Show 33 Z S UP 0 ES JS E ilder ELBER ORSON FEATT delivered livered be in de the tuen tabernacle tabernacle nacle salt allt lake city sunday afternoon june ath 1880 I 1 REPORTED BY JOHN IRVINE man to be judged by law A law given to all things the law of gravitation how arow it varies by distance law of projection angles of projection law of elliptic forms having the same length of year ear law of orbital velocity its variations depending on distance wise adaptations intelligent aej pei selections of law laws of I 1 nature counteracted T I 1 0 WHAT we have heard from this stand this afternoon as well as on former occasions we must meet again in the great judgment day we have quite a number of scribes at the table who are writing down anything that is said these are not however the only scribes there are others behind the vail who take down the discourses of the servants of god they are recorded there and the books will be opened at some future time all the warnings that have been given i ven to the latter day saints and to I 1 the world will again come up in the own due time of th the eLord lord in judgment and it will be required of us to render an account whether we have been obedient to those warnings or whether we have been disobedient the lord is a consistent being in in all ali 1 his doings S he will not condemn the children of men for not receiving something that that they were ignorant of but if they are condemned at all it will be for rejecting something that they have understood der stood or something that they might have understood had they improved the opportunity they will be judged according to law according to testimony and according to that which is written in the sacred books the records of heaven will be opened the records kept by divine authority on the earth will also be opened the evidences and testimonies will be set forth and every man and every woman who is condemn edin the men ment t maywill day Anye will be condemned according to law according to testimony according to evidence according to the light that has been given given according to the deeds done ane in the M body y the lord is a being who has given laws unto all things and he adapted these laws according to the condition and circumstances of all things all agents free agents who have light and knowledge to know how to act how to tig discern good from evil will be j judged according 9 to one law they are not compelled to obey the law which they hear but they can act according q their agency either in obeying bi or disobeying receiving the blessings of obedience or the fruits of disobedience the lord has given a great many laws besides those which he has given to free agents or to td intelligent beings but they differ in their nature according to the condition and circumstances of the materials to which these laws are given see a revelation upon the subject of these laws which was given on the day of december 1832 1833 doc cov pp ap to this revelation was called in those days the olive leaf in this revelation tion the the lord informs us that he hath given a law unto all things by which they move in their times and their seasons these laws which are given to the materials of nature are generally obeyed there does abt seem to be any agency on the part of these materials so far as lwe naturally comprehend it at least if there is an agency it seems to be very obedient instead of disobedient hence when he issues forth a law to govern the materials of creation the law seems to be obeyed at least we do not know of any diso disobedience ed lence it would al most seem as though these mater laig lais act under compulsion and are really obliged to altas act ay they do yet there are some sayings in this same ie revelation which seem to indi indicate date that thab a degree of intelligence even in these materials we lye read that the earth ablith the law of a celestial kingdom I 1 fort rl it falleth the measure of creation its hand titans gresseth not the lawsl this would seem to indicate that thard there is some g connected lymn bd fa itself wherein it has an agency and that because because of the exercise of its agency and keeping the law it should be crowned with celestial glory the materials out of which our earth is formed are also governed by law not only the earth as an organized world but the very materials themselves are governed by laws these laws were given of god and when we ve search into the laws not of nature merely but the laws of god and the more we comprehend the laws bychich by which materials are governed the more we understand the laws of god clod and his big operations operation i in the universe the earth seems to take one continued course it has an orbit it does not deviate from this orbit unless acted upon by some other force foree which may cause some gome fluctuations tuat ions lons or deviations from its apparently patently ly destined path some in reflecting upon this might say gay that the earth is obi obliged ig ed to follow this course I 1 do no not t know about this I 1 am not so sure I 1 think if we could see a little further we would understand that connected with the materials of the earth is a living principle a principle too that acts according to certain laws intelligently not blindly and that our earth in performing its course following the track marked out does so according to law as much as we do when we go forth and are buried in the wa of baptism we go aee ace awarding to law and obtain a blessing so does the earth when following the course marked out nor for it god hath given a law unto all things by which they move in their times and their seasons wo we know that all of these great movements which we observe taking place in the tile universe around us are conducted according to certain laws which mankind have in a few instances been able to search out themselves through the intelligence that god has given them for instance we see a force in exercise when we lift up a stone from the ground and hold hoid rin kin it in our hands bands the moment we leago let iet go this stone it falls to the earth what causes it to fall philosophers tell you that it falls according to a law of nature but who is this nature that gave this law why do material bodies fall why do they not remain stationary suspended in the air or in a vacuum why do they have a tendency to approach the centre of the earth it is because there is a force which draws them towards such centre what is this force scientists have called it gravitation but the name does not explain the force we are certain that a central force exists exist sanI and that such force is something ahat that acts according to a certain law now if you were to take a material body as for instance a stone miles above the surface of the earth and let go of it it would only fall one fourth part of the distance in a second that it will fall here near the surface of the earth why will it not fall with the same velocity up yonder as here because the law which god has given I 1 I 1 in in r relation elation to these materi materials als ais varies in its intensity of force according to some law of the distance from the central force A body will fall near the earths surface about 16 feet and one inch in one second of time you take it up miles and it will fall only about four feet in one second of time this has been demonstrated by the action of the earth upon the moon which is nearly 60 times further from the earths centre than we are the moon only falls toward the earth about the eighteenth part of one inch in a second which is about times slower glower than a stone or other bodies would fall at the earths surface thus it will be perceived that this gravitating force in its intensity according t to a fixed law depending on the distance from the centre of the earth this law was discovered by liy newton it is known beyond all controversy that if we go twice the distance which we are from our earths centre bodies will