thy mercy upon us is unspeakable! Thus, the earth is a most beautiful and wisely constructed dwelling, which the protective right hand of the loving Father of men has prepared for us! Try to be worthy of that love that showers us with its gifts with such generosity, and every time you taste them, bow your knees before the goodness of the Creator, and - “whether you eat, or drink, or do anything else, do everything for the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). (See: “Sunday Thurs.”, 1840, p. 211.) 4. Traces of the wisdom and goodness of God, or expediency in the design of the water element What would happen to our land if beneficial moisture did not penetrate and irrigate it? Devoid of any vegetation, deserted, gloomy, it would look like a block of sand burned by the sun. So, during a drought, when there is neither dew nor rain, we see that plants wither, dry out, and some even die, animals also languish from exhaustion, man himself becomes weak and despondent. Then the sun, instead of animating and fertilizing nature, exhausts and devastates it. From this we understand how great and unspeakable is the goodness of the Creator, who commanded the water element to irrigate the earth. This moisture is mostly distributed in nature in the form of a flowing liquid, but also exists in the form of vapor, snow, hail and ice: to transform it from one to another, you only need to increase or decrease the heat. The vast expanses of the seas can be called the main reservoir from which Divine Providence draws moisture for irrigating and fertilizing our fields. They occupy two-thirds of the earth's surface, and in some places their depth extends to several hundred fathoms. This deepening of the sea bed was created by the hand of the Creator not without intention, but in order to protect the continents from drowning. Enclosed in its abysses, the sea vainly strives to step over the boundaries and crush those barriers and gates with which God protected it, who at the beginning of the universe uttered a creative command to it: “You will come to this and will not pass, but your waves will be broken within you” (Job 38:11). But although the sea is forced to remain hopelessly within its borders, its waters do not rot or spoil due to this. Such damage would be fatal to both animals and people, and the protective Creator prevented this evil by dissolving the sea waters with salt, arranging ebbs and flows and various currents in the seas and commanding the breaths of the winds to boil their abysses from time to time. Thus, Providence arranged and protected from damage the main reservoir of moisture on earth - the sea! By what means does the right hand of God bring forth water from it to irrigate our fields? Bow down here, man, before the goodness and wisdom of the Father and Master of all creation, because His deeds are truly “wonderful”! He does not bring masses of water from rivers and seas onto our gardens and fields - because such a method of irrigation would devastate agricultural work and drown a significant part of the plants - but commands the seas to constantly and imperceptibly evaporate fine moisture in the form of fogs and vapors, which accumulate and are carried by the movement of winds to different countries. He then turns these thin and still rare clouds into liquid in two ways. And firstly, since the tops of the mountains are always colder than the air brought by the winds from the valleys, then any cloud or fog, touching any of these peaks, partly decomposes on it and covers the cold ground with its drops, just as during winter in our homes the heated air, touching the glass covered with frost outside, turns into water on them; mountain peaks, absorbing these drops into themselves, are penetrated and drunk with them, then transfer them to the lower layers deeper and deeper, until they encounter clay soil that does not easily permeate moisture. There, the waters settling from the peaks gather into more or less extensive collections, which, with their pressure and heaviness, make their way out and flow out to the surface of the earth. This is how springs, springs, streams and rivers originate and are fed, regardless of whether they are fed with rain or snow moisture. If the surface of the earth were everywhere smooth and uniform, then these various streams, instead of meandering along it and carrying their waters to distant spaces, would only flood the fields and turn them into puddles and ponds. To prevent this, Divine wisdom arranged the surface of the earth in such a way that it everywhere slopes towards the sea, cut in different directions by more or less deep and wide potholes. As a result of this wise and caring structure, freshness, health and fertility are constantly and in orderly order spread along with the waters across the face of the earth. Everywhere the banks of various watercourses are covered with greenery, decorated with flowers, surrounded by clumps of forest or fruit trees; millions of birds, attracted by the fertility of the places, soar on them and fill the surroundings with their singing; the herds, having abundant food and healthy drinking, become plump and fat on such pastures. Man himself, attracted by the wealth and fertility, freshness and prosperity of the coastal countries, loves to establish his home primarily in them, plants vineyards, scatters orchards, cultivates vegetable gardens, builds various machines, subjugates the stormy elements and makes them work and help him in his labors. Truly, “Wonderful are Thy works, O Lord, that Thou hast done all with wisdom” (Ps. 103:24). But only countries not too distant from the hills and mountains are irrigated and filled in this way. By what means does the remaining, most significant part of the earth, covered with fields and pastures and not irrigated by any rivers or streams, receive beneficial moisture? Without moisture, everything on them would have to dry out and die. But man himself is not able to provide them with the necessary irrigation: he can hardly, with great difficulty and effort, irrigate any piece of land on which his garden or vegetable garden is located. So, what would it cost him if he were forced to draw water from rivers and springs, or even artificially raise it and carry it to a distant place to irrigate his vast fields, fields and forests? The same paternal Providence of the Creator, so to speak, takes upon itself those labors of irrigation that man is not able to bear. In fact, clouds serve not only to feed and support rivers and springs. When God “brings them up from the last of the earth” (Ps. 134:7) to our fields and fields, He does not bring them back in vain, but, as Scripture puts it, He drains these wineskins of heaven (Job 38:37, Heb. vile.) over the thirsty earth. And with what paternal foresight He does this! He exudes the moisture obtained from the vapors of the sea onto the earth not in streams and streams, but in monotonous, orderly falling drops, the smallness and density of which are so wisely considered that, despite the great height of the clouds (and, as we know, increasing the force of the fall), with their fall they do not break either juicy fruits, or young shoots, or delicate flowers, or even the smallest stamens on them! In addition to rain, some plants need, so to speak, daily irrigation and receive it from the generous creative right hand in a special way. Since the air and earth constantly contain a certain amount of moist, although invisible to us, vapors, in the evening, when the air cools, these vapors, condensing from cooling, are deposited by their gravity on the earth and plants; That’s why we often find in the morning that both the earth and the plants are covered, as it were, with drops of rain - wet dew. Dew is one of the main benefits of vegetation: especially during long summer droughts, it only supports and feeds plants so that in some warm countries it takes the place of rain. That is why the patriarchs, blessing their children, desired and asked God for them an abundance of “the fatness of the earth and the dew of heaven” (Gen. 27:28). In some countries, Divine Providence uses a special method of irrigating the land. There, every year, at a certain time, the wide river gradually becomes fuller, increases in size and, finally, overflowing its banks, spills into a distant space. Having watered and fertilized its surroundings with silt, it again flows into its banks; Meanwhile, the farmer goes out to the fields that have been enriched by it, sows them with seeds and soon reaps a rich harvest. These are the various methods of irrigation with which the all-good and wise Creator of the world constantly and in orderly order moistens and fertilizes our fields and fields, our forests and gardens! It is clear, after this, why He surrounded the islands and continents with such vast oceans and seas—clothing, in the words of the prophet, the earth “with an abyss like a robe” (Ps. 103:6). In addition to the countless and varied benefits that the water element brings to man in the community, its abysses are filled with countless millions of fish for the benefit and food of man. The Fatherly Hand of Providence has prepared in them for man an abundant, always ready and never exhausted supply of food, and in the water itself the best and healthiest drink, which refreshes and encourages a person, restores tired strength and even heals his ailments. But, no matter how vast the plains of the seas are, no matter how deep their abysses, they could have been exhausted from continuous evaporation if the same Creative wisdom had not prevented this. She deepened the bed of the seas, among other things, so that all the rivers would flow into them and compensate for their loss resulting from continuous evaporation. Thus, according to the words of the Wise One, “if there are sweaters going into the sea, and the sea cannot be filled” (Eccl. 1:7); All of them, having watered the countries, in turn, pour both their own and the excess water obtained from snow and rain into one common reservoir - so that it is always full and never runs out. Bow down, mortal, with reverence and boundless gratitude before the beneficent wisdom and inexhaustible goodness of the Heavenly Father (see: “Resurrection Readings,” 1853). Appendix A. Beneficial properties of water All peoples, no matter what stage of development they stand at, could not and cannot help but notice the obvious fact for everyone and always that the vital activity of both animals and plants is in the closest dependence on water, that life manifests itself and flourishes only where there is water, and in greater strength and diversity, the more water there is, that with a decrease in water, life also decreases, and that, finally, where there is no water, there is no life, but only the kingdom of death. Even the most primitive, i.e. completely undeveloped, a person could not help but notice that the more solid food he ate, the more water he needed to drink. What is the matter, however? The answer to this is given by the science of physiology. According to the teachings of this science, every organism, both animal and plant, needs a constant metabolism of the substances that make it up, so that in less than a month it is completely renewed and not a single part of the old remains in it. And now, all the substances he needs, whether they be solid or gaseous, i.e. such as air, the body can perceive and release only the smallest doses. And such minute doses of substances can only be formed by dissolving them in water, either in pure water, or with some substance already dissolved in it. This last water is needed for those substances necessary for organisms that either do not dissolve quickly or do not dissolve at all in clean water. Saliva and pancreatic juice serve as such water for people and animals. The food we take in is dissolved by saliva and pancreatic juice, then absorbed along with water by the blood vessels, which carry it throughout the body; this latter, on the one hand, receives the smallest doses of the substance it needs from the blood vessels, and on the other hand, gives back the same particles that have served it, which are also carried out of the body by water. Deprive an animal of moisture, and it will die, surrounded by the most nutrients. The same should be said about plants. A plant planted in soil rich in nutrients, but deprived of moisture in which these substances would dissolve, will inevitably die. But the vital significance of water is not exhausted by this dissolution in it, on the one hand, of substances that are nutritious for the body, and on the other, of substances that are no longer needed by the body, and the delivery of the former to the body and the removal of the latter from it. The body is only capable of all its diverse vital functions when all its parts, both internal and external, are soft and elastic, and for this they all must be saturated with moisture. From this it is clear that life can develop and flourish only where there is enough free liquid water for animals to take it in, the soil is sufficiently moistened by rain for plants to absorb water from it, and, finally, the air is sufficiently saturated with moisture for the outer covers of organisms to absorb this moisture. If we add to this that in every 100 pounds of the weight of an adult there are 70 pounds. water, and in every 100 lb. The weight of a child’s body contains up to 90 pounds of water, and the same weight ratio is observed in the organisms of all animals and plants, then we will understand what an enormous amount of water is necessary for the diverse and numerous representatives of the animal and plant kingdom, living not only in the seas, rivers and lakes, but also on the continents. From here, without any further calculations, it is clear that if, for example, the Moscow province were forced to be content only with the water sources available in it for even one summer, then that same summer all life would cease in it, and the area hitherto full of life would turn into a dead desert. But the Creator, who created the world, is as omnipotent as he is good and wise. Having appointed water to be a necessary condition for the development and prosperity of life, He also gave it special wonderful properties, thanks to which it can appear where there is little or no water and where life needs it; thanks to which it saves life where there is a threat of either excessive summer heat or excessive winter cold, which are equally unfavorable for the life of animals, both terrestrial and especially aquatic. Let us consider these properties and the consequences arising from them. Everyone knows that water boils and that at the same time a whitish cloud forms directly above the surface of the water, which gradually dissipates in the air, becoming invisible. At the same time, the amount of water in the vessel decreases little by little, so that, with a sufficiently long boil, not a drop of water will remain in the vessel. Obviously, the whitish cloud above the boiling water consisted of the same water, only transformed into a different state, in which the water, having moved somewhat away from the boiling surface, became, like air, invisible. This state of water is called gaseous, and water in this state is no longer called water, but steam. Thus, water has the property of turning into steam. But water has this property not only at its boiling point, but at all temperatures, even when it is in the form of ice or snow. It is known that washed and wet linen is dried in the cold in winter; In this case, ordinary people say that the frost squeezes out the water; but since no water remains, it must be assumed that although the frost turned the water into ice, the ice, like all water, evaporated. However, the amount of water turning into vapor depends entirely on temperature: the higher the water temperature, the more vapor is produced, and the lower the temperature, the less vapor is produced. From this it is clear that in summer water evaporates more, and in winter less; in the same way, it is stronger in tropical countries, where the source of the earth’s heat - the sun - stands overhead twice a year; in temperate countries, such as, for example, the Moscow province, evaporation is already much weaker; and in countries even more northern, evaporation is relatively weak. On the other hand, the amount of vapor depends on the surface of the evaporating water. Water in a glass, where the surface is insignificant, will evaporate only in a few days, while the same water spilled on the floor will evaporate in a few hours. It follows that the largest amount of vapor is produced by the seas and oceans, and the smallest by rivers, rivulets and streams. Finally, the amount of vapor depends on the temperature of the space into which these vapors enter: the higher its temperature, the greater the amount of vapor it will accommodate; with a decrease in temperature, the amount of vapor that can fit in the same space will also decrease. This property of vapor indicates the same thing, i.e. that the greatest number of them is formed in tropical countries. But the highest development of life, both in quantity and quality of life representatives, is not in the oceans, but on the continents. And since on the continents there is too little water to satisfy the diverse needs of the numerous species of plants and animals inhabiting the continents, including humans, and over the oceans (as well as over rivers), an excess of vapors unnecessary for the ocean is formed, then for the vital purposes of nature it is necessary that the vapors formed from water receive a special force - a motive force, with the help of which they could, together with the air, be transported to places remote from the place of their formation, to places in need and here, losing the properties of steam, pass again into a liquid state. And couples receive this strength during their very formation as their essential property. Science has precisely established that every pound of water vapor, at whatever temperature it is formed, contains, in addition to the heat detected by the thermometer, for example, 50, 200, and over 500 units of latent heat, not detected by the thermometer. If this hidden in 1 f. If the heat of steam is used to heat water by 10, then over 500 pounds of water would be required. In vapors, these over 500 units of latent heat are used not for heating, but for imparting to the particles of these vapors that motive force, thanks to which they, like air, rise to the upper layers of the atmosphere and, like air, can move wherever obstacles to movement are less than their motive force, until they fall into a medium so comparatively cold, which will take away the latent heat from them and will then again turn into drops of water. Let us now transport ourselves mentally to the oceans of tropical countries, i.e. to where the water and the air above it are heated more than anywhere else, and where the surface of the water is vast. Obviously, here are all the conditions for the formation of the largest amount of vapor. And so, here a huge amount of vapor, together with heated air, rises, like a heating stove, into the upper layers of the atmosphere, and from here it rushes into the interiors of the continents and especially to the north and south, while the lower air of the continents in general, and especially the north and south, will move to the oceans to replace the heated and rising air. But the air in the upper atmosphere is characterized by a relatively low temperature, which generally becomes lower the further from tropical countries. Therefore, our couples will be forced to move among the air that is getting colder and colder; The further this air goes, the more it will take away their latent heat; deprived of this warmth and cooled, the vapors will first condense in the form of clouds, and then will fall down in the form of more or less abundant drops of rain (and in winter, snow), watering not only the soil, but also rivers and lakes, and thereby reviving and enhancing the vital activity of both plants and animals. Therefore, the water, which began its movement from warm countries, having fulfilled the purpose indicated to it by the Creator, will either evaporate into the atmosphere in the form of steam, or through streams, rivers and rivers it will again be carried away into the seas and oceans, in order to begin its vital service from here again. But it does not always rain, and there are periods when rain is excessive for the plants cultivated by man and interferes with the proper conduct of agriculture, when, therefore, they pray to God for lack of rain and sending clear and calm weather. But if during these periods plant life does not need abundant moisture, then it cannot be said that it does not need moisture at all. This moisture is dew. And it is a necessary consequence of the same property of vapors, according to which more of them are placed in the same space, the more heated this space is, and vice versa, the less of them, the colder the space. And so, both of these conditions of the highest and lowest vapor content in the above-ground space occur during periods of clear and calm weather. During these periods, both the soil and water become very hot from the sun's rays, and the air comes into contact with them. As a result, on hot, quiet, clear days, the air is abundantly saturated with vapor, absorbing a huge amount of latent heat, which, without the formation of vapor, would raise the temperature of various soils and water basins to the point of danger for the life of plants and animals. But the sun leans toward the west, its oblique rays give very little heat, while the earth, water, plants, and animals, day, evening, night, and morning, do not cease to emit the heat they receive from the sun into the heavenly spaces and thereby cool, and with it cool the air. Plants transmit the most heat into the celestial spaces with the tips of their leaves. Therefore, the air will most likely cool down near the leaves, the amount of vapor that filled it during the day will become excessive, and therefore more and more of it will turn into droplets, depositing on the culprits of the cooling - the tips of the leaves and giving up the latent heat they do not need to the air and the vapors remaining in it. Due to the fact that such cooling continues throughout the night and even part of the morning, dew drops, increasing in volume, fall to the ground, and on some colder nights they settle directly even above the ground itself. But, although the cooling stops with sunrise, the dew fall in the first hours of the sunny morning is very often stronger than at night. It happens like this. Water, among many other properties, also has the ability to heat up and cool down very slowly, compared to everything around it. Therefore, during the day, the water of rivers, lakes and other open basins, and behind it the air above it, is colder than the continents and continental air, which is why the surface air, saturated with moisture, will move to the surface of the continents in order to irrigate them with more or less abundant dew at nightfall; with the onset of night, a different phenomenon occurs - the opposite. The continents are cooling faster, and therefore colder air will flow from the continents to the surface of the waters, cool the mass of vapors rising from the water and turn them partly into drops, partly into a cloudy state, usually called fog. This transformation of vapor into fog will continue all night until, at sunrise, the continents again become warmer than water; then a thick fog formed over the water stretches from the water to the continents, abundantly watering everything it comes across on the road. Observing all these transformations of water into steam and steam into water, all these movements of steam and water from one place to another and all the good life consequences of such transformations and movements, you will involuntarily stop with awe at the wonderful harmony that has been heard and seen for centuries between the needs of the life of the continents and the properties of the water that fills the seas and rivers, you will involuntarily exclaim with the psalmist: “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fulfillment thereof, the universe and all who live on it, He founded food on the seas, and prepared food on the rivers” (Ps. 23:1-2). But water provides invaluable services to life not only in the liquid or gaseous state, but also in the solid state, when, apparently, nothing else could be expected from it except cooling and thereby the destruction of all life activity. It is known that all natural bodies expand when heated and contract when cooled. Let us imagine that water, like all other liquids, always and unconditionally follows this general law of nature, i.e. with any heating it expands and, therefore, becomes lighter in the same volume, and with any cooling it contracts and therefore becomes heavier in the same volume. Let us note that the lowest temperature of water in the seas and oceans does not fall below 40 C. And that, therefore, everything living in the waters is not adapted to temperatures below 40. Now let’s imagine such a picture. The water in any pool, filled with many living organisms, all has a temperature of 40. But a cold north wind blew and cooled the top layer of this water to 30; Obviously, this layer, following the general law, will compress, become heavier than the rest of the water and sink to the bottom; the same, obviously, will happen with the second layer that took its place, then the third, and so on, so that finally all the water will receive a temperature of 30. But the wind becomes colder, and all the water, both above and below, gradually drops to 20, to 10 and, finally, approaches 00, i.e. the temperature at which it turns into ice. This mere exposure to such a cold environment will end the lives of many more delicate and weaker organisms. But when all the water freezes, then all the strongest organisms will inevitably die, because then not only the water surrounding the organisms, but also the water contained in the internal channels of the organisms and in all their tissues will turn into ice for the whole winter. So it would be if visible nature and all the phenomena observed in it were the result of the interaction of natural forces alone, which appeared from nowhere and acted without any deliberate plan and without any intended purpose. Yes, if we put as the basis of all animal and plant life, on the one hand, a substance recognized by its admirers as something dead, self-inactive, and on the other hand, somehow inherent in this substance are tirelessly active and always unchanging forces, then we will have to admit that water should not, cannot deviate from the general law of heat: with a decrease in this heat, or, what is the same, with an increase in cold, water must, like all liquids, to shrink, the ice should be heavier than water, and in winter the water should all freeze, as well as the living organisms in it, for this will be in accordance with the properties of the substance and the laws of action of its inherent forces. But supporters of such a purely material view of life and nature, having eyes, ears and minds, do not see, do not hear and do not understand that in the material nature around us, life is in the foreground, and not matter, which serves only as an instrument of life: that the forces with the help of which matter turns out to be suitable for life are not the products of matter, but rather its managers, acting, contrary to the properties of this matter - deadness and meaninglessness, according to a strictly thought-out plan and always with precisely defined goals, and precisely the goals of life; that all these forces, despite their apparent diversity and often disagreement, represent types of a single force that manifests itself in such diverse ways only for the sake of the diverse needs of life; that the sometimes apparent discrepancy between the actions of forces and the goals of life depends on our narrow understanding of these goals, adapted to a given time, which are often hidden in time and even space more or less significantly removed from us, but that a more expanded look at the actions of the forces of nature leads to the conclusion about their amazing harmony and wise expediency, clearly indicating that the world is not governed by itself, but from eternity by the existing, wise and good Creator and Provider God. Yes, the wise and good Creator of the world provided, even before the creation of this world, that water, which should serve the vital purposes of the world He created, for the sake of these very vital purposes should not limitlessly follow the law of compression from cooling, for such adherence to the general law threatens life, but should receive an exception to the general rule. And we see that water contracts when it is cooled only to 40; with further cooling, the water not only does not compress and not only does not remain in volume 40, but begins to expand, and, moreover, quite significantly; So, from 92 buckets of water at 00, ice also at 00 is no longer 92, but 100 buckets. It is clear that both water below 40 and ice will not sink to the bottom, but will remain on the water surface. But that's not all. Just as water in all states, so ice is a very bad conductor of both heat and cold; heated or cooled even to the point of freezing, any layer of water transfers its heat or cold no further than 1/10 of its thickness. Consequently, the ice that binds our waters in winter serves for these waters and for the plant and animal organisms in them such a reliable protection from the loss of heat and from the penetration of cold to them, compared with which the thickest walls of our dwellings and the most expensive furs of our winter clothes are nothing. We have not yet considered all the beneficial properties of water for life. But, I think, what has been said is enough to recognize the existence of a wondrous harmony between the needs of life and the properties of water, to see in the existence of this harmony the almighty right hand of the Most High, and to quite consciously affirm together with the Apostle: “The invisible things of God from the creation of the world were conceived by the creatures, and His ever-present power and Divinity” (Rom. 1:20). (See: “Past. Sobesed.”, 1897, No. 29.) B. A phenomenon inexplicable by the laws of nature While sorting through my archives, I, the undersigned, found among other manuscripts “Description of a wonderful ice floe found in the Nizhny Novgorod bishop’s house in 1823, March 14th.” At this time I was a student at the Nizhny Novgorod Theological Seminary and was an eyewitness to this ice floe. I present to the readers a phenomenon that is inexplicable by the laws of nature. “On the 14th day of March 1823, in God-saved Nizhny Novgorod, in the bishop’s house between the ice floes brought from the Volga River on the 11th and 13th to this house for cellars, the Right Reverend Moses, Bishop of Nizhny Novgorod, saw in the middle of one of them, a cubic figure, the following wonderful images: 1) A church of an unusual and beautiful figure with the best and proportional architectural accessories, with a dome and a four-pointed cross on it, which, of course, will serve to expose the schismatics, who are in large numbers in the Nizhny Novgorod province. 