that number of black lines; but if the salt or iron be glowing gas,
in the source of the light itself the same lines are bright instead
of dark.

Thus we have brought to our doors a readable record of the very
substances composing every world hot enough to shine by its own
light. Thus, while our flag means all we have of liberty, free as
the winds that kiss it, and bright as the stars that shine in it,
the flag of the sun means all that it is in constituent elements,
all that it is in condition.

We find in our sun many substances known to exist in the earth,
and some that we had not discovered when the sun wrote their names,
or rather made their mark, in the spectrum. Thus, also, we find
that Betelguese and Algol are without any perceivable indications
of hydrogen, and Sirius has it in abundance. What a sense of
acquaintanceship it gives us to look up and recognize [Page 30] the
stars whose very substance we know! If we were transported thither,
or beyond, we should not be altogether strangers in an unknown
realm.

But the stars differ in their constituent elements; every ray that
flashes from them bears in its very being proofs of what they are.
Hence the eye of Omniscience, seeing a ray of light anywhere in
the universe, though gone from its source a thousand years, would
be able to tell from what orb it originally came.

_Creative Force of Light._

Just above the color vibrations of the unbraided sunbeam, above