weigh two times two less than they weigh here if we recede thrice ahr z ce our pro sent distance bodies w will ili lil weigh three times three or nine times less than if weighed here at ten times the distance the weight would be ten times ten less than here at sixty times our distance from the earths centre which is the distance of our satellite bodies would weigh toward the tho earth sixty times sixty less than they weigh here but sixty times sixty are thirty six hundred that is a pound would weigh thirty six hundred times less if carried to the moons orbit than here in ia the language of or mathematics fatha ha intensity gif mir pf af t th V ing force varies inversely as the square of the distance between gravitating centres bentres cen tres 11 this law is undoubtedly universal in its operations extending to all the visible universe this law combined with orbital movements is necessary to the stability of worlds revolving in space without it systems on systems would soon rush to ruin if any other law of intensity than the one which now exists were assumed irretrievable r ruin would soon follow out of the infinity of laws of variable intensities depending on distances the only one lias has been selected which alone can impart stability to all terns terms in space who made this all wise selection did blind matter select its own laws or did an all wise and an all powerful being impart these laws selecting out of an infinity of offeree force intensities the only law of variable intensity which would render stable the grand machinery ot of the universe this curious law some will tell us is merely a law of materials that god has nothing to do with it but I 1 dispute it I 1 say that god is the author of this law and ano were it not for this infinitely wise provision there would not be such a thing as one particle of matter being drawn to another and a ston ewh en loosened from the hand would still remain where it is set free berth gain we see our world here the earth on which we are permitted to live and have our being sweeping around the great centre of the solar system once in in days and a fraction of a day it has continued in this path not on only 1 through a sew jew centuries but for thousands of years or in other words it has followed this course according to some undeviating ting law whatever this law maybe may be god has ordained it for lor he has ordained the law which is given to all things by which they move in their times and their seasons this earth does not revolve around the sun once a year in a circular orbit but in an oblong elliptical orbit now it is just as easy to cause a 0 body to revolve around the su sun a in an ellipse as in a circle for instance if our earth when at its mean distance from the sun bun should be projected with its ita present mean velocity in a line at right angles to the line joining the earth and sun it would describe a perfect circle around that luminary but let the projections deviate from a right angle a little less than one degree and it will take the very form of orbit it now has provided it is prod projected acted wi with th th the e same m mean ean velocity that it now has again let this same earth be projected at its mean distance from the sun in a line making an angle of 70 degrees 31 minutes and 44 seconds of an arc are instead of 90 degrees as in the instance just named and the form of the orbit would be greatly changed the distance from the sun when nearest ne aresty would be only sixty one millions of miles and in six months after the distance would be doubled that is one hundred and twenty two millions of miles under these circumstances the sun when nearest would appear four times larger than at its ap aphelion bellon belion distance yo you U see then how easy the lord by deviating the angle of projection could cause a great difference in the eccentricity of an elliptic orbit without alterino altering the mean distance or without shortening or lengthening the year the year would remain the same without any deviation in its length if the earth revolved in an ellipse of the kind that I 1 have just named again if you wanted the earth to go so near the sun that it would almost graze its edge and still retain the length of our year dit would not take our advanced university students long to determine the angle of projection the earth should have hake so as to just graze the edge of the sun at the perihelion distance and come back again in an ellipse which would be almost equivalent to a straight line provided it was projected at the mean distance that we now have with its present mean ve and the year would be exactly the same as now I 1 mention these things to show you how the lord by a little deviation can design a great variety of orbit orbits in which worlds may inay revolve according to law for all sil these thing sare are done according to law and if actually y projected as we would pro propel I 1 a cannon ball then all the lord ra has t to 0 do is js to decree the form of the elliptic orbit having one year for its description and the projecting a angle will be at once known this is a law and the lord is the author of it it is not a law of na iia lus INS hau 4 W aerial terdal which have no knowledge or life ilfe I 1 if e connected coi col knect ed with them or in them or round about them I 1 have been speaking of bodies projected at different angles and at the mean distance of our earth from the sun but let us next go still further off into space we can go away to tol the orbit of jupiter about four times dimes our distance from the sun Is there any law for projection or a law of velocity that would cause bodies to revolve in orbits at four times our distance from the sun yes what is the law have the same velocity that we have it must at four times that distance have only one half of the mean orbital velocity of our earth and if you gave it more than one half of such velocity it would decrease the mean distance of the orbit below four if you gave it less it would increase that mean distance above four but if YO you u gave it exactly y one half of the velocity our earth has then it would preserve its orbit in a circle or in any kind of an el lipse at that mean distance Is there any law to govern this velocity depending on the distance from the sun yes what is this thi s law according to mathematical expressions the velocity varies inversely as th the e square root of the distance well says one that is no information to us we dont know what you mean by inversely and dont know what you mean by che the square root for all of us have not sufficiently studied arithmetic so as to understand the roots and powers of numbers in reply I 1 will say that it is something very simple to all advanced arithmetical students let me say a few more words in regard to this law for this is also a law jaw of god for instance we will say that the earth travels a certain distance in one second which we will calla calia call cali a unit distance or 18 miles in a second in its orbit orb t we this distance one we go four times further off than our earth is from the sun and take the square root of four but inquires one how do you get the square soot root of four A number tb that atwill will multiply into itself say two into two makes four two then is the square root of four that is it is the direct square root not the inverse but nut put this figure 2 underneath a line and place the figure I 1 above it thus i and such a fraction is the inverse square root of four hence one half the velocity that our earth has must be given to bodies which are four times further from the sun than we are when nine times further off from the suu than we are the orbital velocity will be only one third of ours because one third is the inverse square root of nine in like manner when sixteen times further oin off the orbital velocity is one fourth of ours urs when twenty five times more distant the orbital velocity will be one fifth and so on to any |