2) Near this church is a bell tower, separately depicted, similar, but in a smaller form, with the same proportional top and head as the church. 3) Behind the church, at the altar, four people are visible, as if on some kind of elevated portico, kneeling and with their heads bowed to the altar, whom almost all spectators revered as evangelists, and some as monastics. 4) At the church, two saucers are visible, belonging to the chalice and paten, on which small round figures are depicted in the form of prosphora or blessed bread. 5) On the sides of these views, separately and very clearly depicted are views of beautiful and proportional candlesticks with candles, from which one can even see a dying candle and thick smoke coming out, as usually happens when a candle is extinguished. 6) At the top of these views, also separately and clearly, there is a view of a chandelier of the best figure, also with burning candles, and next to it there are two small oil lamps. 7) On the same base as the large views, an oblong figure can be seen separately and clearly, as if on four small bases, which most of the spectators considered to be a tomb, and others for a font. 8) On one side of the ice floe, namely from the outside, there is a view of a tall tower standing separately from other views, and below it, as if into the inside of the ice floe or into a church fence, the entrance gate has a semi-circular top, and below them, through several lines that serve instead of a cornice, another gate similar to the first appears, only in a smaller form, which some of the spectators considered to be a depression above the gate with the icon. A chalice with a paten was missing for these church utensils, but these types were also found and brought to His Eminence by one of the priests in one small ice floe. 9) In the middle of this ice floe there is clearly depicted a chalice of a regular figure, covered with a paten, with some thing lying on it. 10) Around this chalice, separate types of candlesticks were seen, similar to those depicted in the larger first ice floe, only in a smaller form. There are six such candlesticks, of which there are three on one side of the chalice, and the same number on the other, all of which are arranged correctly and in proportion. When looking at these images, they appear to the viewer not to be one-sided, as views are depicted in paintings, but as if cast from the purest silver, and each figure has its own roundness and thickness. When these ice floes melted from the heat, it was revealed that the inside of all these images was empty and filled with only clean air. All these images, when the sun’s rays hit them directly, seemed even more magnificent to the eye and seemed to be clothed in various flowers, so that it was impossible not to feel a special reverence at the sight of them. The people soon learned about this wonderful phenomenon and for a whole week, from 6 o’clock in the morning to 7 o’clock in the evening, they constantly came in crowds to the bishop’s house to look at these wonderful images in the ice floe, and everyone was in awe of this wondrous structure of the creative hands of the supreme Artist and Builder of heavenly Jerusalem, whose mania all nature obeys. His Eminence Moses, Bishop of Nizhny Novgorod, in humility of spirit, looking at these images with heartfelt tenderness, ordered them to be copied as faithfully and as close to the original as possible, and reported this phenomenon to the Minister of Spiritual Affairs and Public Education” 22. (“Shower Thursday”, 1882, November.) 5. Traces of the wisdom and goodness of God, or expediency in the structure of the air element The liquid, thin, transparent, light and endowed with extraordinary expandability, surrounds and, as it were, encircles our Earth on all sides, rushes with it in the celestial spaces and with it inseparably makes an annual revolution around the Sun. It is called air and also the atmosphere, the height of which above the oceans and continents, according to some calculations, extends up to 66 miles, therefore, we are all, as it were, immersed in an ocean of air, just like fish in the denser element - water. The air not only embraces and encircles our Earth, but, in its subtlety, penetrates it, embraces the smallest grains of sand, both individually and in combination with others, fills its waters and penetrates into all the voids, cracks and smallest crevices. No matter how light and insensitive the air may seem to us, its thickness, rising over a considerable space above the ground, gives it an extraordinary heaviness. According to the calculations of observers, the mass of air gravitating on each of us is equal to the weight of 85,600 pounds, or 2,140 pounds - a terrible weight! But Divine wisdom precisely and most perfectly balanced the internal air contained in the pores of our body with this external pressure and made it so that we not only do not faint under the burden of this airy gravity, not only are we not suppressed by it, but we do not even feel it. Air is the first and most important need of life on earth; everything not only moving, but also existing on it has an urgent and constant need for it; and, moreover, for the good of creatures it is necessary that its composition be always the same - in that very balance of constituent parts that the Creator commanded to be from the beginning; otherwise, instead of life, death and destruction would develop on the earth, because each of the gases that make up the air, taken separately, is harmful and deadly in itself. Only the highest wisdom and goodness of the Creator, “who gives us life and breath” (Acts 17:25), from these individually destructive, subtle substances produces and arranges a healthy and beneficial mixture called air, so that truly “in His hand is the soul of all living things and the spirit of every person” (Job 12:10). But Divine Providence did not limit its fatherly care for creatures to the arrangement of only the elements that were healthy and necessary for their breathing. It also constantly takes care of protecting it from the influence of harmful impurities that rise every minute from the earth from the evaporation of waters and swamps, from the decomposition of corpses and rotting of plants, even from the breath of humans and other animals. For this purpose, it gave plants such a wise device, according to which the most unhealthy and even fatal vapors for other creatures constitute the best nutrition for them, which they greedily catch and absorb and then, invisibly and unknown, they process within themselves into bright greenery, into fragrant flowers and fruits. The harmful vapors that remain are then carried away daily by the current of the winds, which, while most conducive to the refreshment and health of the air, at the same time serve other intentions of Divine Providence. Appointed to carry life-giving moisture to different countries, they, like faithful servants, flow swiftly to their work, receive their evaporations from the seas and rivers, crowd and compress them with their movement and form clouds from them, which are then carried on their wings to a distant space to irrigate fields and fields and revitalize the thirsty earth. To form these executors of their commands, the wisdom of God uses the warmth of the rays of the sun. The Earth, revolving around the Sun together with its air shell, successively brings different sides of it under its rays, which the Sun heats up as they pass in front of it; because of this, each section of the atmosphere, heated by the Sun, trying to expand, presses and squeezes the neighboring layers and drives them into the distance. Thus, the layers mutually shift, collide, move back and forth, and from this movement a continuous air flow is formed. Who is accustomed, like Abraham, to practice discipline before the Lord (Gen. 19.27) and together with David, before the sun appears, to appear before the Lord to bless the “morning” of His mercy and truth (Ps. 5.4), he can see the experience of this almost daily. If the air is calm, then with the appearance of the sun on the horizon, a more or less light breeze from the east is suddenly felt, and this is because the sun, heating the air cooled at night from this side, expands and drives it into the distance into neighboring layers. The same successive heating of the air layers by the sun also explains why the winds always blow more or less cool from the north, and warm from the south: in the first case, they rush to us “from snowy treasures,” according to Job’s expression (Job 38:22), or from countries of snow and ice, and in the latter, from hot countries. Divine Providence appointed the same air element for another, no less important need of animals and humans - the communication of various sounds to them. Without this ocean of air, in which we are all immersed, a gloomy and everlasting silence would reign in nature, and neither the majestic heavenly thunders, nor the sounds of human voices, nor the singing of birds, nor musical harmony would be heard. Not a single word, not a single rustle would disturb the deathly silence throughout the entire earth, from one end of it to the other, and we would be deprived not only of many pleasures and pleasures, but also of those various benefits that we now enjoy through the medium of air: for the numerous and varied sounds heard around us are not the most faithful and swift messengers, through which the goodness of God conveys to us countless useful and saving information and warnings for us? How many dangers we avoid through them and how many benefits they bring us! Given the shocking property of the air, a person with the most absent-minded sense, without seeing or touching, easily guesses what is happening around him; if his attention is tuned, then, through the same sense, he learns so many circumstances and actions, the knowledge of which neither sight nor touch can give him! What incalculable benefit comes from the fact that through the vibration of air we can freely express and transmit our thoughts to one another! Doesn’t this constitute an immeasurable and irreplaceable benefit in household work and labor, in family and social relations, and in general in all circumstances of life? Isn’t it wonderfully easier and shorter through this element wisely and purposefully arranged by the Creator to satisfy our needs, fulfill our duties, maintain our well-being, and generally improve our natural and spiritual abilities? The very distribution of vegetation on earth is, to some extent, due to the winds; capturing light seeds and heavy grains in their currents, they sometimes carry them to distant spaces, scatter them across the steppes and fields, lift them to the very tops of the mountains and, thus, contribute to the spread and diversity of vegetation on earth. Is any piece of land left unattended and uncultivated, devastated and abandoned by its inhabitants? The winds, replacing the hardworking hand of the plowman, after a while cover the bare earth with greenery. Finally, without the mediation of this atmosphere surrounding us on all sides and everywhere, the fire would not have ignited and would not have burned. We would not be able to warm up our chilled members, nor illuminate the darkness of the night, nor prepare food for ourselves, nor melt metals, nor enjoy the countless other benefits that we now obtain in the hostel, through fire. How much, therefore, is hidden Divine wisdom and intelligence both in the initial composition of the air, and in the methods of daily purification and refreshment of it, and in the variety of benefits and pleasures that arise from it for man and creatures! What an abyss of paternal care, goodness and foresight of the Creator and Ruler of all creation is revealed in all this, at the most superficial glance! Therefore, let us not pass by these blessings of Him indifferently just because they are ordinary and because we use them every minute. (From “Sunday Thu.”) 6. Traces of the wisdom and goodness of God, or expediency in the arrangement of light Every day a sight unfolds before us that would inexpressibly delight us if we had not looked closely and gotten used to it: as soon as night falls and wraps the sleeping nature in a veil of darkness, the whole world appears to us in the form of a kind of dull desert, immersed in some kind of bleak silence. If this state continued longer than the appointed time, one could say that the Creator, in His anger, plunged us into darkness. But as soon as dawn breaks in the east, a ray of light, as if a messenger from heaven, quickly penetrates this darkness and - with its appearance, the gaze begins to discern the order and structure in nature as before. Little by little, as the light increases, objects are defined more and more sharply and views open up further and further. Soon nature, awakened from sleep, as if smiling at the reborn day, puts on its former magnificent cover, woven for it by the hand of the Creator; Each object takes on its own characteristics, each thing has its own colors and shades, and - an amazing phenomenon! - the gaze, which until then had not discerned anything in the darkness of the night, suddenly reaches to the most distant horizon, embraces the most distant objects as if they were here, nearby! All this magnificent illumination of nature is the action of an element, the lightest and subtlest - air, called to existence before all things with the omnipotent verb: “God said: let there be light, and there was light” (Gen. 1:3)! This subtlest element, elusive in its essence by any art of man, poured by the hand of the Creator in the spaces of the air and on earth, penetrates all things, but it shines only when a ray of the sun excites and shakes it, just as the fire contained in flint becomes perceptible through the touch of steel. The beam, no matter how amazing its subtlety, is not, however, completely uncomplicated. It is easy to unfold, and for this you only need to pass a ray of sunlight through a small hole into a completely closed and dark room. Having caught this beam on paper, we will see a circle of dazzling whiteness. This is how the ray appears to us when nothing separates its constituent parts, but if we place a piece of triangular polished glass (prism) obliquely at the hole, then instead of a bright white circle we will see a magnificent group of seven colors from which the Creator composed the brilliant ray of the sun; these colors always follow one another in the same constant order: first red, then orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. Merged together, they make up that bright whiteness that we saw at first, and taken separately, they serve as the basis for all painting in nature. From the mixture of these initial colors - two, three or more - come all those countless colors and shades with which God decorates and diversifies nature. Thus, with the help of one light, the highest Artist cleans and decorates the earthly dwelling of man with the most varied and delightful pictures. To appreciate the greatness of this gift, bestowed upon us by the wisdom and goodness of Providence, let us note that without the brilliant luminous element we would always remain plunged into deep and joyless darkness, and one can imagine how tiresome and sad our lives would then be! How slowly and monotonously the days would drag on if, deprived of the magnificent spectacle of nature, we obtained the necessary information only by touch, acted only in our thoughts, knew only what was at our fingertips and could prevent the dangers that threaten us with just touch! Meanwhile, with the help of light, we not only avoid all these inconveniences and dangers, but also receive countless benefits and pleasures. With one movement of the eyes we survey everything that is around us, we see and identify for ourselves the most distant objects. Do we need food, clothing, fire, some kind of thing or projectile? One has only to grasp with one's gaze what is required - and our need is satisfied: the light, penetrating into the eyes, immediately shows us the place where the thing we need is located. Should we take a trip? The same light illuminates for us the road, the surrounding area and the entire country to which we are heading. And the spectacle of the splendor of nature, and the quiet radiance of the heavens, and the diversity of areas, and the beauty of flowers, and the decoration of animals - how much pleasure and pleasure it gives a person! How in the contemplation of all the forces and other countless beauties of nature, an ever-flowing and inexhaustible source of peaceful and pure pleasures is revealed to him, elevating the soul and leaving behind neither bitterness nor regrets! And with all this he enjoys the gift from the generous right hand of the good Creator for all, “His shining sun on good and evil” (Matthew 5:45). The wisdom of God, having created light, could, without any constraint for creatures, limit its beneficence to one white color, because, as far as we know, this last one would be very sufficient both to satisfy their needs and for their well-being. But the goodness of the merciful Father of men was not satisfied with this and wanted to profitably combine pleasantness and pleasure: instead of simply illuminating nature, that is, making light out of whiteness and shadows, which would have given it a boring and monotonous appearance, it composed a luminous ray of the sun from seven, as we saw, various colors and, not yet satisfied with that, these very colors, through graceful mixing, decomposes into millions of new countless colors and shades, and all this with such high artistry, with such creative skill and inimitable grace that “not Solomon in all his glory was clothed with one” (Matthew 6:29) from the Krin villages. The most beneficial colors for a person are those that do not irritate at all and least tire the delicate organs of his vision, that is, blue and green, and - behold, we see that the precautionary care of the Creator really created these colors predominant in nature: the blue vault of the sky is spread over a person, and a magnificent carpet of greenery spreads under his feet, so that, sitting or walking, standing or bending, he always predominantly encounters these two colors that are beneficial for the eyes. Let us also note that neither in the azure of the sky nor in the green of the fields will his gaze ever meet a tedious uniformity. In this regard, the goodness of God truly, with paternal thoughtfulness, took care of removing it from nature and its shadow, so that, so to speak, not a single corner of a person’s home would tire his gaze with monotony and would not remain untidy and undecorated. In addition to the countless number of stars that adorn the majestic vault of the sky and twinkle sweetly in its depths at night, the human gaze, at certain hours of the day, encounters on the same vault of heaven either the ruddy color of dawn, or the bright orange or golden sunset of the sun, or multi-colored clouds, or sometimes picturesque reins of lightning or a magnificent rainbow. Likewise, the greenery that covers the earth in the form of a magnificent carpet has countless shades, and no matter how numerous the plant species are, we see a special color in almost every one of them. Animals also present us with no less variety in the color of their clothes and covers, and even in the same breeds the colors constantly change and diversify. All this infinite variety is not a matter of any accident, but the Creator of the world, as the greatest Artist, Himself, so to speak, selects colors and colors for the clothing of His creatures, combining in them brilliance with grace and attractiveness with splendor. Indeed, the fur of a quadruped, the scales of a fish, the feather of a bird, the delicate fabric covering an insect, the wing of a moth or butterfly, taken separately, are not the most elegant works of the highest mind and art, which it would be in vain for human art to imitate? Should we talk about the beauty and splendor of flowers or the graceful lighting of fruits during their ripeness? In addition to the fact that each of the first has its own, so to speak, predominant color, there are so many other colors and shades in the decoration itself! What a free and graceful combination of them! One who considers flowers as the most beautiful creatures, full of freshness and life, cannot help but be touched by the soul and bow down in gratitude before the goodness of the Creator, who scatters so much light and flowers on the tender past, “which exists today and is swept into the cave in the morning” (Matthew 6:30). The same creative goodness, during ripeness, colors the fruits with the brightest colors, so that not a single one of them escapes, so to speak, from the gaze of a person and doubly attracts him to itself - both by the beauty of the appearance and the fragrance of the taste. In general, the phenomena of light in nature are so beneficial, inexpressibly graceful and magnificent that the words of the Wise One can be applied to them in full force: “the eye of seeing will not be satisfied, nor the ear of hearing will be filled” (Eccl. 1:8). But, no matter how beautiful the visible light is and no matter how brilliant and magnificent its manifestations are both in nature and in creatures, both of them are nothing more than some semblance of that invisible and ineffable light, with which “the righteous will one day be enlightened in the Kingdom of the Father” (Matthew 13:43). The apostles on Tabor saw a faint reflection of it, and, moreover, in the merest measure, like mozhahu, and - out of admiration, forgetting all the beauties of the earthly world, they exclaimed in delight: “Lord! It is good for us to be here” (Matthew 17:4). (See: “Sunday Reading,” 1856–1857, p. 190.) 7. Traces of the wisdom and goodness of God, or expediency in the arrangement of plants Let's delve into the composition and life of a tree. Firstly, what is striking about it is that from a small seed, almost homogeneous in composition, over time a huge plant with heterogeneous parts or organs emerges. Secondly, it is surprising that the plant power contained in the seed, entering into a struggle with the enormous force of earthly gravity, overcomes it and draws the plant upward towards the light and sometimes lifts it very high above the ground. Thirdly, each part, or each organ, in the plant is given its own special task, and all the different parts serve to maintain the general life of the plant; here not one thought, but many thoughts and goals are reduced to achieving a common goal. A plant, in a small form, is a semblance of a state in which the inhabitants form different ranks according to the division between them of different types of labor necessary for a common life. The roots of a tree are the same as farmers; they extract from the earth juices with substances beneficial to the whole tree, and the whole tree is established on them; branches and leaves facing the light process these juices and partly use them for themselves, partly return them to the roots and partly produce fruits from them. These are the middle and highest ranks in the state, more or less educated, enjoying the light of science. What are leaves? This is the same as the lungs of animals, only facing outwards. Plants breathe through their leaves. Air enters the leaves through very small holes, which are mostly located on the underside of the leaves so that they do not become clogged with dust or damaged by other causes. Leaves take in those parts of the air that are exhaled by animals and people, as outdated and harmful to them, but they are useful for plants. By taking in these air particles, plants, with their breath, return oxygen gas to the air, which is beneficial for animals, and thus purify the air for animals and people. If there were no plants, the air would be spoiled by the breath of animals and life would be impossible for them. Who put plants and animals in such a relationship with each other that what is harmful to some is beneficial to others, and through this the plant and animal kingdoms mutually support each other? Of course, this was done neither by plants, nor animals, nor the earthly mother, but by the highest intelligent Being. Fourthly, another amazing thing about plants is that, growing from seeds, they again, and many every year, produce new seeds in great abundance, sufficient not only for the continuation of their species, but also for the needs of animals and humans. All scientists agree among themselves that there was a time when there were no plants on the earth, but they appeared after the earth was prepared for their growth. But scientists disagree on the question of how plants appeared on earth. Some, in accordance with the word of God, argue that God Himself, through a special creative action, gave the earth plant power, and it, according to His will, once and for all produced various kinds of cereals and trees, so that they then began to grow on their own; and others, who do not believe in the Lord God, the Creator of the world, say that earthly matter itself in ancient times had the ability to produce plants by its own power. If we agree with the latter, then it means that earthly matter itself must be given the highest intelligence, creative power and foreknowledge. If previously the earth produced plants from itself by its own force, then why did it cease to produce long ago and does not produce now? Plants now grow only from each other through seeds or through the division of roots or branches. Because, they answer, the earth now does not produce plants without seeds, because it is outdated and weakened in productive power. So, the earth foresaw that it would become obsolete, therefore it so wisely produced plants that they began to grow seeds and be reborn from them again, and, moreover, plants produce seeds so wisely that they prepare the first food for them near the sprouts, for not only does the sprout lie in the fruit, but the very first food for it is prepared, like a mother’s milk for a baby. So, in ancient times the earth had not only a great mind that created the plant, but also a foreknowledge that it would lose its productive power. There are obviously incongruities here that are contrary to the common sense of man. In plants, from the beginning of their existence to the end, to their final goals, a great mind is visible, many heterogeneous thoughts are visible. Before creating plants, it is necessary to draw up a plan for their organization, for, as we said, in them each part is given a special task; it is necessary to draw up not only a general plan of the plant, but also of the entire vast, heterogeneous plant kingdom, then it is necessary to place the plants among a number of other creatures so that they serve not for themselves, as insensible creatures, but for living beings, and behold, they not only purify the air for animals with the breath of leaves, but with all their composition they serve for them and for humans; they provide people with food, clothing, shelter, medicine and satisfy other needs. Moreover, they, as works of a higher mind, higher love and beauty, contribute to the development of the human soul. With their marvelous structure they clearly speak of the great Creator of the universe. Do plants need this wondrous beauty of various fragrant flowers, which raises our hearts to the highest beauty of the Creator of the worlds, this eye-pleasing green leaves and slender branches? (See: “Conversations about the fundamental truths of the right faith.” Sergius, Archbishop Vladim.) Appendix Example of feasibility (Neptune's cup - sponge) Not only is every organism a work of art, corresponding to the law of unity, but also every creation, executed together by a collection of living units, is the embodiment of artistic thought. One of the thinkers, a deep naturalist and a true poet at the same time, captured and expressed this truth amazingly well. “I can never look at one of these huge sponges (Neptune's cup) without bowing to the wisdom of Providence. This truly monumental work is erected by myriads of polyps, weak animals huddled in their burrows and crawling half out of there in order to plunge their imperceptible tentacles into the waves. But these polyps are separated from each other and are often located at a distance of a meter: who directs and guides their barely noticeable Tentacles to give their structure harmonious symmetry? When part of the stem of the cup is finished, who announces to the whole colony that it should begin to expand it? Who warns when the moment has come to make a recess in a bowl, sharpen its edges, or furnish its ribs with elegant decorations? Finally, what supreme inspiration indicates to this multitude of workers, separated from each other and confined in their cages, that when casting a cup, artistic proportionality should be observed? I still understand the bee building its cell; the foresight and general order in the work are clear, all employees of which can see each other, communicate and enter into mutual agreements; but, I confess, everything seems incomprehensible to me in the architectural work of Neptune’s cup. My mind refuses to understand and becomes confused. This magnificent building represents the best objection to materialism. Do the physical and chemical sciences explain how different animals communicate with each other when constructing their common home (because it is necessary to assume that they are all guided by one dominant idea)? - Not at all. These proud theories, captivating only by their audacity, are completely powerless” (F.A. Pouchet. Universe. M.). However, the mere fact that these beings communicate with each other does not necessarily constitute the continuous participation of Providence. But this fact plays a secondary role here. There is another, prevailing over everything. Neptune's Cup is a work of art, as Pouchet's beautiful description says. It expresses one harmonic thought in all the variety of parts. In order for the execution of this cup and the means for it to be possible, it is necessary that the plan of the whole work should be inscribed in advance in the very nature of each of the individual builders. Here is a fact that really prevails and belongs in its nature to the field of psychic phenomena: it alone represents the most energetic refutation of any materialistic interpretation. Such a fact distinguishes the vital element of the humble polyp from forces and from matter in the same way as it distinguishes the soul of man from them! (See: Gustav Geer-n. Analysis of the Universe. M, 1898, pp. 464–466.) 8. Traces of the wisdom and goodness of God, or expediency in the structure of the stellar world Let's say a few words about how God reveals himself in the star worlds and throughout the visible universe. What do sciences say about the visible universe? They say that our Earth is a ball that is 12 thousand miles in diameter; it is 143 million miles away from the Sun, and therefore the Sun seems small to us, but in fact, in terms of its mass and gravity, it is equal to 359 and a half thousand earthly globes 23 and consists of material substances similar to the earth, but in a molten and incandescent state. Our earth, with the air surrounding it, flying through space with the greatest speed and flying more than 100,000 versts per hour and more than two and a half million versts per day, makes its course around the Sun for a year or 365 and a quarter days and then again begins to make the same path around it. Flying near the Sun, it at the same time, like a wheel, revolves around itself, or around its axis; because of this, on the side facing the Sun there is day, and on the opposite side, turned away from the Sun, there is night. Since the Earth rotates quickly around its axis, so that the highest, middle parts of the globe, when rotating per hour, make an arc of one and a half thousand miles, it seems to us that it is not the Earth, but the Sun that is moving, just as it seems to those traveling fast on a railroad that it is not they who are moving, but the trees and other objects located near the road that are moving. In addition, during its movement around the Sun, the Earth, in relation to it, throughout the year, alternately takes such a position that on one hemisphere the rays of the Sun fall from a height more directly, or point-blank, which is why there is spring and summer in this part, and on the other hemisphere, opposite, the rays of the Sun at this time fall more indirectly and slide along the earth, which is why there is autumn and winter. Further, astronomy, that is, the science of stars and celestial bodies in general, says that the Moon is a ball, much smaller than the Earth, revolving around the Earth for 29 and a half days; its diameter is almost four times smaller than that of the Earth, and its weight is 80 times lighter than the Earth; is 360 thousand versts from the Earth. The rays of the Sun, falling on the Moon, are reflected from it; through this she shines on the Earth. The Earth also shines with the same reflected light from the sun. Other planets similar to the Earth also make their way around the Sun; some of them are smaller than the Earth, while others are much larger; some are closer to the Sun than the Earth, while others are much further; they all have different speeds of movement around the Sun and around themselves; those that are closer to the Sun fly faster around it, but turn around themselves more slowly; more distant planets have several moons, or satellites, revolving around them (from four to seven); the farthest of the recently discovered planets (Neptune) is five thousand million versts from the Sun, 24 it flies around it six times slower than the Earth and, due to the enormous latitude of the circle it makes, completes its journey around the Sun in more than 164 Earth years. Not without reason, astronomers believe that among the planets there are those that were torn into pieces, and their fragments continue to fly near the sun 25 . Further, from astronomy we learn that the stars we see are huge self-luminous bodies, similar to our Sun or even much larger than it, but due to their extreme distance from us, they seem to be small luminous points; that our Sun revolves around its axis in 25 and a half Earth days and flies around another, larger sun, making more than 200,000 versts per hour; that through large astronomical glasses one can see hundreds of thousands of millions of stars, or suns (up to 500 thousand millions), which are invisible to the naked eye and which are collected in separate groups, or systems; that in the group of luminaries to which our Solar system with the stars we see belongs, there are up to 20 million suns; that light, flying up to 290 thousand versts per second and from our Sun to the Earth 143 million versts passing in 8 minutes with a few seconds (with 13–18 seconds), from the most distant stars, or suns, traveled to the Earth for thousands of years, so that it is very difficult to express in numbers their distance from us, and with all that, no end has been found to the countless suns and worlds. But there will be time, the suns, that is, the stars visible now, will darken. One astronomer saw that a long-observed star during his observations changed its silver-like light to the color of hot coal and then became invisible 26. In addition to self-luminous suns and planets and their satellites, shining with reflected sunlight, there are also comets in the celestial spaces. As one astronomer (Kepler) put it, there are as many of them in the celestial spaces as there are fish in the sea 27; but very many of them are invisible to the naked eye. They consist of light gaseous matter and often have the appearance of a broom with a bright core at the head, facing the sun. In some of the comets great changes occur during observations; one split into two parts and in this form moved away from the eyes of observers. Comets fly near the Sun not along circular, but along elongated paths and cross the paths of the planets, come close to the Sun and, having gone around it, move very far away from it; As they approach the Sun, they fly much faster and cast their light stripes far; They shine with reflected sunlight. Their sizes are very large. The comet of 1843 was 300 million miles long 28; but the matter of comets is much lighter than the earth’s air and is so thin that there is nothing similar to it on Earth in terms of thinness, and if the Earth had passed through a comet, it is believed that no harm would have come from it 29 . Among the comets there are those that move hundreds of thousands of millions of miles away from the Sun. The comet, which appeared in 1680, approached the Sun, circled it at a speed of one and a half million versts per hour and cast a bright streak 150 million versts; it departs from the Sun 123,200 million miles, and its entire journey takes 8,800 years; at the farthest distance from the Sun, its movement is equal only to the flow of a river of average speed 30. No matter how far comets move away from the Sun, the self-luminous star closest to it, that is, the other closest sun, is incomparably further away from ours, exactly 270 times more than the distant comet of 1680 moves away from our Sun. In general, celestial bodies, for the most part quickly, like lightning, flying around each other, move according to such precise and firm laws that astronomers with amazing accuracy calculate their long-term and varied paths many thousands of years in advance and predict the return of comets from distant spaces hundreds and thousands of years in advance and die without waiting for the fulfillment of their predictions, which their descendants are destined to see. What makes huge masses of celestial bodies revolve around each other? Two forces: the force of attraction and the force of rejection, which are inherent in the matter that composes them. The force of mutual attraction between matter particles operates according to two immutable laws. The first law: the more the mass of one matter is greater or heavier than another, the more attraction the first mass exerts on the other, and the less the second attracts the first. The globe is 80 times heavier than the Moon, therefore it attracts the Moon 80 times more, and the Moon attracts the Earth 80 times less. The second law of attraction is that the force of attraction of one mass of matter to another decreases with increasing distance between them, or with the removal of one mass from another, decreases exactly as much as the squares of the distances separating these masses increase; The Moon is 360,000 miles away from the Earth; if you remove it twice, that is, 720,000 versts from the Earth, then the mutual attraction of the Earth and the Moon will weaken not by half, but by two times, that is, by four times; if the Moon is removed from the Earth three times opposite to the present, then their mutual attraction will weaken nine times, etc. Although particles of matter are united by the force of attraction into larger or smaller bodies, they also retain the force of mutual rejection of one from the other, and if this force is helped, then the particles of the body disintegrate; Thus, the heat melts the hardest bodies, and their particles even fly apart. Many objects are broken and separated by the human hand and other forces. In addition to the force of heat and other forces that help the force of particle rejection, it is also helped by the rapid circular motion of the object. When a ball tied on a string is quickly rotated by hand, it tends to break away and fly away, and the faster it rotates, the greater the force of rejection, but the string holds it, and it makes a circular motion near the hand. When a wheel rolls on the ground after rain, particles of the earth stick to it due to the force of attraction, or adhesion; but if the wheel moves, then they fly off again, and the more and the further they fly off, the faster the wheel moves, then, encountering resistance in the air and being attracted by the earth, they fall onto it. The harmonious movement of celestial bodies around each other is mainly based on the struggle between the force of attraction and the force of rejection: the Moon around the Earth, the Earth and other planets around the sun and suns around the suns. The Moon is 80 times lighter than the Earth and is attracted by it, although the Moon also attracts the Earth; but since the attraction of the Earth is much greater, the Moon should fall to the Earth, but it does not fall, because from the very beginning it was given a push, or given a movement, away from the Earth, not opposite, but lateral. The Moon, due to the strength of the movement given to it away from the Earth, tends to break away from the Earth's gravity, just as a ball rotating on a cord near the hand tends to move away from the hand, but the force of the Earth's gravity, like a cord, holds the Moon, and it, obeying equal forces pulling it in different, but not opposite directions, goes along the middle circular path, goes around the Earth in twenty-nine and a half days and, without encountering any obstacles, airless space, repeats the same circles around the Earth, and this continues for thousands of years. According to the same laws of forces, the Earth and other planets move around the sun and lead with them their smaller satellites close to them, not allowing the distant attractive force of the Sun to tear them away from them; however, there are other conditions and reasons why the Earth and other planets move around the Sun, and satellites around the planets, not along perfect circular paths, but along oblate circles, which are called ellipses. Circulating around the Sun, the planets at times approach one another and, exerting mutual attraction on one another, deviate slightly from their paths and, at a mutual distance, again fly along the paths indicated by them near the Sun. From the above it is clear that the forces of attraction and rejection inherent in matter slavishly fulfill the laws given to them and by themselves could not give the heavenly bodies a varied and wonderfully harmonious movement. To give the celestial bodies such movement, everything must be weighed, counted, measured and divided in advance, and this requires the mind. What an immense mind does that Being have, Who for each of the innumerable luminaries, surpassing each other in enormity, calculated in advance with perfect accuracy - both the force of attraction and the counteracting force of repulsion, and the speed of rotation, and the mutual distance, and the mutual approach of the celestial bodies, so that the harmony between their paths would not be destroyed and so that they would not tear each other away from the paths indicated by him and would not collide between yourself? What force is required to give these masses of celestial bodies a rotational movement around themselves and around each other? What force set the worlds in motion? Of course, the force is not mechanical, not material. Matter cannot give itself movement, much less can it give intelligent movement. The worlds were set in motion by the spiritual force, the omnipotent will of the Creator. And everyone can partly see for themselves that this is so. I move my arm, leg and whole body, and through it other objects. By what force? By the power of your will. Therefore, we imagine that wise movement was given to the worlds by the omnipotent will of the highest intelligent Being, or God. It cannot be otherwise, although it remains a mystery to us how our spirit, our will acts on the body and how the highest Divine Spirit acts on the matter of the world. The marvelous, wise laws governing the innumerable celestial bodies, discovered by natural scientists, speak so clearly and loudly of the highest mind and the highest power that created the universe that one famous astronomer, who lived 200 years before us (Isaac Newton), always took off his hat when the word “God” was uttered. In the vast mass of worlds, where some stars or suns predominate over others, nothing is small for the highest Being, although in comparison with Him even the greatest is insignificant. In the visible universe, everything is interconnected, one influences the other. The planets, attracted by the Sun and revolving around it, have a mutual influence on the Sun and on each other. The Small Moon, a satellite of the Earth, although it depends on it in its movement, but itself has an important influence on the position of the Earth during its movement around the Sun 31 . She sheds a gentle and quiet light on the Earth at night. Attracted by the Earth, it itself attracts it to itself and through this it raises water in the seas and produces ebbs and flows in them on its way, and this has a huge impact on plants and animals near the sea shores. If the Moon raises and moves water in the seas, then even more so it influences the vibrations of the air, or the air ocean surrounding the Earth. When the Moon passes between the Sun and the Earth, so that for some places on the Earth it covers the circle of the Sun, that is, it receives the rays of the sun, then a solar eclipse occurs in those places on the Earth. Observations of the Moon contributed greatly to the study of not only the Earth, but also other planets and the Sun itself. With such a great connection between celestial bodies, large and small, there is nothing small in the world, and therefore is still under the wondrous providence of God. And if the Lord God provides for the transitory objects of the visible world, then all the more does he not leave without providence the immortal souls of men who are capable of cognizing and glorifying Him. One intelligent soul is higher than huge masses of lifeless intelligent matter. The forces and laws of the visible world are a reflection of the forces and laws of the spiritual world. Without the spiritual world, neither the beginning nor the final goal of the material world is inexplicable. Just as in the visible world, celestial bodies, with the forces of attraction and repulsion placed in them by the Creator, rotate one around the other: satellites like our Moon around the planets, planets around the suns, suns around other suns with all the bodies subordinate to them; so in the spiritual world, the lower ranks of angels obey the will of the higher ones, and on earth children are to their fathers, fathers to their superiors, superiors to others, to the highest superiors, and the highest of them to the Sovereign; all heavenly and earthly spiritual beings are governed by the one Lord God, whose omnipotent will and power called into being and set the spiritual and material worlds in motion. In the visible universe there are different lights, greater and lesser, there is the bright light of the sun, which is difficult and unsafe for earth-born people to look at; there are second lights: this is the reflection of solar light on the planets and their satellites; There are different lights emitted by earthly objects. So it is in the spiritual world. The first light, which enlightens everything, is the highest Divine mind; from this light the higher angelic minds borrow light and pass it on to the lower ones; There are heterogeneous minds on earth, transmitting their light to other minds. Just as in the visible world the power of warmth spreads and supports life everywhere, so in the spiritual world everything is enlivened by the warmth of love. God is Love, and the spiritual mutual love breathed into beings by Him strengthens families, societies and states and revives the angelic worlds. “Seek God, and your soul will live” (Ps. 68:33). (See: Sergius, Archbishop Vlad. Conversations about the fundamental truths of the Holy Orthodox Faith. Published in 1893) Appendix A: Elements of the Universe We find in the composition of the universe three completely separate kinds of elements: 1. Attic element - heat, electricity, light, force of attraction, known to us only on our planet in separate units, in connection with organic bodies, in which it acts on matter only through physical forces and only through them perceives the sensation of matter. This element is gifted - in its various forms to varying degrees, and in the lower ones only in the beginning - with arbitrariness, inseparable from isolation; in its highest forms, it is gifted, moreover, with the ability to think and feel, and in the human soul - with the ability for clear self-awareness, abstract concepts and limitless self-improvement, which all together can serve as proof of the possibility of its existence outside the body, and then regardless of the conditions of space and time. 2. Inert matter, consisting of various atoms (the existence of which is not arbitrarily assumed, but is proven by indisputable facts), constituting, under the influence of forces, all bodies subject to our senses, occupying a place in space and relating only to space. 3. Forces capable of moving atoms and bodies and putting them in communication with each other, acting on them everywhere in infinite space and, as it were, potentially containing time (because the concept of time arises only from the concept of movement). They act according to immutable laws, therefore, they do not have arbitrariness and are unable to act in their established relationships both to matter and to the animistic element when it creates and animates organisms. From the elements of these three kinds the universe is composed in its harmonious, magnificent diversity. This is in no way just a variety of our sensations. Although light with all its colors, sounds with all their tones, heat are familiar to us only as our sensations, they at the same time constitute the properties of the action of forces, the properties of matter moved by forces. In the universe, everything is in a close and inextricable connection, and no matter how we strive to imagine phenomena in abstraction from our sensations, we cannot free ourselves from subordination to the law of relativity. It is impossible to look for the essence of things in abstraction from their properties and it is strange to imagine various movements in their reality taking place in darkness, silence and cold, as if the idea of ​​a being sparingly gifted, blind, deaf, insensitive is closer to the truth than the idea of ​​a being generously gifted. Not in the absence of a subject, but in connection with the ability to sense, to know everything, phenomena in their essence must be conceivable. What we know is only a particle of the infinite diversity and harmony of reality (see: Gustav Girn. Analysis of the Universe. M„ 1898, pp. 15–16). B. A remarkable fact from the field of geology Divine Revelation teaches about the six-day origin of the whole world and from the beginning of the universe keeps a certain number of years (7.407). Meanwhile, false science, which often gives, instead of mature speeches, only infantile babble, attempts to establish its own foundations of the universe, which contradict the biblical ones. Thus, geology, the science of the formation and structure of the earth’s crust, extends the period of the universe to millions of years, arguing that many layers, for example, coal, cannot be formed faster. Here we naturally remember, first of all, the saying of the Holy Scripture - “ignorant... of the power of God” (Matthew 22:29) - that those who say this forget the most important thing: the Creator, who stands above all laws of nature, created and balanced by Him; but then it turns out that scientists are not yet knowledgeable enough in the field of science itself. What would a geologist say if it were proven to him that coal can be formed in no more than 50 years? After all, from a million to five dozen is a huge distance! And the mentioned fact is obvious to us and was made public by Mr. Meldenke from New York. Here is what he writes: “Mr. Kiesel, a banker and agent in the city of Scranton (North America), who has lived there for a long time, showed me wooden pillars that 50 years ago were placed as supports in coal mines and recently removed from there. These pillars mostly turned into hard coal; in some places a tree is visible, so the suspicion of deception or error is completely eliminated.” Let us note that the pressure that geologists mention was not present here. If so, then it is fair to admit that the conclusions of modern geology, which is still very young, are premature, and it would not be a dream to assume that, having developed, science will prove by experiments and observations the same thing that has long been accepted as truth by the heart of every simple believer" (see: "Sunday Day", 1899, No. 22). C. The properties of the phenomena and laws of the universe require recognition of the existence of God Everything we see only seems so, but in reality everything happens differently. It seems to us that the Sun revolves around us, rising in the morning and setting in the evening, and the Earth on which we live seems motionless. In fact, it's just the opposite: we live on a spinning and flying projectile, thrown into space at a speed seventy-five times greater than the speed of a cannonball. We were now listening with pleasure to the enchanting sounds of a harmonic concert... But there is actually no sound, it is nothing more than a sensation produced by air vibrations of a known amplitude and a known speed - vibrations that in themselves are completely inaudible. Without an auditory nerve, without a brain, we would not know what sound is. In reality there is only movement. The rainbow spread its radiant arc before us; roses and cornflowers, washed by rain, shine and sparkle in the sun; a green meadow, golden grain fields diversify the plain with wonderful tints of colors and colors... But in reality there are no flowers, no colors, not even light, but there are only vibrations of the ether acting on the optic nerve. All appearances are deceiving. The sun warms and fertilizes, the fire burns; in fact, there is no warmth, but only sensations. Heat, like light, is nothing more than a special kind of movement. This invisible divine movement reigns everywhere. Here in front of us is an iron beam, one of those beams that are now usually used in buildings. The beam hangs in the air at a height of five fathoms, resting only with its ends on the opposite walls. Without a doubt, it is hard and durable. A load is hung in its middle - a hundred, two hundred, a thousand pounds - but it does not feel this terrible load, so only a very sensitive level can detect a barely noticeable bend in it. Meanwhile, this beam is made up of particles that do not touch each other, are in constant vibration, moving away from one another under the influence of heat and drawing closer together when cooled. Tell me, please, on what does the strength of this iron beam depend? From his material atoms? Obviously not, because they don't touch each other. This strength lies only in partial attraction, i.e. in immaterial force. A solid body in an absolute sense does not exist at all. Let's take a heavy cast iron core in our hands. This nucleus is made up of invisible particles, or molecules, that do not touch each other; the particles, in turn, are made up of atoms, which certainly do not touch each other. Thus, the continuity represented by the surface of this core and its apparent solidity is nothing more than a deception of the senses. For a mind that could penetrate into its internal structure, could see this structure, our core would appear in the form of a swarm of midges milling around in the air on a warm summer day. The core appears hard; but let us heat it, and it will turn into liquid and flow; Let us heat it up some more, and it will turn into steam and still will not change its properties, its nature: whether it be a liquid or a gas, it will not cease to be iron. At the moment we are in the house. All these walls, floors, wallpaper, furniture, this marble fireplace, all this is made up of particles that are not in contact with each other, and all these composite particles of bodies are in motion, rotating one another. Our own body represents the same thing. It is made up of constantly moving particles. This is a flame that constantly burns and is constantly renewed. It’s the same as a river: standing on the bank, you seem to see the same water in front of you, and yet it is replaced every minute by new water thanks to the constant flow. Each ball of our blood is a special world, and there are five million such worlds in one cubic millimeter. In our arteries and veins, in our body and brain, everything moves, knowing neither time nor rest, everything tirelessly spins in a vital whirlwind, relatively as fast as the whirlwind of celestial bodies. Particle by particle our brain, our eyes, our nerves, our flesh and blood - all our matter is constantly renewed, and renewed so quickly that in a few months our body receives a completely different composition. From considerations based on molecular attraction, it is calculated that in the head of a pin there are no less than eight sextillion atoms, that is, a billion squared times eight thousand (8 x 1021), and these atoms are separated from each other by gaps much larger than their own dimensions, and yet even the most powerful microscopes are not able to show us such gaps. If we wished to count the number of atoms contained in the head of a pin in millions, that is, mentally separating from this number a million every second, then such a count would have to be continued continuously for two hundred and fifty-three thousand years in order to reach the end. In a drop of water, in a pinhead, there are incomparably more atoms than the number of stars in the entire sky known to astronomers armed with the most powerful telescopes. What supports the Earth in the midst of eternal emptiness, what holds the Sun and all the luminaries of the universe? What holds together this long iron beam, spanned across the entire building from end to end, on which several more floors will now be built? What keeps all bodies in shape? - Strength. The entire boundless universe, all objects, all beings, everything that we see, is composed of invisible and weightless atoms. The Universe is dynamism embodied. God is the soul of the universe, but not in the pantheistic sense, but in the theistic sense - recognizing a living, personal, all-wise, all-good and all-powerful God. By him we live and move and are. Just as the soul is the force that moves the body, so the incomprehensible Being is the moving force of the universe! A purely mechanical theory of the universe will always be insufficient in the eyes of a researcher and thinker who penetrates deeper into the nature of things. True, the human will is weak compared to cosmic forces, but still, when I send a train from Paris to Marseille or a ship from Marseille to Suez, I, of my own free will, move some infinitesimal part of the earth’s mass and thereby change the movement of the Moon in its orbit. Dividing and decomposing matter, I finally come to the invisible atom: matter has been destroyed, disappeared like smoke. If my eyes were capable of seeing what is in reality, then my gaze could penetrate the walls, because they are composed of particles separated by spaces; for me all bodies would be transparent, because they are only vortices of atoms. But our bodily eyes do not see what is, and this can only be seen with the eyes of the mind. The evidence of our senses alone cannot be trusted: during the day there are as many stars above our heads as at night, but we do not see them. In nature there is no astronomy, no physics, no chemistry, no mechanics - all these are just human ways of knowing. The Universe is a single and indivisible whole. The infinitely great is identical with the infinitely small. Space can be infinite without being large; time can be eternal without being continuous. Stars and atoms are one and the same. The unity of the universe lies in the invisible, weightless, immaterial force that sets the atoms in motion. If even one atom stopped moving by force, the universe would stop. The Earth revolves around the Sun, the Sun gravitates towards some kind of stellar focus, which itself moves in space; millions, thousands of millions of suns filling the universe rush, fly faster than cannonballs: these stars that seem motionless to us are all suns, rushing through the eternal emptiness at a speed of ten, twenty, thirty million miles a day, striving for some unknown goal, common to all suns, all planets, all satellites, all comets wandering lonely through space... The center of gravity, the fixed point that an inquisitive mind seeks, flees as how we seem to be approaching it, and, in fact, does not exist anywhere. The atoms that make up bodies move relatively as fast as the celestial bodies. Movement controls everything, movement is everything. Even the atom itself is not an inert substance: it is a center of force. What the human being consists of, what constitutes the essence of the human organization, is not at all its material substance, it is not protoplasm, not a cell, not these wonderful and life-giving compounds of carbon with hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen: it is a spiritual, invisible, immaterial force. Only it groups, directs and holds in mutual connection the countless atoms that constitute the marvelous harmony of the living body. That our body quickly decomposes after death, that it slowly decomposes, constantly being renewed throughout life - this does not matter: our soul remains constantly alive. The center of this force is the psychic organizing atom. We can't destroy it. Everything we see is just an optical illusion; there really is only one invisible thing. (See: K. Flammarion. In the skies. St. Petersburg, 1896, pp. 73–79.) D. Force exists independently of the matter it controls. Here is proof of this truth. All celestial bodies strive towards each other; everyone is in a mutual and continuous relationship of light, heat, electricity: the distances between them, more or less enormous, millions, billions of miles, change the tension of these relationships, but cannot destroy them, no matter how great the distances may be. Of course, unconditional emptiness cannot establish these relations: they can only exist thanks to something that fills infinite space. If nothing exists in the universe except matter in motion or in relative rest (as the materialistic doctrine asserts), then this something must obviously be composed of material atoms. If, for example, the phenomena of light arise from the oscillatory motion of material atoms, then it is necessary that the entire infinite space be filled with a gas similar to our atmosphere. But air and all other gases resist, as we know, the movement of the bodies that move in them; a projectile fired from a firearm rapidly loses its speed due to the impacts it inflicts on the material atoms of the atmosphere. But the planets and their satellites are the same projectiles, possessing a speed that is often a hundred or a thousand times greater than the speed imparted to the projectile by some kind of firearm. The material atoms which are supposed to fill space would therefore resist their motion, just as air resists the motion of a nucleus. If the gas filling space were a million times rarer than the air under the bell of the best of air pumps, then it would still little by little slow down the movement of the planets, which would finally fall into the sun. The issue was considered from this point of view by our analysts. Nothing in the perturbations of planetary movements gives the right to allow any resistance in space. The answer, however, is that due to the enormous size of the planetary masses and due to the low density of the interstellar atmosphere, the effect of resistance could not yet be noticed in the short time since man has been able to accurately observe. This objection may seem reasonable: when billions of centuries are available, it is no more difficult to arrest the movement of the Earth than to turn a bird into a mammal. But there is one class of celestial wandering bodies regarding which this objection loses all its force. Comets, which for so long have terrified the human race with their unexpected appearance, emerge from the abysses of space as if to teach us a great lesson in metaphysics. These bodies have mass, are formed, in a word, from matter, but their weight is so small that it cannot be compared at all with any of the smallest planets of our solar system. Babinet, in somewhat hyperbolic language, calls them visible things (des rien visibles); but even if we free this expression from poetic exaggeration, it still remains true that the cometary mass is extremely small. On the other hand, comets are often of enormous volume: the gaseous mass composing them is therefore extremely rarefied, so that it can be compared with the mass of the quasi atmosphere filling space. Since the volume and surface of the comet are very large, and the mass is very small, the movement of these bodies near the Sun should quickly slow down. Among the periodic comets, now very well studied, there is one whose speed, indeed, is continuously decreasing and which is also constantly approaching the Sun, where, without a doubt, it will someday fall. Astronomers have long studied the perturbations of this comet: some were inclined to attribute them to the resistance that it experiences in its movement; others argued that this resistance would in no way explain the movement of the star. The overwhelming majority leaned towards these latter when one of the French astronomers and deep thinkers managed to prove that the perturbations of the comet do not occur from the resistance of the material environment, but because it is very weakly repelled by the Sun as a source of heat. At the same time, Fey enriched astronomy with one of the most important facts and physics with an unexpected discovery; through his desk experience he proved that a really hot body repels other bodies in the most perfect void that we can create with the help of pneumatic machines. The infinite space in which the suns and their planets are scattered is filled, therefore, with something that does not have any of the properties of matter in the proper sense. This something gives rise to the phenomena of attraction and repulsion, light, heat, electricity. This something, in a word, is force, considered in its most general form. Force is by no means a fictitious being, serving to explain phenomena when any other tangible cause turns out to be insufficient. Force exists as a constituent principle of the universe, on the same basis as matter, and on the same basis as the animic principle of every animate being. The doctrine that attempts to explain all phenomena with the help of one element of matter and which forced us to look at the soul of an animate being as an empty phrase is a great error, which has now been completely refuted. Force is neither a fictitious being nor a quality of matter, as is often said; it has the same independent existence as matter, and is a special beginning of the universe. The matter that makes up the body is finite; it has a shape and occupies a limited, unchangeable space. The force, on the contrary, exists not only in the spaces separating the atoms, but also outside the body extends to infinity. So, to illustrate this with an example, two bodies attract in the inverse ratio of the squares of the distances. This great law, discovered by Newton, is confirmed not only for all bodies of our planetary system, but also for other planetary worlds, completely different from ours. It means that only at an infinite distance does attraction become zero; in other words, the force that establishes the relationship between different bodies, which we call attraction, exists everywhere in space, but the tension of the tendency it establishes between bodies to mutually approach each other is a function of the distance and becomes zero only when the distance itself becomes infinite. Laplace proved that if attraction does not act instantly everywhere at once, then the speed of its propagation is, in any case, several hundred million times greater than the speed of light, which, as is known, is about 280,000 versts per second. What we said about universal gravitation can be said, in almost the same words, about other forces. Force, considered in general, is by its nature transcendental, as we say in mathematics, that is, not subject to the finite conditions of time and space. I especially insist on this property of it: it shows us clearly why all efforts to imagine, to depict the action of force, will always remain in vain: that which, by its very nature, does not have a definite form, eludes us as soon as we try to imagine it in some form. Since the time of Newton, incredible efforts have been made to explain gravity, to identify all possible forces; Some explain all forces by electricity, others reduce all phenomena of heat, light, electricity to the effects of gravity. The final result of all these systems, ingenious or absurd, is that force is deprived of the reality of its existence and becomes a pure fiction of our mind, in order to then be destroyed. Until now, I have always used the word strength in the singular. If we take into account all the variety of phenomena, well defined and classified, we come to the conclusion that this word must be used in the plural. It is difficult, for example, to confuse the force that gives rise to the phenomena of universal attraction with that which connects two chemically different atoms, or with that which we call thermal force. In a word, the study of facts leads us so far to the assumption of the existence of several forces, as well as to the assumption of several kinds of atoms constituting as many chemical units. Without guessing anything about what the successes of the natural sciences may reveal to us in the future in this regard, we can currently recognize as special forces: the force of attraction, the force of electricity, the force of heat and light. An important classification of these forces is established, so to speak, by itself. The tension of the first is constant, in other words, the energy with which the celestial bodies gravitate towards each other remains unchanged. The energy of the second and third, on the contrary, fluctuates from one moment to another, and their tension can vary from zero to infinity. These forces, like the power of light, are distinguished, moreover, by a special way of manifestation, very characteristic. We know that heat tends, as they say, to come into equilibrium everywhere. When a warm body is placed opposite a cold one, that is, when the tension of force in one is greater than in the other, and when between them there is an empty space containing no weighty matter or filled with a body that transmits heat, then a movement begins to take place from one to the other, as a result of which the tension decreases in one and increases in the other. This movement is completely different from the movement of matter. It is usually compared to the vibrations of a sounding body. But this is only a very convenient way of representing phenomena and subordinating them to calculation, and not to the expression of truth. The motion of an element, transcendental in nature, must be quite different from the motion of ponderable matter. Manifestation in the form of movement, which heat, light, electricity are capable of, gives these transcendental principles a very special role in the universe. They turn out to be not only causes of movement, forces, but also means of knowledge and mutual circulation of various bodies. The animic principle of an animate being is in communication with the outside world exclusively through their mediation. (See: Gustav Girn. Analysis of the Universe. M., 1898, pp. 56–62.) D. The world did not exist forever: it was created by God in time The idea of ​​the world existing indefinitely in time cannot be allowed at all by modern natural science. And if in words naturalists constantly affirm this eternity, nevertheless, it is not difficult to show that in their research they unconsciously proceed from its denial. Two reasons can be given for this denial: one is quite old, provided by mechanics and physics, and the other is new, proposed by thermochemistry. The second of them confirms the first, and both of them, coming from different principles and leading to the same results, affirm in thought that no logical mistakes were made in them. 1) Modern science tries to consider all phenomena in the world as various types of movement. One of these types of motion is heat. One of its properties is the desire for uniform distribution. But the life of the world is determined by its uneven distribution. When the heat in the world is distributed evenly, life will disappear. The molecular movements of all bodies will be equal, and diversity will disappear in the world. Despite the immutability of the law of conservation of matter and energy, the world will be destroyed, it will plunge into nirvana, plunge into the abyss of indifference. Imagine an innumerable number of atoms, located at an equal distance from each other, performing equal oscillations around their centers, and the oscillations themselves occur in such a way that at the moment when one atom moves, let’s say, to the right, all the other atoms of the universe will move in the same direction to the same distance. What follows from here? That the relation between the atoms will not change, and that although the world will have the same amount of motion as it received at its creation, no motion will be detected in it. Mechanics encourages us to think of such an end of the world as inevitable, even if it is quadrillions of centuries away from us. 2) In the material world we notice the predominant tendency of matter to accumulate, or condense. All chemical elements of nature tend to combine and form more complex particles, and it may very well be that what we call elements are actually already a complex combination of primary elements. Modern chemistry contains up to 70 elements - substances that cannot be decomposed by any means known to us (the number of elements, in fact, has not been established with accuracy. The last element, germanium, was discovered in 1886. Mendeleev predicted its existence and properties long ago in his natural system of elements). Studying the properties of these elements, we find that they have very different degrees of energy and that the more energy an element has, the less often it occurs in the free state. Hydrogen, this energetic element, is not found free on earth at all, we extract it only from compounds; There are huge masses of hydrogen on the Sun; in cosmic nebulae it is the predominant element. Arranging the celestial bodies in a certain order according to the degree of their development, we find that in the nebulae - these world embryos - there are only the most active elements known to us, there are no inactive elements and sometimes there is some problematic element - helium - that is not found on earth. In nebulae and worlds at further stages of development, we notice, on the one hand, a decrease and disappearance of elements with higher degrees of energy, on the other, the gradual appearance of inactive elements. This suggests that these inactive elements are actually compounds - complex bodies formed from more energetic elements. But these inactive elements strive for further connections and for further loss of their energy. Matter in general tends towards aggregation and rest. This desire is the cause of chemical compounds. When such compounds are formed, heat is released, or, more generally speaking, and perhaps more precisely, energy is dissipated. Thermochemical laws, established mainly by Bertolo, partly and others, by the way, and by Russian researchers, oblige us to think that in the future the number of elements will decrease more and more. Oxygen, iron, etc. on earth will have to disappear. Matter in the universe will unite and unite, and at the same time life will disappear. Dissipated energy, distributed evenly throughout the universe and, so to speak, leaving matter, will not counteract this dying of the universe. From the point of view of thermochemistry, the process of world life consists in the transition of matter from a state of extreme dissociation to a bound state, and the universe itself was formed due to the desire of matter for this transition. Now the question arises: why has matter, if it exists from eternity, not reached its final state - complete rest, why has it not yet freed itself from the energy imposed on it and scattered it across the vast spaces of the world? To this question, only one answer can be given, that our “if” is wrong, that matter is not eternal, this world was not from time immemorial, but arose along with time and has not yet had time to go through its life cycle: eternity is too sufficient to achieve any results and any goal. Peering into the fluidity of world life, in the unstoppable flow of which we rush, we, on the basis of studying this existence, must deny it the signs of eternity and infinity. Infinity cannot be made up of arshins or meters, and eternity cannot be made up of years and centuries. What is infinite and eternal is unchangeable. The world in no subsequent minute is what it was in the previous one. And we say: the world is finite and has a beginning. The old objection to this, that we must necessarily think of the world as infinite in both space and time, is no longer significant at the present time, because hardly anyone now imagines space and time as realities, as something in which the constantly changing world fits: space and time are something subjective and themselves are properties of the world, phenomena of the world’s essence, and not the conditions of its existence. This is proven by the recent physical, mathematical and natural scientific considerations: they force us to assert that space and time are really not the essence of reality, they are as real as the color violet or orange, they are only phenomena under which the relations between things are revealed to us (but they, therefore, are not what Kant believed them to be: not a priori forms of sensibility). Let us give one of the reasons for this view. Let us assume that between two given points there are arshins of distance, let us further assume that the arshin - this well-known unit of distance - has decreased by 4 times, and in nature all distances have decreased by 4 times, areas - by 16 times, volumes - by 64 times; Will we notice the change that has taken place, will we notice the change in our own value? No, we won’t notice, because a change in magnitude can only be detected through a change in relations, but in this case the relations between all things remained unchanged. Instead of 4, 16 and 64, we can allow the universe to decrease by A, A 2 and A 3 times, and the result will be the same: there will be no changes in the universe. By arbitrarily increasing A, we can bring it to infinity and, thus, reduce the entire universe to one point. And yet, if now, at this very moment, the universe were reduced to the size of a single point - with the condition that the relations between things remain unchanged - no one would notice the change that had taken place and everyone would still talk about the immeasurability of interplanetary spaces and the enormous distance between the fixed stars. Hence, it is permissible to ask whether the universe really does not lie at one point, or, to put it differently, whether it is not outside space and whether space is not simply a phenomenon, as little objective as color or sound? The answer, they say, can only be in the affirmative. The same reasoning applies to time. If the passage of time became 2, 3 or 5 times faster, no one would notice it. Let's imagine that a year would pass as quickly as a second, that the movement of celestial and terrestrial bodies, the speed of physiological processes would increase in proportion, would we notice this change? No, we didn't notice. And if the entire centuries-old history of the universe were brought together at one point in time, no one would notice this change. From this follows the same conclusion for time as for space, that it is not something objectively existing, but that it is only a form under which we recognize the relations between objects. Recognizing the world as finite, and space and time as its properties, like color and smell, we can say that the world arose along with space and time. Considering the world as infinity, space - as something that really stretches in all directions of existence and time - as something that really determines the possibility of changes, and is not determined by them, we only achieve that reality is incomprehensible and contradictory for us. In order to understand the world, we must imagine it as finite. But if it is finite, then it is not original. None of the things in the world can be a cause of itself, and the world cannot be such a cause for itself, for it cannot be eternal. So, this means that the world received the beginning of its existence from some external force, from something extra-worldly. This extra-worldly force - in contrast to the world and its limitations - must necessarily be thought of by us as infinite and, therefore, in its essence incomprehensible to us; it can be cognized by us only in its relation to the world and in its manifestations in the world. The world must be the free product of this extra-worldly force. This can be done by contradiction. If the world were a necessary work, a necessary emanation of extra-worldly being, then it would be one with this being, it could not be as we know it: the finitude, the completeness of the world tell us about its createdness. In order to understand the world, we must recognize it as created by God, (from the brochure: Prof. M.A. Ak. S. Glagolev: Miracle and Science.) E. Several examples of natural phenomena that testify to the all-wise Creator of the world In nature we notice many phenomena in which a definite purpose for which they exist and to which they are best adapted is clearly visible. Such phenomena convincingly tell us that the world is the work of an intelligent Being who fully knows the relationship between means and ends and has therefore created the right means for certain ends. In addition, in animals we notice actions in which traces of reason are clearly visible, while the producers of these actions themselves, animals, are guided by blind instinct and have no reason. Whose mind is it that is reflected in the actions of animals? Obviously, the mind of their Creator. Let us point out some of these remarkable phenomena. 1) Exclusion of water from the general physical law. We have already talked about this above. 2) How is perspiration moderated in the human body in warm climates? In warm climates, the heat of the sun can produce excessive perspiration in the human body, and excessive perspiration produces relaxation. And therefore, if there were no counteraction in nature to the excessive perspiration that the heat of the sun can produce in our body, then warm climates, so beneficial to man in many other respects, would be unfavorable to the health of people, especially those who must work and be in the open air longer and more often than others. But excessive perspiration in our body is counteracted by the same sun, which is capable of producing it with its warmth. From prolonged exposure to sunlight, our skin becomes thicker, rougher and harder, and through this it becomes less capable of perspiring through itself. Thus, those who are more exposed to the heat of the sun and the danger of relaxation from excessive perspiration, benefit more from the sun's counteraction to excessive perspiration in the body. Wonderful balance! A wise combination of opposite actions in one creation (the sun) for the beneficial balancing of one action by another! Here is the seal of the Creator's wisdom and goodness! It must also be added that even if a person sweats more in hot countries than in temperate climates, the relaxation and lethargy that can result from this are also prevented by the effect of the sun on our body. The famous English physician Kilgur, in his “Lectures on Ordinary Actors of Life,” says that sunlight increases the strength and tension of muscle fibers (see: “Bible for Readers,” Vol. 8. Part I, 1835, mixture, p. c). From all the beneficial effects of the sun on our body that we have indicated, it depends that working people are as strong in tropical as in temperate climates. Moreover, in hot countries a person living in the shade, covered with a dress, is weak, tender, inactive and lazy, but, on the contrary, one who is forced to work almost naked under the rays of the scorching sun is strong, vigorous, active: look at the Chinese mandarin and then at the Arab. 3) The ability of insects to produce a type of tumor on tree leaves by their degeneration. Some insects lay their eggs on tree leaves. But if these testicles were left without any foreign cover, then they could hardly achieve their destination: they could be spoiled by rain, the wind could carry them away, and they would be wasted under the feet of people and animals or from other accidents. But for the eggs, a cozy cover is built, as if by itself, on the leaves, protecting them from rain, wind and various accidents. The insect stings at the place on the leaf where it wants to lay its egg; and from this sting, a kind of tumor is formed on the leaf, inside which the testicle is preserved harmlessly and reaches its destination without hindrance. You can often see such tumors on the leaves: destroy any of them, and inside you will see a barely noticeable insect formed from the egg. Thus, the property of insects to produce by their sting a kind of tumor on tree leaves has a definite and important purpose. 4) The butterfly emerges from the cocoon. The silkworm forms a thin, light thread from the juice of the mulberry leaves it eats and, attaching one end of it to a mulberry tree branch, begins to make strange movements: turning in all directions, it releases thin threads from its lower lip, which it wraps around itself in the same way as we wind a ball of thread. Such a ball is called a cocoon. Inside the cocoon, the silkworm transforms: its legs, eyes, teeth and hairy skin harden and turn into a hard shell; after fourteen days this shell bursts and a butterfly emerges. But in order to emerge into the light, the butterfly still faces an obstacle in the cocoon into which it locked itself as a worm. How can a butterfly get out of its prison? Her paws are weak and cannot break many threads; She doesn’t have her old teeth at all; Her tender tongue is only suitable for drinking sweet juice from flower cups. The butterfly would certainly have to die in its strong prison if there were no special means of emerging into the light. The butterfly has a kind of magic juice: a few drops of this juice are enough to destroy the threads of the cocoon and open the door for the butterfly, through which it flies into the light of God. 5) Mathematical instinct of bees. The actions of pure instinct have never been attributed to the faculty of judgment, and yet they represent the strongest evidence of the existence of an intelligent cause and the unity of intention in the world. The labors of bees are among the most remarkable facts in both respects. Their honeycombs are the same in appearance, proportionality and size wherever we please, and this type is the one that, with the help of the most sophisticated analysis, is recognized by mathematicians as the most convenient and requiring the least labor and material. This discovery was made about a hundred years ago, and even the method that made this possible, i.e., differential calculus, was invented only half a century earlier, while bees have been building according to this unchangeable rule for thousands of years in all countries of the globe. With amazing precision, they choose an angle of 120 degrees for the inclination of the walls of their small cell, which has long been recognized as the best and most convenient, and for the inclination of its roof, angles of 100 and 70 degrees, properties of which not a single person knew until the eighteenth century, until Meclorinus solved the curious problem of maxims and minims, inaccessible to research without differential calculus. (See: “Bible for Readers.” T. XII, mixture, p. 15, 1835; sn. “The Wanderer,” 1870, August.) G. There is no spontaneous generation in the world This scientific axiom points to the existence of God, the author of the first life. In order not to waste time on a historical review, we hasten to make a reservation that, in view of the excellent works of Pasteur, the entire doctrine of spontaneous generation collapses at its foundation and that at present it can only be considered a major mistake. This skilled chemist proved in the most certain way: 1. That certain organic substances, both plant and animal, can be preserved indefinitely, even in contact with air, as long as this air is properly prepared. 2. That this preparation does not require a change in the composition of the air at all, but a simple purification, freeing it from those germs that the atmosphere carries everywhere. 3. That, by collecting atmospheric air in glass vessels with due precautions in different places on the Earth, we can always expect to find, among thirty vessels, two, three, four containing such air as can be brought into contact with organic substances for an indefinite period of time, without causing the generation of any living being. In a word, in the environment of the atmosphere itself there are areas in which there are no embryos. 4. That no organic matter can cause the generation of a living being, even when it decomposes on contact with purified air. 5. That the decomposition of these substances, which occurs naturally in purified air, produces completely different products. 6. That the decay of organic substances is a consequence, and not the cause of the existence of microscopic animals or plants, and that, in a word, in fact, the so-called decay is impossible without these creatures. To these conclusions, which have been summarized as carefully as possible, following the works of Pasteur, we will add one remark of our own. The increase in the number of microscopic animals in the fermented mass does not occur everywhere simultaneously, as it would if this mass, homogeneous in itself, were endowed everywhere with the same creative abilities, but gradually spreads from one part to another. Acetic fermentation of alcohol, for example, occurs, as Pasteur very well proved, only under the condition of the presence of acetic bacterium (bacterium aceti). When in a large vat, about 0.75 square meters wide. fathoms filled with diluted alcohol, put a small particle of acetic mycoderma, the proliferation of bacteria, starting from the place where this particle is located and moving to neighboring ones, occurs quickly. Bacteria, in a word, reproduce in the same way as all other living beings, and, therefore, are equipped with the organs necessary for reproduction. If matter and forces were capable of producing living beings on their own, why would they supply bacteria with this ability, which is unnecessary for them in this case? Why would they refuse the highest power, the power to create, if they really had it? I don’t know if I’m mistaken, but it seems to me that this consideration alone resolves the issue and puts the theory of spontaneous generation among the scientific fables that have their origin in nothing other than the insufficiency of our means of observation. We can now confidently assert that every living being originates in one way or another, but always directly from another, previously existing one. It comes out of an embryo that has already been organized by another being. (Gustav Girn. Analysis of the Universe. M, 1898, pp. 112–114.) 3. Biogenesis. (Life comes from life) The debate about the origin of life has torn the scientific world apart for two hundred years. Two great schools defended completely opposite views: one argued that matter could spontaneously give rise to life, the other that life could only come from pre-existing life. Several years ago, the so-called doctrine of spontaneous generation was revived again thanks to Bastian and a whole series of his experiments on the origin of life. In his own words, he came to the following conclusion: “Both observation and experience,” he says, “indisputably confirm that living matter is constantly being formed anew according to the same laws that govern all the simplest chemical compounds.” That is: life is not the gift of life; it can arise on its own, it can arise spontaneously. This statement called him to the scientific field of a number of researchers, and the highest authorities of biological science again took up the solution of this issue. The necessary experiments can be done by anyone with the skill. Glass vessels are filled three-quarters full with an infusion of hay or other organic matter. This infusion is boiled to kill all living embryos and then hermetically sealed, thereby blocking access to outside air. The air inside the vessel maintains the temperature of boiling water for several hours; it is assumed that all the embryos in it are killed, and therefore, in the event of the appearance of living beings inside the vessels, they seem to be born in it spontaneously. In Bastian's experiments, with all possible precautions taken by him to destroy all the embryos, myriads of living beings appeared in the vessels. And therefore he argued that living beings arose spontaneously. But a number of researchers found two important errors in his experiments. Professor Tyndall repeated the same experiments, but only with scientific precautions to ensure the complete absence of embryos, which constituted his own discovery. He came to the conclusion that in Bastian's experiments, unkilled embryos could still remain in the air inside the vessel. If the air were absolutely pure and without any germs, could these myriads of living beings arise? He placed his vessels in an absolutely pure atmosphere, which is considered the surest proof of the complete absence of germs. Not the slightest trace of life appeared. He modified his experiments in various ways, but the substance in the air, alien to embryos, never gave rise to life. Dallinger pointed out another mistake. He found that the lower beings had a remarkable and persistent vitality. Many of them can survive in temperatures much higher than those to which Bastian exposed them in his experiments. Some embryos survived the effects of fire almost without harm. These experiments put an end to the dispute. A positive solution to this issue now exists in science. As far as science can decide anything, it affirms positively and indisputably that all attempts to generate life from dead matter have been a complete failure. The doctrine of spontaneous generation must be abandoned forever. And all people of science recognize that life can arise only from contact with life. Huxley decisively declares that the doctrine of biogenesis, i.e. about the origin of life only from life has achieved complete victory in our days. And Tyndale, confessing that he would like to see the triumph of the opposite doctrine, is forced to say the following: “I affirm that there is not the slightest reliable experimental evidence in favor of the fact that life can now arise independently of previous life.” (See: Drummond. Natural order in the spiritual world.) I. Resolving objections to expediency in the world The unbelieving mind of false science rises up against the wisdom of God in the world with its objections to expediency. These objections come from both philosophy and science. Descartes rejects the teleological view of nature on the grounds that we cannot know the purposes of the Creator due to the limitations of our minds; but he would be right if we claimed absolute knowledge. Gassendi wittily objected to Descartes that there are cases when God Himself does not want to hide His goals, but reveals them and exposes them to the whole world (in an example of which he points to the valves of the heart). There are more numerous objections from natural science; they consist in indicating exceptions to the law of expediency in the form of the existence of useless organs (for example, the spleen), the so-called. rudimentary organs (mammals in a man, membranous muscle of the neck, vermiform appendix of the cecum, where food does not penetrate, but once penetrated, leads to a disease of the intestinal system, often ending in death); organs, even harmful ones (the serrated sting of a bee and a wasp, which a bee and a wasp can tear out from the body of their enemy, and also tear out their own insides 32. But even if we recognize all the cited facts as reliable (correctly indicated), then the conclusion from them drawn by science (that there is no expediency) would be incorrect; Only the following would be correct: in nature there are expedient phenomena, and there are also inexpedient ones, and therefore, in the end, the expediency of nature is not absolute, but relative. But it is partly like that, and in fact not only in this quantitative sense, but also in a qualitative sense. “The curled horns of rams are instruments of defense, of course, less perfect than the straight horns of bulls, but still they are instruments of defense; the sting of a bee, perhaps, can cause her death, but still it is protection, and in this wearing it is no longer absolutely useless” (Paul-Janet, p. 279). In relation especially to rudimentary organs, the consideration of teleologists (cited, for example, by V. Kudryavtsev: “The Initial Foundations of Philosophy,” ed. 2, p.) has very great force. 264) that “for a correct understanding of the structure and life of nature, one must take into account not only its present state, but also its past history and future development”: what was now useless was or will be useful, and much in nature has the significance of the scaffolding and scaffolding of a building under construction. “Nothing is more consistent with the theory of expediency than the gradual disappearance of useless complications (organs)” (Paul-Janet, p. 276). One cannot deny the significance of the circumstance, sometimes noted in teleology, that the uselessness of many rudimentary organs is imaginary; Thus, the mammary glands in men cannot be considered completely useless, sometimes secreting milk, hair on the head, nails (with the destruction of which the necessary hardness in the extremities of the fingers and even the sense of touch weakens), the frontal and ear muscles in humans, the wings of an ostrich, etc. (see: Ebrard. Apologetics, § 153). To correctly explain some cases of apparent inexpediency, it is also necessary to keep in mind that nature in its creations pursues not only benefit, but also beauty. “Nature is not only a practically useful economy, but also a work of art” (Ebrard. § 153); and therefore it is not reasonable to exclude the aesthetic point of view in the assessment of natural phenomena in general, as is done, however, in the utilitarian-materialistic view of nature, where, although the beautiful in nature is allowed, it is always in conjunction with the useful, and, moreover, in subordination to the useful (thus, Darwinism gives importance to the various decorations of animals, such as their coloring, feathers and birdsong, etc., only as agents in natural selection). The utilitarian point of view of nature encounters a stumbling block in the plant kingdom, especially in the endless variety in it of the forms of leaves, flowers, fruits and the smell of flowers, which have no bearing on the benefits of the plants themselves; here the aesthetic tendency of nature makes itself felt too clearly. But it is also found in other areas of nature, preferably everywhere. Let's take animals and humans. Müller, considering the structure of the motor organs of animals, apparently discovers a major flaw in it, especially in the arrangement of the levers of the legs, which is not entirely consistent with the laws of the lever, requiring that with the least possible amount of labor, the greatest possible movement can be achieved: “muscles in general have (on the levers of the legs) a very indirect effect, not to mention the fact that their ligaments are often placed too close to the points of support.” But such an arrangement is caused both by benefit in the end and by the requirements of beauty: “if nature had arranged the levers of all members (animals) in the most favorable way, then the general structure of their body would have been much more complex, angular and heavy” (in P. Janet, p. 48). Teleology, in addition, can put forward general provisions suitable for explaining all cases of violation of expediency and for establishing the correct relationship to them: a) one should not rush to a verdict on the inexpediency of any given phenomenon, due to our limited knowledge of nature, the lack of “full knowledge of nature in general and in particular” with a complete and clear understanding of the mutual connection of all its parts and phenomena. In any case, the authority of the verdicts should be proportional to knowledge, which is far from complete. It may very well be that the spleen also has some significance in saving the body” (see: P. Janet, p. 270, etc.); in these cases, Darwin establishes the following position: “we know too little about the general economy of an organized being to decide with certainty which modifications can be of greater and which less importance for it” (ibidem, 271). B) In general, it is illogical to draw a conclusion from ignorance of the goal about its absence, especially in the field of organic phenomena, where expediency is a specifically dominant phenomenon, and the phenomena of uselessness are the exception. The laws of the inductive method would require the extension of a principle that well explains the entire organic world to these phenomena. “If the law of the usefulness and adaptability of organs is justified by an infinite number of cases, then it would be completely irrational to question it simply because its presence does not appear in a few cases; for, in all likelihood, the gap that appears falls not on the side of nature, but on the side of our incomplete knowledge” (Paul Janet, p. 272). C) Objections to expediency turn out to be especially powerless in the face of teleology, which stands on the basis of the Christian religion, which provides the best means for the correct explanation of evil in the world without prejudice to the principle of final causes. According to the meaning of the Christian teaching about Divine Providence, the various evils existing in the world (physical and moral) not only do not violate expediency, but provide an opportunity for a special triumph for the beginning of final causes; by the miracle of God’s omnipotence and wisdom, all evil, even sin, is directed towards good goals and turns from evil into good (for example, the great atrocity on Calvary); evil thus becomes expedient as a means to good. The non-contradiction of existing evil with the law of expediency follows not only from the doctrine of Providence, but also from the doctrine of atonement, especially in connection with other teachings that are part of soteriology, and from the entire Christian worldview in general. According to the view of scientific and philosophical teleology, nature, or the whole world, is designed for the unchanging, purposeful continuation of its existence. From the point of view of this general goal of the world (its preservation), illness, struggle, suffering, death, etc. are evil, standing in direct contradiction to the purpose of the world. But in Christianity there is and may be a different point of view on these and similar phenomena due to the difference in the teaching about the final common goal of the world. The preservation of peace in its statu quo is not recognized as such; preservation could only be the primary goal of the world - before the Fall and the appearance of evil in it. With the advent of evil, the primary goal gives way to a secondary one: it consists in the liberation, or redemption, of the world from evil, not just one person, but all his creatures, equally sharing the burden of evil with him (Rom. 8:19). Not the preservation of this world, but a new world with a new heaven and a new earth through the gradual transformation of this world (2 Peter 3:13) - this is the final goal and task of the world process indicated by Revelation! From the point of view of this goal, there can be no question of violating the principle of expediency by the existence of physical evil; on the contrary, the very evil of the world, directed by the Wise Providence, serves the purpose of transformation (transformation) of the world, just as the death of a person serves as a condition for the renewal of the body (resurrection), the rotting of grain in the Earth - plants 33. (P. Svetlov, priest, professor of theology. Scientific evidence of deities, arch. rel.) 9. Facts of expediency in the field of living beings and especially in the structure of the human body We do not intend to present here all those almost innumerable facts that are usually stated with great benefit in treatises of so-called physical theology and which at the same time can speak in favor of expediency; We will limit ourselves to pointing out and considering only a few and the most important of this series of facts as examples, having in mind mainly the ideas that can be deduced from them. The phenomena of living nature, which have an undoubted character of purposefulness, can be reduced to two main groups, of which one can be called a group of functions, and the other a group of instincts. The first of these phenomena (functions) can be defined as the internal actions of organs, and the last (instincts) as the external actions of these organs, and especially the organs of relation. In the examination of functions we will pay attention mainly to the agreement of the organic mechanism with the function, and in the study of instincts - to the agreement of the operating mechanism with the effect that it should produce; from our point of view, the most striking thing in function is the structure of the organ, and the most striking thing in instinct is the action itself. Of all the phenomena of adaptation, the most striking is the structure of the eye in its relation to the act of vision. Here nature had to overcome countless difficulties and fulfill countless conditions 34 for the solution of the problem facing her. The first necessary condition for the function of vision is the existence of a nerve sensitive to light; This is a primary fact, hitherto not amenable to further analysis and therefore inexplicable. So, vision requires, first of all, a nerve endowed with sensitivity, and, moreover, a specific one, not at all similar to sensitivity, for example, tactile. But a nerve simply receptive to light could in itself only serve to distinguish between day and night; to distinguish objects with all their outlines or for vision in the proper sense of the word, something much more is needed - it is precisely a whole optical device that is needed, more or less similar to those optical instruments that create human art. Here is what the famous German physiologist Müller says about this subject: “In order for images of objects to be imprinted on the retina of the eye, it is necessary that the light coming from certain, specific parts of an external object, whether directly or reflected, activate only the parts of the retina corresponding to them, and this requires certain physical conditions. Light emanating from one or another luminous body usually spreads by rays in all directions, if it does not encounter obstacles, so that one luminous point usually illuminates the entire known surface, and not just one point of this surface. If, therefore, the surface exposed to the action of light coming from a certain point is the surface of the retina, then the light from this point should cause a sensation of light everywhere in it, and not just in one part of it; the same must happen with all other luminous points from which light falls on the retina.” It is easy to understand that in this state of affairs there could in no way be vision in the proper sense, i.e. separate and specific; because the retina would only perceive light, but not the images of things. “In order for external light to excite in the eye an image corresponding to an external object, for this it is certainly necessary,” the same physiologist teaches, “the presence of a special projectile, which would be designed in such a way that the light emanating from points a, b, c would act only on isolated points of the retina, located in the same order, and which would not allow one point of the retina to be illuminated at once by several points of the external world.” As for the lens, its structure represents one of the most interesting and striking examples of expediency, namely, what is striking about it, first of all, is the proportional relationship that exists between its convexity and the density of the environment in which the animal is called upon to live. “This lentil,” says Müller, “obviously should be the more dense and convex, the less difference the density of its moisture represents in comparison with the environment in which the animal lives; As a result, in fish, for example, where this difference is very insignificant, the lens is always spherical and the cornea is flat, while in animals living in the air, the cornea is more convex and the lens is flatter.” But this proportionality is understandable only on the assumption that the lens has a known purpose; it does not necessarily follow from purely physical causality, since it can hardly be assumed that liquid media, acting mechanically on the lens, by their pressure alone exactly determine the degree of its convexity, which in this case is necessary for vision; this is obviously a relation of provision and not of necessity. Even more remarkable is another feature of the lens, which has only recently attracted attention. “If the eye were nothing more than one simple camera obscura, all parts of which were unchanged and invariably located at the same distance from an external object, then it is clear that in such a case every object could be visible only at one certain distance. But everyone knows from experience that such imperfection is alien to our vision, for our eye, directed at some object, let’s say, on a shiny metal wire fifteen centimeters away from it, can see this wire in a distinct outline even when it is moved away from it by thirty, and with good vision - even further, by forty and fifty centimeters. This means that our eye has the ability to adapt, which we recognize in it; so, for example, when we turn our gaze to two luminous points located at different distances from us, we clearly feel the effort made by the eye in order to see successively first the closest of them, and then the most distant one.” This ability of the eye has been explained differently by physiologists and physicists, but at present it can be considered proven that one is rooted in the lens. The most accurate experiments have proven that the lens is capable of changing the curvature of the surfaces that surround it. Due to the influence of the will, the essence of which is still unknown, the lens can bend more or less and thereby change the degree of convexity, which determines the refraction of the light ray; these changes in curvature in measurement reach one hundredth of a millimeter, and they are exactly the same as those required by the theory so that the images of objects located at different distances can be clearly imprinted on the retina. This result is confirmed by the observation of cataract sufferers, whose ability to distinguish distances is always very weak. It would not be superfluous to point out in the structure of the eye that feature of it, far from being explained, but not subject to doubt, which is known as achromatism of the eye; it consists in the ability of the eye to correct that defect of lenticular glasses, which in optics is called refraction aberration. When two such glasses of noticeable curvature are located next to each other, then a more or less wide line appears between them, painted with the colors of the rainbow - this happens, at least, with the images of objects if you look into this type of glass. Newton considered this shortcoming of our optical projectiles to be incorrigible. Indeed, it is only partially eliminated in so-called achromatic glasses; but if human art cannot achieve complete achromatism, then the eye naturally possesses it, as can be seen, for example, from the fact that when we look at a white object lying on a black background, we do not notice any intervening feature. It may very well be that this achromatism is not entirely perfect, but still it is quite sufficient for practical use. This property of our eye is not nearly as important for vision as the previous conditions, because even without achromaticity it would see objects separately, but not in the same exact form as it now sees them; but in no way, however, it cannot be denied that with an achromatic eye, distinguishing objects becomes much more convenient. Among the facts of the expedient structure of the organ of vision, let us finally point out the role played in the act of vision by various external organs, which, without making up parts of the eye, serve in some way as its patrons, such as the eyelids and eyelashes. For a long time and without any difficulty, people noticed that these organs protect the eye from clogging with various substances harmful to it, but until recently no one suspected another equally important role of these organs - namely, their ability to retain and not allow the so-called ultraviolet rays to pass to the eye, i.e. those light rays that lie beyond the violet rays in the solar spectrum, and although invisible to the eye, undoubtedly exist, since they have a clear chemical effect on the photographic plate; These rays of light have been proven to be very harmful to the retina of the eye. In addition, Jeanson proved with numerous and precise measurements that these protective media also have the ability to block almost all infrared rays of the light spectrum, which, penetrating into the eye, could destroy too delicate retinal tissue. Thus, thanks to these organs, which seem to be secondary, only those rays of light are transmitted to the nerve that determine the act of vision without damaging its organ. With these facts we can complete the enumeration of what many conditions had to come together in order to make the eye capable of the most important function that it performs in the body. We have dwelled in such detail on the organ of vision because this organ, of all other organs, has the largest number of adaptations, and, moreover, under the most noticeable conditions. But similar observations can be made on the organ of hearing. Of course, this organ cannot be compared with the eye in this respect; in order to ensure the reproduction of images and, after scattered vision, to achieve separate vision, a special, highly complex apparatus is needed; but to make it possible to hear sounds, only some conductor of sound is needed, and since every substance is to a certain extent capable of conducting sound waves, the function of hearing is possible even with any structure of the organ. However, even here nature had to observe many precautions, of which the most important relate to the differences in the environment in which the animal is destined to live. Here is what Müller says about this: “In animals that live in the air, sound waves are transmitted primarily to the solid parts of the body, and in particular the organ of hearing, and from here they go to the watery fluid of the ear labyrinth. The power of hearing in these animals depends, therefore, first of all on the degree to which the solid parts of the auditory organ are capable of receiving air waves, then on the degree of compression experienced by the concussed muscles of these parts at the moment when the vibrations of the air are transmitted to them, and, finally, on the degree to which the labyrinthine water is able to perceive the vibrations occurring in the outer parts of the auditory organ. The entire external part of the organ of hearing is thus designed to make the transmission of air vibrations to solid parts, which in itself presents many difficulties, as easy as possible. As for animals that live and hear in water, the task of hearing is completely different. The medium that transmits sound vibrations here is water; she leads them to the solid parts of the animal's body, from where they go once again into the water of the ear labyrinth. Here the intensity of hearing depends on the degree of force with which the solid parts of the auditory organ are able to perceive the shocks of the water waves produced by the air waves in order to transmit them again to the water, and on the degree of compression experienced by the shaken muscles during this transmission. And here, it means, the entire outer part of the auditory organ is designed to facilitate this transmission.” Thus it appears that the conditions of hearing are everywhere fully adapted to the two different environments in which the animal must live. Let the defenders of the blind mechanism of nature now explain how it is that one purely physical reason, which could not at all have in mind the different properties of one or another environment, nevertheless, in the structure of the organ of hearing was so faithfully adapted to these properties, - why these two different systems of the auditory organ do not meet alternately, by chance, in one and the other environment together, but, on the contrary, a system adapted to air is found only in air, and one adapted to water is found only in water. They can tell us that animals that would not have such an adaptation, deprived of means of defense and self-preservation, inevitably had to die and that is why we do not see traces of them anywhere. But we do not understand at all why animals deprived of hearing should certainly die, when many of them still live without hearing; this deficiency might be compensated by some other means of protection and preservation. Thus, the question: why is the structure of the ear in agreement with its use remains in full force. It is clear that a purely physical and mechanical reason cannot in any way be a sufficient reason for such a correct correspondence. We are afraid to bore the reader by going into the same detailed review of all parts of the organization, although there are very few among them that would not lead to similar conclusions, and we consider it sufficient to point out only the most striking and decisive facts, namely: Firstly, on the shape of the teeth - cutting, tearing and grinding, which are so adapted to the way of life of the animal that for Cuvier they served as the most decisive and characteristic signs of the animal - on the method of their attachment and the strength of the base, so well correlated with the laws of mechanics and with their use, on the enamel covering and protecting them instead of that bony membrane that covers all other bones, but is not suitable for teeth because of its sensitivity and tenderness. Secondly, on the epiglottis, which serves as a kind of door to the windpipe, which descends like a bridge when food enters the esophagus, and rises by itself, as if on a spring, when the food passes, so that the breathing function is not interrupted. Thirdly, on the rounded and elongated fibers of the esophagus, which by their peristaltic movement determine the movement of food, a phenomenon that is absolutely inexplicable from the law of gravity alone: ​​only thanks to this mechanical combination is swallowing possible, despite the horizontal position of the esophagus 35 . Fourthly, to the structure of the heart, so wonderfully adapted to the great function it performs in organization, to its division into two cavities - right and left, without any communication with each other, so that the blood does not pass from one to the other, and their division, in turn, into two others - the ears and the ventricles, whose movements are mutually coordinated in such a way that the contraction of the ears causes the expansion of the ventricles and vice versa; on the concentric and radiant fibers of which the membranes of the heart are composed - fibers whose action is not yet fully known, but which, without any doubt, contribute to that dual movement of expansion and contraction (diastola and systola), which serves as the driving principle of blood circulation; - finally, to various valves, of which the triacicular valve prevents blood from returning from the right ventricle to the right ear, and the sigma-shaped valves do not allow it to return here from the pulmonary artery, just as on the other side the miter-shaped valve prevents the blood from returning from the left ventricle to the left ear, and the sigmoid valves allow blood to pass into the aorta, but do not allow it to return from there. In order to explain without a final cause such a complex and at the same time so simple mechanism: simple in the unity of principle, complex in the multitude of active parts, it must be assumed that some physical cause, acting according to these laws, accidentally came across the most perfect of all possible systems of blood circulation, that at the same time other causes, equally blind, produced the blood itself and, by virtue of other laws, forced it to flow in vessels so well located, and, finally, that this blood circulating in these vessels, due to a new set of circumstances, by an unforeseen accident, turned out to be useful and necessary for the preservation of a living being. Fifthly, on the apparatus of the human voice. “When you study the human voice,” says Müller, “you are amazed at the infinite art with which its organ is constructed. Not a single musical instrument, not even excluding the organ and piano, can stand comparison with it. Some of these instruments, such as the wind trumpets, do not allow the transition from piano to forte, while others, such as all percussion instruments, lack the means of maintaining sound. The organ has two registers - the register of wind pipes and the register of pipes with reeds - and in this respect is similar to the human voice with its registers - chest and falsetto. But none of these instruments combines all the advantageous conditions of sound like the human voice; The voice organ has this advantage over all instruments, that it can convey all the sounds of the musical scale and all their shades by means of one wind pipe, while the most perfect instruments with reeds require a special pipe for each sound. But besides this important advantage, the human voice has another, even more important one - namely, the ability of articulation, which is in such close connection with the expression of thought that thought, apparently, is even impossible without words: this connection has not only a philosophical, but also a physiological basis, for it is known that cerebral paralysis is always accompanied by a more or less complete loss of language. Another coherent series of facts that serve as the basis for the theory of expediency represents the area of ​​phenomena of the so-called animal instinct. It is all the more important for us to state this type of facts because the analogy between function and instinct, in our opinion, should serve as the most important basis for proving the expediency of an organism. This is not the place to expound the theory of instinct, and we will limit ourselves only to borrowing from the naturalists what is most known and probable regarding the nature of this force and its various types. “The main thing that distinguishes instinctive actions from conscious or intelligent actions,” says Milton Edwards, “is that they are not the consequences of imitation and experience, that they are always performed in the same way and, apparently, are not preceded by any foreknowledge of their result or benefit. Reason presupposes judgment and choice, instinct, on the contrary, is a blind impulse that forces an animal to act in a certain way; Although his actions may sometimes be modified by experience, they do not at all depend on him.” And indeed, if all the facts would be decisively against any theory, it would be against the one that would try to explain instinct by the individual experience of the animal. Here, for example, is what Reaumur says about the instincts of bees: “As soon as all the parts of a young bee have time to dry, as soon as its wings gain the ability to move, it already knows everything that it will do throughout its entire life. Let them not be surprised that she was trained so early and so well; after all, she was taught by the same One who created her. She, apparently, knows very well that she was born for society: like other bees, she flies out of the common dwelling and flies, like them, to look for flowers, flies alone, not at all worrying about whether she will be able to return back to the hive, even if this was the first time for her. If she bites into a flower and extracts honey from it, then she does this not so much in order to fortify herself with food, but in order to begin work for the common good, since after the first flight she sometimes brings a collection of unrefined wax. The naturalist Maraldi claims that he saw bees returning to the hive with two large balls of this substance on their wings on the very day they were born.” The same author says about wasps: “I saw how these flies, on the very day of their transformation, flew into the field and divided the prey they brought among the worms.” Another naturalist, by the way, says: “What does a moth do when it comes out of its egg completely naked? Now, after birth, she feels the discomfort of her nakedness, and this inner feeling makes her take care of clothes, she weaves clothes for herself, and when these clothes become very narrow, she has the art of cutting them at the top and bottom and making them spacious, connecting both ends of them. The mother of this animal had the precaution of laying its egg in a place where the newborn could find substance both for its clothing and for its food... The spider and the lion ant have not yet seen, much less eaten, those insects that should serve as food for them, and meanwhile they are already diligently laying out nets for them, making cobwebs, digging ditches... How could a worm, which exists only a few days, and which has been in some underground cave since its birth, invent the art of spinning cocoons, or acquire it by teaching or example? The same must be said about those animals that hatch in the sand by the rays of the sun; As soon as they hatch, they immediately rush into the water without any guide.” “The famous Swammerdam made a similar observation on a water snail, which he himself took out of the uterus fully formed. This little animal, having been thrown into the water, immediately began to swim, move in different directions and use all its organs as well as its mother, and showed equal skill with her, either going into the shell to sink to the bottom, or coming out of it to rise to the surface of the water.” These testimonies and these observations most decisively show that instincts are innate arts and that, therefore, nature (of animals) receives from nature some hidden force or an unknown mechanism, which immediately, without imitation, without experience, without skill, performs a series of actions related to the benefit of the animal. Instinct, then, is an art; but all art is a coherent system of actions adapted to a future definite result; This means that in instinct the distinctive feature of expediency appears in a superlative degree. Let's move on to a review and analysis of different types of instinct. All instincts in general can be divided into the following three main classes: 1) instincts relating to the preservation of the individual, 2) instincts relating to the preservation of the species and 3) instincts relating to the relationships of animals to each other - in other words - individual instincts, domestic or family instincts, and social instincts. 1) Instincts relating to the preservation of the individual. a) Predisposition in animals to a certain type of food. Smell and taste are the tools that guide animals in choosing food; but only a special instinct can be recognized as the main reason inducing animals to eat only that which affects their senses in one way or another. It is remarkable that this instinct sometimes suddenly changes its direction and forces the animal, at a certain period of its development, to completely abandon its previous way of life; for example, known insects in the larval state are carnivores, but in their full form they become herbivores, and vice versa. Regarding this first kind of instincts, it should be noted that even if it were possible to explain them by smell (assuming that each species of animal is guided by sensations that it likes), then it would still remain incomprehensible how the sense of smell is consistent with the benefit of the animal, and why the sense of smell does not attract it to harmful and poisonous substances, since there is no necessary relationship between the pleasure of the external sense and the needs of the internal organization: this exact adaptation of them to each other, apparently, is therefore the result pre-established harmony. b) Means used by carnivores to ensure the acquisition of prey. Here are some great examples. The lion ant moves slowly, and then with difficulty, so its instinct prompts it to dig a small hole in the shape of a funnel in the fine sand, then lie down at the bottom of this trap and wait patiently until some insect falls into this small abyss; if the victim tries to escape or stops his fall, then he stuns him and forces him to fall to the very bottom of the hole, generously showering him with sand using his head and jaws. Spiders set up their traps even more intricately. The arrangement of the threads of their web varies according to the type of spider; sometimes it does not represent any correctness, but sometimes it is so elegant that you wonder how such a small animal could weave such a skillful and such a large warp, such as, for example, the warp of our garden spiders. Some spiders, in addition, also know how to swaddle their prey with this base... “Some fish have the art of spraying drops of water on insects living on aquatic grasses so that they fall into the water.” Thousands of examples of this kind of tricks, the same for each species of animal, used by them from a very early age, therefore, before any imitation and experience, can be given. c) Instinct of accumulation, or reserve. “During the summer, squirrels collect provisions from nuts, acorns, pine and spruce cones and set up their stores for it in hollow trees; They have the custom of making large reserves and placing them in many hiding places, which are easily found in winter, despite the fact that they are covered with snow.” “Another rodent - the Siberian haymaker - not only collects the grass that it will need during a very long winter, but, like our farmers, having cut the healthiest and juiciest herbs, first of all shakes them out so that they dry better in the sun, then rakes them into heaps to protect them from rain and snow, and finally, under each of these warehouses, digs an underground gallery leading to his home, arranging it so that he can conveniently visit his food warehouses when necessary.” d) Instinct of construction. “The silkworm makes a cocoon for its metamorphosis in it; the rabbit digs a hole for itself, the beaver builds a hut.” “The hamster builds himself an underground dwelling with two passages, of which one is curved for throwing out dug up earth, and the other is perpendicular for entry and exit; these passages lead to a certain number of round caves, connected to each other by horizontal passages; of which one serves as the animal’s home, and all the rest as its stores.” “Some spiders (mygales) make a home for themselves, the opening of which is closed by a real door with a hinge - namely, they dig a kind of cylindrical well 8 to 10 centimeters long in clayey soil, cover its walls with a very strong lime mortar, then, from alternating layers of dissolved earth and threads connected into fabric, they build a lid that fits exactly with the opening of the home, which opens only outwards; the hinge on which this door rests is formed by a continuation of fibrous layers, from the point of its contour descending to the walls of the pipe located below, where they form a kind of clamp put on it, which serves as its platband; the outer surface of this cover is rough and hardly differs from the surrounding earth, but its inner surface is smooth; in addition, on the side opposite the hinge, there is a row of small holes into which the animal puts its paws in order to better hold the door when some enemy begins to break into it by force.” 2) Instincts related to the preservation of the species, a) Precautions when laying eggs. “Among the phenomena that can give a clear idea of ​​what instinct is, special attention is drawn to the phenomenon observed in known insects at the time when they lay eggs. These animals will never see their offspring and cannot have any experimental idea of ​​​​what will become of their eggs, and yet they have the habit of placing next to each of their eggs a supply of some substances suitable for feeding the larva that will emerge from them, and this is even in the case when the larva’s lifestyle is completely different from their own and when the food it collects is completely unsuitable and unnecessary for them. It is obvious that in these actions they cannot be guided by any reflection, because even if they had the ability to reflect, they do not have the data that could lead to such conclusions; This means they do all this out of necessity, blindly.” Let us give several examples of instinctive actions of this kind. The following is known about the insect gravedigger (Necrophores): “the female, when going to lay eggs, always tries to bury the corpse of a mole or some other small quadruped in the ground, where she lays the eggs, so that from the first minutes after birth, her offspring are among the substances most capable of serving as food for her.” “Pompiles insects live on leaves when mature, but their larvae are carnivorous; why their mothers, in concern for their feeding, place the corpses of spiders and caterpillars next to their eggs in a nest they have made.” b) Arrangement of nests. The amazing skill that birds display in making nests is so obvious and well known that there is no need to insist on it; It will suffice to give a few examples of it. “One of the most remarkable nests is the nest of saya - a small Indian bird, very close to our bullfinch: its shape resembles a bottle and hangs on several branches, so flexible that not only a monkey, a snake, but even a squirrel cannot reach it; Moreover, in order to make it even more inaccessible to its many enemies, the bird makes a hole in it not from above, but from below, so that it itself can only get into it directly in the air; the nest inside has two compartments, one of which is occupied by the female, sitting on the eggs, and the other by the male, entertaining his girlfriend with singing all the time while she performs her maternal duties.” “Sylvia sutoria, a pretty bird, takes two woody, oblong, spear-shaped leaves and stitches the edges together using a stalk of flexible grass instead of thread; then the female fills the bag thus formed with down and places her offspring in this soft bed.” “The oriole of our countries does the same with the difference that it fastens its nest not with grass, but with threads stolen from the nearest hut; the question is, how did she manage in this case, until art invented spinning wheels and threads? “The great grebes, or pochard (diving duck), hatch their young on a real ferry that floats on the surface of our ponds. This ferry is nothing more than a heap of thick stems of various water herbs; since these stems contain a significant amount of air and since, in addition, when weathering, they emit various gases, these circumstances make the nest made from them lighter than water, and it floats on its surface in secluded places among reeds and reeds. Here - on this improvised vessel - the female warms her offspring on her wet bed; but if some curious person suddenly opens it or something threatens it, then the wild bird plunges one of its wings into the water and, acting with it like an oar, begins to move its home and move away; The little pilot thus drives her fragile boat wherever she wants - it’s a kind of floating island.” 3) Instincts of the public. We will not dwell long on this class of instincts, since they are of much less importance from the point of view that occupies us, and we will limit ourselves to only pointing out two different kinds or classes of societies in the animal world - namely, random societies and permanent societies. Class 1 may include groups of predatory animals - hyenas, wolves, which gather to catch prey, and then disperse again; associations of traveling animals (swallows, pigeons, locusts, herrings), which disintegrate at the end of the journey; entertainment processions of parrots who gather to swim and frolic together in the water, but then scatter, etc. Class 2 should include the well-known colonies of beavers, wasps, bees, and ants.” (Extracted in abbreviation from the book “Final Causes” by Paul Janet, translated from French, 1878) 10. Expediency in the structure of the human body, adapted to self-defense from harmful internal and external influences Let's see what can threaten the body? Here is a classification that we will often have to use: 1) external temperature, 2) injuries, 3) parasites, 4) poisons. These are the enemies you need to watch out for. We will see that most often it is the skin, thanks to its passive resistance, that is excellent for protecting us from all kinds of enemies. First of all, the skin is a wonderful defense apparatus against external temperature, cold and heat. It counteracts the loss of radiant heat so excellently that we have not yet come up with anything better for protection from the cold than clothing made from animal fur. If the hair is shaved, many small animals die; they die from the cold because their excellent protection has been replaced by bare skin, which, although no doubt protects, is not enough. The skin is also a good protector against injury. Even in humans, whose outer skin is less perfect than that of other animals, it is both elastic and strong so much that with severe injuries, the internal organs can be destroyed, but the skin remains intact. There has already been much debate about whether the vortex generated by a passing cannonball can cause death; in fact, it causes destruction of the internal organs while the skin remains apparently intact. For the most part, in animals, the skin, due to its thickness, provides excellent protection; in an elephant, a hippopotamus, or a crocodile, it cannot be penetrated by ordinary bullets from even the best guns; Explosive bullets are needed to destroy this strong cuirass. Wool and feathers not only serve to keep you warm, they also resist injury; the mane of a lion is thick enough to resist the bite and blows of a saber, and all hunters know that if a large bird has folded wings, a large caliber of lead is needed to kill it. Another remarkable property of skin is its resistance to electrical stimulation. It conducts electricity poorly, which allows electrical phenomena occurring inside the body not to dissipate and does not allow electrical vibrations in the air to affect our body. This resistance of the skin is 10 - 30 thousand times greater than that of other organs. When measuring the body's resistance to electric current, the resistance of the internal organs is completely neglected. The skin is completely impenetrable for germs. If the skin is not damaged and the epidermis is intact, then no microbe will ever penetrate through it. The skin also perfectly protects against the penetration of chemical poisons. In classical works they constantly talk about the absorption of poisons through the skin, but this is wrong, and I would rather talk about the inability of absorption by the skin; and in fact, if it exists, it is to the most insignificant degree. You can increase the content of strychnine, arsenic or mercury in a bath a thousand times more than is necessary to kill 10 people, but what? – after an hour in the water there is no evidence that even traces of one of these substances have penetrated the body. It is necessary, of course, to ensure that small amounts of poison do not penetrate the mucous membranes or any damage to the skin. So, the skin does not absorb, and you can touch the most poisonous substances without fear of bad consequences. Thus, in relation to temperature, injury, microbes and poisons, the skin, as we see, is a remarkably well-structured covering that allows the body to complete its development without being subject to the harmful influences of external changes. Before finishing the history of the development of the body's passive self-defense forces, it is necessary to say a few words about the influence of the anatomical arrangement of parts. First of all, the fact is established that the most important organs are best protected. The spinal cord, which is the center of the whole organism, is placed in a cavity with very strong walls, covered, in turn, with a thick muscle layer. The brain is housed in a skull whose strength is incomparable. The eye is protected not only by the bony walls of the orbit and the zygomatic bone, but also by a number of movable protectors: eyebrows, eyelids, eyelashes. On the limbs, the most important parts are located deeper than others. So, for example, arteries are placed deeper than veins, as if nature knew that wounding an artery is more dangerous than violating the integrity of a vein. All these facts make it possible to understand how the normal state of the body can continue, despite sudden changes in the environment and all kinds of dangers. (Extracted in abbreviation from the book “Self-Defense of the Body” by Charles Richet. St. Petersburg, 1895) Methods of self-defense of the body Physiologists divide animals into two classes. Some retain their temperature unchanged, no matter how environmental conditions change: these are warm-blooded animals; others, on the contrary, follow exactly changes in the temperature of the external environment: these are cold-blooded animals. It is clear that we will deal only with warm-blooded animals (mammals and birds), because only they have a known means of self-defense against thermal changes in the environment; for others it is not necessary. First we'll tackle the cold. Most often we have to protect ourselves from the cold because, except for rare exceptions, the ambient temperature is lower than our own; Consequently, one almost always has to get used to cold more than to warmth. The reaction against cold becomes understandable if we assume that we imagine chemical devices that produce and lose heat; hence the double path to adaptation, in relation to the formation and loss of heat. This regulation can be compared to the balance in business that a businessman tries to maintain, either increasing his earnings or reducing his expenses. We have a consuming device - thermal radiation, and a producing device - the formation of heat inside the body. Let us first see what the processes are by which the change in radiation emission is regulated. In the normal state we lose a certain amount of heat through radiation; This can be verified by placing an animal in a calorimeter - this is our heat loss; The greater the radiation emission, the more heat we waste. Numerous experiments have proven that radiation emission increases with increasing temperature. If we measure the amount of heat lost by a rabbit at a temperature from 0 + 15°, we will see that at 0° it is very small, at 15° it is much greater, as a result of which equilibrium occurs with the external temperature; as if it were designed precisely to lose more heat when it is hot, and as if it realizes that it must retain all its warmth when the temperature drops, and spends it more boldly when it rises. This regulation in most cases occurs due to changes in blood circulation on the surface of the skin. The more blood flows along the skin periphery, the greater the radiation emission. When there is flushing and redness of the skin, then radiation emission is increased; when capillary circulation decreases, heat emission immediately decreases. This is proven by the simplest observation. When the external temperature rises, the skin turns red, blood rushes to the face, the temperature of the extremities rises, and the body can lose more heat because it is warm outside. On the contrary, if the external temperature drops, the skin turns pale, discolored, the limbs become cold, anemic, blood circulation in the skin reaches a minimum so as not to lose precious heat, so necessary for the internal organs. If we assume that the amount of radiation at 0° is 1000, then at 5° it is 1600, 10° 2000, 14° 2600 (this is for a rabbit). It is very important to focus our attention on this fact, because it establishes a fairly definite difference between a living being and an inert object. The latter loses more heat, the lower the temperature of the environment. Newton perfectly proved that with the same surface, radiation emission is completely proportional to the difference between the temperature of the body and the environment. Therefore, in order to not obey Newton’s law and behave completely backward, a living creature must have an active regulator, which consists in changing the skin blood circulation. It is quite difficult in calorimetric experiments to separate the part of the heat occurring as a result of radiation from that generated as a result of its increased production. But in general, when determining the amount of heat generated by a rabbit, we only know that part that occurs due to radiation. If, however, the measurement continues for a long time, then it is clear that only if the same temperature is constantly maintained, the entire amount of heat released occurs by radiation. It would be better to correctly determine the formation of heat by measuring chemical processes, i.e. oxygen consumption, because the latter is always accompanied by the formation of heat and both processes occur in parallel. Let's see how external temperature affects oxygen consumption. The result is very clear. As the outside temperature decreases, it increases; here is an excellent regulator, thanks to which the animal can withstand external cold for a long time. Obviously, such regulation can only occur through the nervous system, and, moreover, it is different for different creatures, because various tissues, muscles, glands, mucous membranes are almost the same in large and small creatures, but their nervous system reacts completely differently. In small ones, where a lot of heat is needed, it enhances combustion, in large ones, in which there is less heat loss, it weakens the combustion force. The following experience confirms this position. If you take two dogs of different heights, it turns out that the amount of oxidation is inversely proportional to growth. Dogs are especially suitable for such experiments because they come in a wide range of weights. This difference in burning power between large and small dogs depends on the nervous system. If, in fact, chloral is given to animals, the difference disappears: large and small animals release the same amount of heat per unit of weight, this is clear proof of the importance of the nervous system in regulating the intensity of combustion, because when it is paralyzed, it is proportional to the mass, and not to the surface of radiation. There is another way to carry out this experiment without a calorimeter; it is necessary to give chloral to two dogs, large and small, at the same time; Left to the influence of the cold, both freeze, but the small animal incomparably sooner. All these facts lead us to the main conclusion that only thanks to the nervous system is it possible to maintain a constant temperature of an animal; it balances the chemical processes of combustion - the source of animal heat - with radiation into the environment, which, in turn, depends on the ambient temperature and the size of the radiation surface. All tissues of the body participate in combustion, but the main role really belongs to the muscles, first of all because they make up 50% of the whole body by weight, then because oxidation occurs more intensely in them than in other tissues, so much so that it accounts for 75% of all oxidation. As a result, the muscles primarily fight against the cold, and their contraction is the main source of heat. A sleeping person, therefore motionless, will die of cold if he is not dressed warmly; The best way to warm up when there is no other source of heat at your disposal is vigorous movement. Instinct leads us to this, and you don’t need to be a physiologist at all to know that by walking and muscular work you can maintain the constancy of your temperature even in very extreme cold. But besides instinct, there are also special reflexes: trembling, a reflex movement that seeks to warm the body by contracting various muscles. When exposed to cold, we begin to tremble, and all our muscles contract involuntarily; the latter rhythmically covers all muscles, interrupting at certain intervals. Obviously, it occurs due to irritation of the skin by a feeling of cold, i.e. reflex origin. In a chlorinated animal, when the skin is irritated by cold, trembling does not appear. Now you understand by what means we actively fight against the influence of cold. This struggle, mind you, is absolutely real. When we are healthy, our body temperature, despite its sharp fluctuations in the environment, is constantly normal. With fever and poisoning, regulation is deeply disturbed. Since the mechanism of fever itself is of little interest to us here, we will assume, and this is almost probable, that it occurs as a result of a violation of the mechanism of our thermal regulator. Resistance to heat is the same as to cold, but its mechanism is completely different. If the body produces a certain amount of heat, then a certain amount of radiation is necessary so that it does not accumulate in the body and produce dangerous symptoms. If, for example, the external temperature rises to 30–32, then this will be enough for the temperature of our body, if there are no conditions for cooling, to rise above normal solely due to its accumulation from internal combustion with insufficient cooling outside. To cool down, the body has the only universal method - the evaporation of water. In humans and many animals, cooling depends on sweating. It is difficult to even imagine that sweat has a different meaning, because it is a very liquid secretion, containing almost no dense substances and therefore having only an insignificant excretory value. In other words, the meaning of sweat is purely physical (evaporation and cooling); its chemical role is apparently completely negative. But the physical meaning is very important. It's about protecting the body from excess heat. Every time one gram of sweat, appearing on the surface of the skin, evaporates, disappearing into the atmosphere, the skin and, therefore, the blood cools by 575 microcalories (heat units), which is absolutely enough for the most precise regulation of heat. Skin evaporation is subject to reflex influences. Indeed, it has been proven that the sweat glands are subject to nervous influences: just as when the chordae tympani is irritated, an abundant secretion of saliva occurs, so sweating increases when the sweat nerves are irritated. So, the separation of sweat is of a reflex nature. When the skin warms up, the cutaneous nerves transmit excitation to the centers, causing the release of sweat. This very important phenomenon can be easily demonstrated. It is enough to enter a room with a temperature of 35° for small drops of sweat to immediately appear on the skin, which quickly evaporates and produces cooling. Only thanks to this cooling of the skin can it withstand significantly increased ambient temperatures for a long time. In Senegal, for example, or Aden, the temperature in the shade sometimes reaches 45–50°. In the heating room of large ships, especially in some places, such as the Red Sea, the temperature rises to 65°. True, Europeans can hardly stand this temperature, but some blacks and Arabs can stay there for about an hour. At the end of the last century, English physiologists showed that it is possible to remain in a chamber at 100° for several minutes if the air is dry. As soon as they enter, there is a profuse secretion of sweat, and the evaporation of this sweat lowers the body temperature so much that it does not rise above normal. Studying more closely the phenomena of skin sweating, we find the same double process of protection as with trembling. We can observe the separation of sweat of reflex and central origin. We observe reflex sweat, for example, when we enter a heated chamber. Before the body temperature changes, stimulation of the skin nerves causes a reflexive release of sweat. The nervous system, notified by skin sensitivity, sends an impulse to the sweat glands, sweat is released, which immediately evaporates and produces cooling. But this formation of sweat also occurs when the body is warmed when the temperature of the external environment does not change. A subject performing great muscular work sweats profusely to cool down. It is clear that this separation of sweat is not of reflex origin, since the external temperature has not changed; but he sweats because the nerve centers, being warmed, are excited in such a way as to cause the separation of sweat. So, trembling and sweat are examples of a dual mechanism, reflexive and central, as a process of self-defense of the body. Many mammals and birds do not secrete appreciable amounts of liquid on their surfaces. Humans and horses sweat more than any other animal. Nature has created a different evaporation apparatus for them. Cooling is achieved continuously through the same physical phenomenon, i.e. evaporation of a certain amount of water; but this function is performed by very different devices. When dogs are hot, either as a result of being in the sun or running fast, they always breathe very quickly, panting and out of breath, with their tongue hanging out; There was little interest in the mechanism and purpose of such accelerated breathing. I will indicate in a few words the nature of this important function. For simplicity, we will call this accelerated breathing shortness of breath. If you expose a dog to the sun's rays in the summer, then after a few minutes the breathing rhythm accelerates and remains so the entire time the dog is in the sun. Of course, in this case, the irritation is a reflex, because, on the one hand, her own temperature does not change, on the other hand, if the central nervous system is paralyzed, shortness of breath does not appear. The experience can be very clear if two dogs, one of which is chlorized, are exposed to sunlight. The latter will breathe with the same mouth, and its temperature will rise significantly. On the contrary, a normal animal will begin to breathe at a faster rate and, cooling through pulmonary evaporation of water, will maintain its temperature at normal. In general, anesthesia through chloral perfectly demonstrates the role of the nervous system as a heat regulator and protector of the body against excessive heating and cooling. When the nervous system is paralyzed, no regulation is possible. But such shortness of breath can also be of central origin, as we saw in relation to central tremors and the same separation of sweat. If, in fact, instead of a change in the external environment, we somehow heat the blood, for example, by intense running, then we will see that when the temperature rises (in dogs, quite accurately up to 41.7 °), shortness of breath will appear; the latter does not depend on the peripheral nerves because the environment remains the same. Apparently, warmed blood excites the nerve centers and causes shortness of breath. Nature seems to have provided another apparatus to help the first when it becomes insufficient. Most often, under normal living conditions, reflex shortness of breath is sufficient; but if, despite this method of cooling, the body warms up and reaches a dangerous state, then the nerve centers begin to act and produce an even greater acceleration of breathing. There are two ways of acting on the nerve centers: firstly, irritation of the sensory nerves and, secondly, a change in the temperature of the blood itself. Accelerated breathing produces cooling because each breath contains a certain amount of water in the vapor state. This water, evaporating, lowers the temperature, and the blood brought by the pulmonary veins to the left heart is noticeably cooled. Each exhalation cools in proportion to the amount of water it contains. This amount, thanks to the structure of the lung, which has such an extensive surface for evaporation, is almost equal to the amount that saturates the air at 35°. Therefore, the amount of water is proportional to the amount of air exhaled; and if we assume that all breaths are equal, then we will come to the absolutely precise conclusion that the cooling of the body is proportional to the rhythm of breathing. I could quote many experiences, but I will limit myself to only two. If a warm and rapidly breathing animal is placed on a sensitive scale, its weight is found to rapidly decrease, and this lost weight can be attributed solely to the amount of water excreted by the lungs. By weighing, the amount of heat lost due to this release of water can be determined. Another experiment involves covering a dog's mouth and exposing it to the sun. Thus, she cannot breathe quickly, since for this the airways must be completely free. Such a dog with its mouth covered (if the external temperature is elevated) dies after half an hour from excessive heat, because it could not cool itself through the evaporation of water. So, we can now form a general idea of ​​the body’s defense against cold and heat, which only warm-blooded animals possess and which consists in maintaining a constant internal temperature. First of all, there is passive protection through skin that does not conduct heat well, especially if it is covered with thick hair or has a thick subcutaneous fat layer. Then, the animal can increase or decrease the radiation emission at will. Since the latter is a function of surface, animals with a larger surface (relative to their weight) should produce more heat, which they achieve thanks to their excitable nervous system, which controls these changes. The animal fights against the cold by shivering, i.e. involuntary muscle work. It fights against heat by evaporation of water, which, depending on the anatomical structure, occurs on the surface of the skin or lungs; reflex or central shortness of breath, reflex or central sweating appear. So amazingly is the protection of a warm-blooded animal, and the regulation is so perfect that our best physical apparatus can only with difficulty compare with them. (Extracted in abbreviation: Charles Richet. Self-defense of the body. St. Petersburg, 1895, pp. 18–35.) Every living creature is subject to injury (injury). Therefore, he needs to vigorously guard himself against this cause of destruction and death. And it is, indeed, gifted with amazing means of protection against injury. We will divide them into protective, immediate and sequential. A protective method can only be of a psychic nature, because foresight requires intellect. The reflex mechanism works immediately after irritation, but in order to anticipate and warn, it is necessary to have intelligence. We, of course, will not talk here about defense as a consequence of the conscious phenomenon of forethought, but only about manifestations of instinctive, spontaneous defense, characteristic of all individuals of the same species, independent of education or memory. Although involuntary and common to everyone, it is still a mental phenomenon that presupposes intelligence. By examining the instinctive sensations evoked in us by objects and beings, we can distinguish two classes: sensations of attraction and repulsion. Here we will have in mind only the latter sensations, because we are talking about defense against enemies; they can be reduced to one type - the feeling of fear. Fear, or apprehension, warns us of danger that threatens us. Fear is caused by unfamiliar, dangerous objects until you get used to them. A horse, a dog, even a person gets scared when an object appears in front of them that they have never seen before. There are, however, well-known objects that are familiar to us, which, nevertheless, evoke a feeling of fear in us. These are, first of all, dangerous animals. Here, for example, is the instinctive fear that snakes (and animals similar to them) inspire in almost all mammals and birds! If you put a snake in a monkey's cage, the monkey will show all the signs of extreme fear. This is, perhaps, a reflex, but a mental one, because its origin requires a complex mental act. One of the modifications of the feeling of fear is the feeling of disgust, which, found in relation to dangerous animals, even more often applies to plants and poisons. True, fear and disgust often coincide - and the horror experienced by some people at the sight of a toad or spider contains as much fear as disgust. I will only allow myself to bring closer to the feeling of fear another instinctive feeling that protects us from possible dangers - dizziness; but fear usually arises in relation to animate objects, while dizziness occurs in relation to inanimate ones. It is easy to understand how it is our guardian. Dizziness makes walking completely impossible; further approach to danger, or to what seems to us to be such, is impossible, and we are thus protected from ourselves. I believe that if it were not for this feeling of dizziness, the incidence of falls and dangerous accidents would be much more frequent. As for fear, it sometimes paralyzes, sometimes, on the contrary, it stimulates and excites. Either it prevents you from approaching and being exposed to danger, or, on the contrary, it gives strength to people gripped by fear. Dizziness, disgust or fear - all these instinctive reactions protect us from danger and force us to be prudent. Apparently, nature wanted to protect us from ourselves and for our salvation instilled in us invincible feelings. The first result of injury is an increase in all the forces of a living organism, allowing it to resist the attacking enemy. But if the irritation is too strong and goes beyond measure, if, for example, the matter is about an enemy that is too terrible, against which the fight is impossible, then all the apparatuses are paralyzed. The heart, instead of speeding up, slows down and even stops; the pupil dilates; blood pressure drops; breathing is held; chemical processes are reduced to a minimum. A kind of suspension of life occurs, which saves the subject from the consequences of too strong a traumatic excitement, so that there are degrees of pain that cannot be overcome, and when it comes to them, a temporary cessation of life is more advantageous than the continuation of such a dangerous state. It is here that the action of the reflex apparatus precedes direct defense. But, no matter how important it is, the mental device, the cerebral one, which joins the work of the reflex apparatus - the spinal cord, is even more important. This mental function of self-defense, and specifically immediate, is the feeling of pain. The feeling of pain lies in the fact that any strong stimulation of the nerve of the sensitive sphere causes an unpleasant, painful feeling in the centers of consciousness; as if you do not want to be subjected to its further action, but you also do not dare to despise it. It can be assumed that any too strong irritation of the nerves is dangerous for the normal continuation of life. Therefore, the body should be warned about the danger. It seemed as if nature had looked down upon our intellect and our senses, so that she had endowed us with such a sense of horror against unpleasant painful sensations that we avoid them without reasoning, not because they are dangerous to our lives, but simply because they are too difficult to bear. So, pain is the sentinel of our existence. It protects us from mistakes that we would constantly make if we did not use it for our own salvation. If there were no pain, we would constantly be burned, we would receive wounds and the most severe injuries; we would not be masters of our own health and our strength, and it is very likely that there would not be a second generation of people. People often ask what is the meaning of the existence of physical pain, why there is so much undeserved suffering in nature, so many useless tears. Wonderful! If you thought about it, you would soon realize that this whole mass of suffering is absolutely necessary. Nature's great task is not to make her creatures happy, but to give them life, no matter what the cost! So, life is possible only if trauma inspires us with insurmountable horror. So, the true organ of self-defense is pain, because it is such a powerful, irresistible feeling that all the efforts of our existence are aimed precisely at avoiding it. By protecting ourselves from pain, we thereby avoid influences harmful to our body. Let's look at how the airways are protected. It is very important that the lungs, the organ of blood purification, are not contaminated or clogged with foreign bodies; in addition, they must be wide open to the outside air: a double task, so perfectly solved by nature! If, in fact, a foreign body enters the nasal cavity, it causes a specific sensation, a special tickling sensation, which entails sneezing. This is a reflex that originates on the nasal mucosa, which is sensitive due to the endings of the nerve branches of the fifth pair in it, the reflex center of which is located in the respiratory centers of the medulla oblongata. Sneezing is the act of inhaling very forcefully followed by a sudden exhalation with the mouth closed. Then the air that entered the lungs during a deep breath, all with force, is expelled through the nasal openings through a sudden involuntary exhalation in order to free the overlying airways from the object that irritates them. This is a reflexive, irresistible act. Let us assume that the object has passed this first obstacle and penetrated further into the larynx; he encounters an almost insurmountable obstacle there. We will not talk about the anatomical location of the epiglottis and larynx, which is generally very convenient for preventing the penetration of food and foreign bodies, liquid and solid, but only about the physiological characteristics of these sensitive apparatuses. If any object comes into contact with the larynx, a remarkable phenomenon occurs: a sudden and complete cessation of breathing. The flow of air through which the object was brought into the lung is suddenly delayed, because the further movement of this dangerous, harmful object must be prevented. Therefore, the mucous membrane of the larynx is innervated by the superior laryngeal nerve, which is endowed with this remarkable ability to stop inhalation when it is severely irritated. Irritation of the mucous membrane not only stops inhalation, but it causes sudden exhalation - coughing. So, what is a cough if not a current of air suddenly exhaled? It moves everything in its path and throws out liquid and dense substances that got there. When, as a result of improper swallowing, some particles of the food mixture enter the larynx, they cause severe coughing attacks, real suffocation, and breathing becomes difficult not due to the presence of a material obstacle in the airway, but because irritation of the mucous membrane powerfully suppresses the motor centers of inhalation, which is why it happens that if the sensory nerves of the larynx are cut, there is no longer any protection against the penetration of foreign substances into it. They enter the larynx and are not expelled by this life-saving cough, which protects the entrance to the airways and closes it to all solid and liquid substances. If dogs die a few days after cutting both vagus nerves, then for the most part this is due to the entry of nutrients into the larynx, trachea and bronchi. The sensitivity of the larynx has disappeared, and there is no longer any protection against the danger of penetration of foreign bodies. Thus, another device is added to the hematopoietic apparatus, which in an amazing way protects life and without which it would probably be impossible. Moreover, it is not only solid and liquid substances that act in this way; irritating gases produce the same effect by the same mechanism, and this not only in the region of the superior laryngeal nerve, but also in the region of the trigeminal nerve, which innervates the nasal openings. Here is a rabbit that is breathing correctly, and you can observe its breathing better if you look at its nostrils rather than at the movements of its chest. You see that with each act of breathing his nostrils open and close. Let's bring a sponge soaked in chloroform to his nose; breathing immediately stops - and often for a long time, even for a minute, then resumes, first in a slow rhythm, then in the same rhythm. The stimulation of the trigeminal nerve caused this cessation of breathing, as if the body realized that it should not continue to inhale air saturated with such a poisonous vapor. Living beings are no less armed for protection against foreign bodies that can penetrate the digestive tract. But this problem is already more difficult to solve. Indeed, food substances, with their mass and irregular shape, are truly foreign substances: however, they are necessary for existence, therefore it is necessary to make a distinction between useful and harmful substances. It is quite difficult to understand how the body accurately distinguishes food from a foreign body. How does the phenomenon occur that food introduced into the pharynx causes the act of swallowing, while a foreign body, for example, a finger, causes vomiting? Analyzing this phenomenon, we see that once the food mixture is introduced into the pharynx, it first of all causes a swallowing movement, which carries the food bolus into the esophagus and stomach. This is normal swallowing. But if this effort of swallowing does not entail the passage of food into the esophagus, then, when this tension intensifies for several moments, a real spasm of the pharynx occurs, which, becoming more and more energetic, spreads to the stomach and causes the onset of vomiting. In other words, prolonged and strong irritation following weakened swallowing produces vomiting, while moderate actual irritation does not disrupt the normal act of swallowing. It seems that the body, having made an attempt to swallow, recognizes its powerlessness and then tries to expel the object that it was unable to carry into the stomach. But, be that as it may, mental preparation plays a very important role in this phenomenon. It is known that some people cannot swallow medicinal wafers, which immediately cause them to experience pharyngeal spasms and vomiting. There is also an organ specially adapted to resist the influence of trauma and the introduction of foreign bodies: this is the eye, the inviolability of which is absolutely necessary for the life of the individual, from the point of view of his intercourse with the outside world. Regardless of its anatomical position, the eye is equipped with an extremely fine system of sensory nerves. As soon as any object, no matter how small, touches the eye, a feeling of pain, photophobia, lacrimation, rush of blood to the eyes and blinking immediately appears. Let's make a brief analysis of these symptoms. First of all, the pain can be very strong and unbearable, although the irritant is minimal. A speck of coal, once on the eye shell, causes very severe pain, which seems completely disproportionate to the quantity and quality of the irritant. Fear of light, the mechanism of which still seems to be one of the darkest, is also a form of pain; and if I were not afraid to exaggerate this whole teleological part of the question, I would say that this photophobia forces the subject not to neglect eye injuries. He will not be able to lead a normal life in full sunlight if danger threatens the integrity of his eye, this main instrument through which his relationship with the outside world is established. To remove the harmful body, a very copious separation of tears occurs, in some way, washing the wounded eye through profuse lacrimation. Blinking is also a process of removal, an imperative and irresistible reflex of self-defense, which, on the one hand, protects the eye from irritation that may recur, and on the other hand, helps remove an already existing irritant. In the same way, thanks to all these means of protection, despite the extreme tenderness of its membranes, the eye remains undamaged, retains its transparency, mobility, charming fidelity, and yet it is located so superficially, so to speak, on guard, exposed more than any other organ to various injuries. These are, as briefly as possible, the immediate means of protecting the body against foreign bodies and wounds. Let's see what the sequential methods are. First of all, Pasteur's remarkable work showed that wounds, in the absence of germs, have the ability to heal and do heal on their own. Apart from a few exceptional cases, wounds fester only in the presence of microbes. A germ-free wound left to its own devices will heal by direct repair if all important organs are also intact. Consequently, we do not need to study inflammation and suppuration - phenomena of microbial origin, but only the formation of a scar of aseptic wound healing. There are three periods in this process. First of all, between the edges of the wound, blood coagulation occurs and fibrinous threads form, which produces the first, preliminary scab. Then, in the second phase, the connective tissue cells affected by the injury form a more resistant scab; relying on fibrinous fibers, they strengthen them; in the third phase, these connective tissue cells multiply and form scar tissue. Reproduction after injury in order to firmly connect both edges of the wound is the main property of a living cell, independent of blood circulation. If a foreign body gets into the wound, the phenomena are similar. Scarring proceeds correctly if the foreign body is aseptic. Scar tissue forms around this body, if it is large. If it is very small in size, microscopic, then the blood leukocytes capture it, like amoebas, the prey that they come across, and which they draw in with their long processes. Thus, if there are no chemical poisons or microbes, the scarring proceeds firmly and quickly, and nature restores the disorder introduced by chance into our organs. This is the vis naturae medicatrix (the healing power of nature) of the ancient authors. But in lower beings this restoration is even more amazing; they experience not only scarring, but also complete recovery. Amazing experiments that Tremblay conducted on hydras in the last century showed that when we cut a hydra into two parts, we see that each of them continues to live and grows into a whole creature. Balbiani saw ciliates that, having been cut, were restored intact if their core remained intact. Old and simple observations taught that if crayfish had their antennae, eyes, or claws cut off, they would regenerate them. This is no longer scarring, as in humans and higher animals, but rather the regeneration of an entire removed part. Even important organs can be restored, at least in lower animals. It is known that Spalanzani cut off the snails' heads and the latter was reborn. Removing the salamander's eye, we see that it is reborn again. Nothing proves the power of this healing power of nature more perfectly than Vulpian's wonderful experiment on the scarring of a tadpole's tail. Left to its own devices under favorable conditions, this tail continues to grow and move for several days, presenting the well-known phenomena of healing. Now let's combine all these amazing processes of protecting the body against wounds and foreign bodies: first of all, there is a protective defense, an instinct that forces us to avoid dangers, i.e. natural enemies in the form of wild and poisonous animals, also objects unknown to us, abysses and cliffs. Fear and disgust are natural sensations of natural self-defense, strong enough that our reasoning mind and our will are unable to resist them. If this protective defense is powerless, then at the very moment of injury there are immediate methods of protection: mental - pain, which inspires us with horror of the wound and forces us immediately to peace, prudence and restraint. Then the physiological reaction is widespread spinal reflexes that strengthen the body's strength, increasing the energy of all its functions and allowing it to better support the fight. Since the airways and digestive tracts are every moment exposed to the possibility of the harmful effects of foreign bodies, a special protective apparatus is located near the first tracts; an imperative, irresistible reflex appears whenever any object enters the larynx or pharynx, so that, except in exceptional cases, very rare, no foreign substance can enter the lungs or stomach. Finally, there is also a consistent defense consisting of the phenomena of scarring and restoration. So, thanks to all these processes of defense among all kinds of enemies, both living and inanimate, the organism continues its existence and development and maintains the integrity of its organs, primarily necessary for life. Of all the enemies that can attack and kill an organism, the most terrible, without a doubt, are parasites; This idea of ​​parasitism has now become so widespread that it completely dominates both in medicine and in surgery. Germs and microbes, as Pasteur wonderfully proved, exist everywhere: these parasites, capable of infecting and infesting living beings, are countless; воздух содержит их бессчетное число. По известным вычислениям, в каждом кубическом метре воздуха их больше 27.000. In water they are contained in countless quantities, for example, the water of the Seine contains 200,000 per 1 liter. Assuming that a person consumes 2 liters of water and 20 cubic meters of air per day, we will see that more than a million germs enter our respiratory and food tract, and this is under normal living conditions, assuming the absence of any special pollution conditions. From this follows the conclusion that all around us there are many germs that threaten us, and it is necessary for the body to defend itself against them. This kind of protection occurs in a similar way to what we saw with injuries. And in fact, strictly speaking, the penetration of a parasite into the body is a real trauma, a violence against which one must protect oneself. So, the first, most effective protection is the skin, which, thanks to its thick epithelial cover, is completely impenetrable if it is not damaged by any injury. But the mucous membranes of the respiratory tract and food are no longer so well protected against microbes. They represent too fragile an obstacle to millions of attacking microbes. However, the liquids secreted by the digestive apparatus have a certain destructive power; but it is weak and insufficient to kill all parasites entering the mouth, esophagus, stomach and intestines. The best proof of the insufficiency of their action is that microbes multiply over the entire surface of the mucous membrane, from the oral cavity to the rectum. Being constantly surrounded by microbes and parasites, the body, however, continues its development, that is, it knows how to free itself and fight against their introduction. The health and normal state of the body lies in a brilliant victory over them. We have just noticed that a million microbes come into contact with the mucous membranes of the respiratory and food tracts. Of these, very few are pathogenic, that is, capable of causing disease; however, all of them, both pathogenic and not, sown in a nutrient broth, develop in it and therefore could multiply in the blood if something did not counteract their development. But they do not reproduce in the blood. Out of a thousand microbes, perhaps one is pathogenic, and probably even fewer. What does such an extraordinary proportion of non-pathogenic microbes mean, if not that higher organisms are so created that for every thousand microbes that they can destroy, there is one that they are not able to kill? The body's defense against microbes can be characterized by the words: “among the countless species of microbes, only a small number are of a pathogenic nature.” If you introduce a harmless powder under the skin, the blood leukocytes immediately rush to grab it, draw it into themselves and try to dissolve it in order to transfer it further to those tissues where its final absorption will take place; thus, the body is freed from the foreign body. This phenomenon is related to another extremely interesting fact discovered by Conheim in 1867, called diapedesis. This is what this diapedesis consists of, which, as you will easily understand, is the most powerful defender of the body against the invasion of microbes. Let a drop of germ-rich water be squirted under the skin. After a few hours, an accumulation of white blood globules will occur at the injection site due to diapedesis, which consists of the release of white blood globules. The following happens. In the first phase, vasodilation, acceleration of blood flow, then (second phase) - in the area of ​​dilated veins, the pressure drops, blood flow slows down, leukocytes, or white blood globules, collect in a thick layer covering the inner surface of the vessel. Third phase: these leukocytes do not remain inert, they release amoeboid processes and try to pass through the vascular endothelium, achieve this and, finally (fourth phase), collect outside the vessels, forming here an accumulation of pus with their sequential emigration. They thus left capillaries in order to come to the aid of an organism threatened by dangerous parasites and destroy them. This is undoubtedly one of the most remarkable phenomena of life, this effort of white cells to mobilize into an entire army to help the attacked organism. As soon as the signal appears, they rush to the battlefield, and a fight breaks out between the hostile parasite and these defenders, who normally live in the blood. But it was not enough to study the mechanism of the release of white balls; they tried to penetrate into its cause, hence a whole series of highly interesting studies arose, which had as their starting point the excellent observation of Leber (1888). He actually established that some substances attract leukocytes, while other chemical agents remain indifferent to them. Currently, this fact has been well studied. Experiments on various microbes and substances have established that the ratio of leukocytes is different. Of all the substances that act attractively on leukocytes, the most active are those that are extracted from the nutrient broth for microbial cultures. But not only microbes and their poisons produce pus. In fact, it was possible to prove that for the formation of pus, i.e. The presence of microbes is not absolutely necessary for the release of white blood cells. Although most often it is pyogenic microbes that are found in pus, it is however possible to experimentally prove the formation of aseptic pus, i.e. pus that does not contain microbes, by injecting, for example, mercury, turpentine oil and other substances that, with complete asepsia, have the ability to irritate leukocytes. Thus, an amazing fact occurs that in the blood of higher beings there live single-celled organisms, independent of the nervous system, freely floating in the blood fluid. These formations, which might be called normal blood parasites, are endowed with a remarkable sensitivity to chemical irritations; as soon as any chemical substance appears in the body that produces destruction or irritation, immediately a whole army of leukocytes appears to absorb it, and since the substances manufactured by microbes are the most powerful irritants of this chemical sensitivity of leukocytes, it follows that the latter has the ability to direct their activity to the destruction of microbes. One general phenomenon during digestion can be generalized and explained by the chemical sensitivity of leukocytes. In fact, it seems that the absorption of fatty substances depends on the activity of leukocytes in the intestine; penetrating into the intestinal tube, they absorb dense particles of the food mixture, then return with their prey to the lymphatic system to deliver to the blood the fats that they found among the dissolved nutrients. So, living cells, leukocytes and others, are gifted with subtle sensitivity and are capable of being influenced at a distance by a wide variety of chemical substances, just as higher organisms, thanks to their sense organs, can detect phenomena of attraction or repulsion in relation to various objects surrounding them. (Compiled from the book: Charles Richet. Self-defense of the body. St. Petersburg, 1895) No matter how difficult it is to define the word “poison,” we can agree that poison is any substance that, due to its chemical properties, has a disastrous effect on the body. There are external and internal poisons, i.e. substances coming from outside or formed inside, since the normal course of life processes in our tissues entails the production of chemical substances that could not accumulate in it without danger to the body. First, let's study ways to protect the body against poisons coming from outside. Both in relation to injury and in relation to poisons, there is a protective means of self-defense. Like fear and pain, it represents a mental function and manifests itself as a feeling of disgust. Since poisons cannot penetrate intact skin, only the respiratory or digestive tract remains for them; liquid and solid substances enter through the food tract, gaseous substances through the respiratory tract; Due to the fact that most poisons are solid or liquid, and not gaseous, then, of course, they most often enter the body through the food route. It is at the entrance of the digestive apparatus that protection is located to prevent the dangerous accident of mixing a toxic substance with food. In this exact place there should be a sensitive organ capable of making us feel pleasure from beneficial substances and discomfort when receiving harmful ones. Suppose, for example, that no instinct warns us against danger from poisonous plants or putrefied liquids, then it would be impossible to distinguish a harmful plant from a edible one. Disgust or repulsive taste causes a state of consciousness that is extremely similar to the feeling of pain. This is indeed pain, but a very specific one, causing salivation, nausea and all the main reflexes that accompany fairly severe pain. When disgust is expressed sharply, there is a complete impossibility of swallowing and, consequently, poisoning. An irresistible contraction of the pharynx and repeated, invincible attacks of vomiting absolutely prevent the swallowing of a toxic substance. Thus, the herbivore is not poisoned on the arable land on which poisonous plants also grow; it is careful not to eat herbs, fruits and plants that contain poison, and in order to distinguish them it does not need prior experience; To distinguish the useful from the harmful, one instinct is enough. Microbes are invisible, and, of course, preliminary protection is only possible against the toxins they produce. In other words, if we are unarmed against microbes that elude our senses, then, thanks to taste or smell (for example, during decay), we can fight their poisons, and therefore, with them. Our sensations depend on the needs of our body; taste and smell inspire us with feelings of disgust or pleasure, in accordance with the danger or usefulness of the substance. Pain and vomiting are the second means of self-defense. If, in fact, the poison for some reason, despite its bitter taste, bypassed the pharynx and entered the stomach, then it must be removed from the digestive apparatus; this occurs through vomiting. Vomiting is the first symptom of any poisoning; this obviously indicates that nature was looking for a remedy against the most common case of introducing poison into food mixtures. If, despite all preliminary efforts, the poison has passed the stomach and entered the intestines, it meets there with an organ that is very sensitive and makes a great effort to get rid of the poison; the stomach produces vomiting, the intestines produce copious discharge in order to simultaneously dilute the poison accumulated in its cavity and facilitate its removal through profuse diarrhea. Thus, indeed, most inorganic poisons are both laxatives and emetics at the same time. Here, approximately, are ways to protect living beings against poisons introduced with food. These poisons are perhaps not the most dangerous; on the contrary, we are forced to think that the most dangerous poisons are those that are formed when infectious microbes multiply in the blood. In fact, Pasteur's amazing experiment with chicken cholera showed us that the symptoms of a microbial disease can be caused not only by the microbe itself, but also by the chemical products of their vital activity. All recent research has confirmed this great principle, according to which a microbe causes death by poisoning with those chemical poisons which it itself produces. Thus, microbial diseases are undoubtedly poisonings. The poison is not introduced with food, but is manufactured inside the body by microbes, and the toxicity of some of these substances is much higher than many known poisons. The body is not defenseless against these terrible microbial poisons and has a special reaction: fever. It is remarkable that with mineral poisoning there is no fever, while with microbial infections it is inevitable. Thanks to this increase in temperature, the body can more actively defend against microbes, weaken and delay their development and therefore heal more easily. The body protects itself against poisons in another way. We are talking about the remarkable property of blood to produce antitoxins that neutralize microbial poisons. Science has proven that the blood of vaccinated animals, injected into susceptible animals, delays the development of the disease. Gg. Roux and Vaillard, Behring and Kitasato, Cattani and Tizzoni conducted excellent experiments and proved the following 3 essential facts: 1) an antitoxic substance is formed in the blood of the vaccinated animal; 2) it does not interfere with the development of the microbe, but destroys the effect of its poison, 3) therefore, it is possible to save an infected animal by injecting it with an antitoxin. There are other very obvious ways to keep our organs in a state of stability. We'll deal with them now. First of all, habit. The best example of a habit is provided by morphine. You, of course, know that unfortunate people who are accustomed to smoking opium, chewing it, or injecting themselves with subcutaneous injections of morphine become accustomed to consuming it in almost incredible quantities. They talk about a patient who took 9 grams of morphine per day; this dose would be quite sufficient to poison 900 children. Children do not form a habit to morphine, and small doses have a great effect; For habitual consumers, even colossal doses do not produce a noticeable effect. Poisons other than morphine also develop a habit: for example, alcohol has a much stronger effect on people who have not consumed alcoholic beverages for a long time than on those who consume them daily. Tea, coffee, tobacco, ether, sodium iodide, arsenic, all these poisons are ultimately well tolerated by persons accustomed to their use. Probably some kind of habit exists in relation to microbial poisons, and in chronic diseases, some kind of resistance to the poisons produced daily is undoubtedly developed. But the most remarkable form of habit is that which can be called hereditary. From this side, there is no more remarkable fact than the resistance of some animals to known poisons. For example, atropine in a weak dose causes quite severe consequences in humans and is almost harmless for animals and especially for herbivores, as if they, thanks to a long series of ancestors, had acquired relative immunity against this plant poison. In fact, herbivores and carnivores resist atropine poisoning, and I can recall in this case an experiment carried out two years ago in order to ascertain whether, from this point of view, the monkey approaches man. Not without some surprise, I noted that from this point of view the monkey is closer to animals than to man; 0.15 grams of atropine given to a small 10 pound monkey did not cause death. Perhaps this will serve as a new argument to establish a more precise distinction between man and ape. The last method of defense is selection. Indeed, as soon as a toxic substance enters the blood, nature strives to remove it. Everything that is extraneous to the normal composition of the blood is quickly removed by natural means, even if we are talking about substances that are apparently very close to normal tissues of the body. For example, Claude Bernard has long shown that if you introduce a solution of protein, then after a few minutes it is excreted in the urine, and yet the similarity between egg white and whey protein is quite great. When isolating, not only the quality, but also the quantity of the substance is important. If the normal components of the blood accumulate in large quantities, they are quickly removed from it. Poisons produced by microbes are also eliminated in the urine. In all infectious diseases, ptomains are found in the urine. Bouchard's excellent research has shown that the urine of patients has poisonous properties that normal urine does not exhibit. Thus, during illnesses, the same release of poison occurs as during accidental poisoning, and it contributes to the healing of the body. So, the body fights against poisons, providing for their entry the mucous membranes of the digestive apparatus and respiratory tract, which are endowed with a sense of taste and smell, inspiring us with disgust against everything that is poisonous in nature. If the poison does enter the body, it is removed by vomiting and coughing. If it penetrates the intestines, diarrhea appears. Once in the blood, it is quickly eliminated through secretions. If, finally, microbes have produced dangerous poisons in the intestines or in the blood, the body counteracts by secreting antitoxic substances that neutralize microbial ptomains and leukomains and cause their removal through intestinal diarrhea or copious amounts of urine. These are the means by which the integrity of the body is maintained among countless chemical influences that could be dangerous. (Compiled from the book: Charles Richet. Self-defense of the body. St. Petersburg, 1895) Mineral, plant or microbial poisons are accidents in the life of an organism; internal poisons seem to be a normal, constant phenomenon and even constitute a condition for the existence of the organism. Chemical processes that constantly occur in our tissues and fluids form substances that, as they accumulate, must be removed, otherwise they threaten life-threatening phenomena. The microbe, multiplying in the culture broth, produces a number of successive generations; but soon reproduction stops, and the microbes die, not because the nutritional material contained in the broth is depleted, but because toxic elements have formed in it, causing the death of the last generations. In the same way, people, remaining locked for a long period of time in a closed room, will suffocate and get poisoned, even if they were supplied with a sufficient amount of oxygen and food. There is, therefore, an absolute necessity for the constant removal of digestive and metabolic products. Such regulation completely coincides with protection, since the protection of the body, strictly speaking, consists of maintaining its balance and stability. By exploring how the body can regulate the release of toxic substances it produces, we also learn about its means of self-defense. There are two ways to deal with internal poisons: removing them and destroying them. Let's see how they are removed. First of all, carbonic acid must be removed, because man produces enormous quantities of it. An adult produces almost 900 grams of carbonic acid per day, which must be eliminated because it is poisonous. However, it is not very dangerous. If the amount of oxygen does not decrease, then you can breathe with impunity, at least for several hours, with a mixture containing 20% ​​carbonic acid. Above this dose, carbonic acid is no longer safe, because then it lingers in the blood and is not released. The release of carbonic acid depends to a certain extent on our will. It is possible, for example, to speed up the breathing rhythm and thus reduce or increase the release of coal gas. But this influence of will is not very strong. If you try to slow down your breathing as much as possible, then for 10–15 minutes you can remain with much less carbon gas emissions; but at the end of this time we are forced to return to more active breathing, and the compensation is established in such a way that in the end, despite the most energetic efforts of the will, we are forced to exhale all the carbonic acid that accumulates in the lungs. Are toxic substances released in sweat? At first glance, this is unlikely, because the amount of dense substances contained in sweat is very small: only 3 grams per 1 liter, and even then the substances are apparently few active. I would readily agree that sweat has only one physical role - that of a coolant, and that it does not remove any toxic substance. It should not be forgotten, however, that the cessation of skin separation by varnishing causes severe seizures, which are difficult to attribute to cooling alone. Perhaps the skin secretes some poisons in small quantities. The kidneys secrete many substances, the main one being urea. An interesting parallelism can be established between urea and carbonic acid: carbonic acid is a poisonous gas, the final result of the combustion of fatty substances and carbohydrates; urea is a liquid poison, the last product of the breakdown of protein substances. Both of these poisons are low in energy, can accumulate in the blood for some time without much danger, but eventually cause disease; they are both the result of the process of decay that occurs in the body with transitional poisons, which are incomparably more active. Quinquand and Grehant supported the opinion that urea is quite poisonous; but even according to their research, its lethal dose is very high. Therefore, death due to cessation of kidney activity does not depend on the accumulation of urea in the blood; it depends on other reasons, which I cannot go into in detail. Perhaps it depends on the conversion of urea into ammonia (in the intestines) or on the retention of other products removed from the blood through the kidneys, for example, potassium salts or other inorganic substances. Let's first see what is done with potassium salts. Since the famous Bouchardat studies, it has been known that potassium salts are very dangerous, 20 times more dangerous than sodium salts. Potassium is found in bread, meat, wine, and all mealy and herbaceous vegetables. The amount of potassium we consume daily for an adult reaches up to 4.475 grams per day; 4 grams are excreted in urine. So, along with the elements necessary for our life, we constantly introduce into ourselves a large dose of poison, which must be excreted. If, therefore, we assume that during normal nutrition the excretion of potassium salts through the kidneys does not occur, then poisoning with them should occur after 5 or 6 days, since then an amount will accumulate that is completely sufficient to poison a person. Urine containing such a large amount of potassium salts also contains other substances with toxic properties, namely: 1) urea, a weak poison formed by the hydration of protein substances; 2) mineral salts taken with food, and among them very poisonous potassium salts; 3) other unknown or little-known substances, perhaps very numerous, leukomains, contained in a very small dose, but with high toxicity compensating for the insignificance of their weight part. During illnesses and poisonings, urine, in addition to the constant poisons formed by a normally functioning body, also removes random poisons found in the blood. Generalizing, therefore, the phenomena of the elimination of poison through secretions, we see that the body produces extremely toxic substances, but only low-toxic substances are released, so that the elimination of poisons is only part of the body’s defense; our tissues have a different task: they must modify extremely toxic substances produced during the normal course of life processes. The destruction of poisons precedes their removal. In other words, poisons produced by living cells exist only temporarily, because other cells have the ability to destroy and convert toxic substances into harmless ones. Thus, we have approached the second part of our work, i.e., having studied the removal of poisons, we will begin to study the question of their destruction, which goes along with and even precedes their removal from the body. This teaching can be summarized in the following four propositions: 1) the life of tissues is accompanied by the formation of very active poisons; 2) they are converted into urea and carbonic acid (non-dangerous poisons) in the liver and large vascular glands; 3) kidneys and lungs remove urea and carbonic acid; 4) active poisons that have not undergone destruction are excreted in small quantities through the kidneys. First of all, it turns out that the formation of bile is not directly related to digestion; the digestive role of bile is in the background. The matter is, without a doubt, about the removal of known harmful substances from the blood, and indeed, bile salts injected into the blood cause death, which has long been known. Thus, a toxic liquid flows into the intestines, which should not be absorbed, since it will cause poisoning, but will certainly be destroyed. In fact, bile products are no longer found in feces, or only a small amount. On the other hand, urine does not contain bile acid salts; so a fermentation process occurs in the intestines, due to which taurocholic and glycocholic soda are destroyed and lose their toxicity. Schiff has long suggested that the liver destroys poisons, and indeed Roger, having taken up this issue very diligently, clearly showed that the liver retains in its tissue poisons introduced into the blood, for example, up to 50% of nicotine and even more putrefactive poisons. Thus, the role of the liver is clarified. It not only delays the poisons passing through it, formed either in the blood or during digestion, due to its large mass, but it also transforms these poisons into inactive substances. Now delve into this amazing mechanism designed to protect the body. During digestion, poisons are formed, the toxic strength of which, suppose, is equal to 4; the liver reduces their toxic strength to 2 and releases them with bile into the intestines; toxicity decreases even more under the influence of digestive juices and intestinal fermentations and then becomes equal to one. Other organs, the spleen, thyroid gland, adrenal glands, even the pancreas and kidneys also have a destructive effect on normally formed poisons. I won't talk about the spleen. It is difficult to think that it is useless, and yet, physiologists have seen that dogs without a spleen survive well. I remember a dog who, despite the removal of her spleen, was in excellent health for 10 months; she even had a tendency towards obesity. If we were to draw a conclusion from such numerous experiments, then I would have to say that the spleen is useless, but I will be more prudent and only say that we do not know its function. The thyroid gland, on the other hand, cannot be removed with impunity, as Schiff first showed in animals and Reverdine in humans. A few days after the thyroid gland is removed, real poisoning develops. Convulsions, paralysis - in a dog; in humans or monkeys - severe eating and intellectual disorders. All these phenomena can be explained as follows: in the tissues, as a result of life processes, a small amount of an as yet unknown poison is formed, which must be destroyed in the body. The thyroid gland is designed to destroy it, not by removing it, since it has no excretory ducts, but by neutralizing it, probably by producing antitoxins similar to those that make it possible to fight against tetanus. Therefore, in the absence of the thyroid gland, the toxin accumulates in the blood and produces a toxic effect. The correctness of this assumption is confirmed by two important experiments. First of all, it turns out that if you leave a small piece of the gland, poisoning does not occur. If sometimes animals deprived of the thyroid glands through surgery remain alive, it is always because not everything was removed. Clay recently showed that the rabbit has small accessory glands, and it is necessary to remove them for the operation to cause death. Another very revealing experiment was made by Vassal. If a dog deprived of the thyroid glands is injected with the juice of the thyroid gland of another dog, then for a while the signs of poisoning disappear, as if an antitoxin is being injected, neutralizing the accumulated poison. The function of the adrenal glands is very similar to the function of the thyroid gland. Brown-Séquard showed that the animal from which they are cut out quickly dies. Here are very clear examples of the action of poisons formed in the body and the glands specifically engaged in their destruction. But protecting the body is even more difficult. Not only are there glands that destroy poisons, but there are also others that produce chemicals that can stimulate the activity of our organs. In relation to pancreas, Merong and Minkowsky made an interesting discovery: they showed that its removal causes diabetes mellitus. Consequently, a substance is formed in it that destroys sugar. Here we are no longer talking about the destruction of poison through an antitoxin produced by glands, such as the thyroid and adrenal, but about the fact that a normal component of food - sugar - is decomposed by an enzyme produced in the pancreas. As for the kidneys, they probably have another function besides removing urine. Brown-Séquard, who foresaw this with remarkable insight, believes that the kidney secretes an enzyme that creates substances in the blood that are beneficial to the body or destroy known poisons; he based his opinion on the fact that animals in which the kidneys have been removed and severe symptoms of uremia appear, receive relief if the juice of the kidney tissue is injected into the blood. Thus, the individual strives to constantly maintain his status, without being subject to disturbances due to external changes and attacks from enemies from without, and, despite the continuous chemical changes occurring in the tissues, he maintains his normal composition. In general, if I were trying to formulate this self-defense of the organism, then I would say: a living being is subject to all influences and yet resists everything; it is eternally renewed and eternally remains unchanged. (Compiled from the book: Charles Richet. Self-defense of the body. St. Petersburg, 1895) I certify the reality and accuracy of this description with my own hand, a witness of the above-mentioned miraculous ice floe, who was a student of the Nizhny Novgorod seminary in 1823, and now, by God’s grace, the unworthy archpriest of the Arzamas Nikolaev Convent, Avraamy Nekrasov. Humboldt. Space. Part III. Art. 327. Ed. 1863 Hartwig. Unity of the Universe. Page 3 and 5. Humboldt. Space. Part III. Page 444. Words by Filaret. T. V, p. 299. Ed. 1885 Humboldt. Space. Part III. Page 483. Ed. 1863 Matveev. Experience about peacemaking. Page 68. Mitchell. Heavenly bodies. Page 225. Right there. Page 210. Humboldt. Space. Part I. Page 106 and 107 and part III. Page 320. Mitchell. Star bodies. Page 147. This fact, however, is not considered completely proven: they say that bees can remove their stings when they are not in a hurry (see: Paul-Janet, p. 279). Readers can find an explanation of many of the perplexities caused by the existence of evil in the world in the most beautiful experience of the theodicy of Prot. F. Golubinsky: “The wisdom and goodness of God in the destinies of the world and man” (see special, letter 3 according to ed. 3 1885, pp. 223 etc.). This book is worthy of taking an honorable place in general Christian, and not just Russian, theological literature. Even Hartmann, in his philosophy of the unconscious, lists a few, but still 14 conditions necessary for vision, the probability of meeting which under the action of physical laws alone, according to his own calculation, is so small that it is almost equal to zero. And not only the structure of the organs of food intake and digestion, but also the very history of their functions presents many skillful adaptations that reveal amazing expediency. Nature, notes Berzelius, even took care of the alternation of reactions in successive parts of the digestive canal, in order to ensure the timely production of the various juices necessary for digestion. The reaction in the mouth is alkaline, and food moistened with saliva transfers this reaction to the stomach, where it causes the same secretion of gastric juice, under the influence of which oxidation occurs. Then, when food enters the duodenum, bile is immediately released, as a result of which the reaction changes again, becoming alkaline again. Cl. Bernard. Lezons sur les proprietes des tissus, p. 325. You might be interested in: