The Story of the Crystal

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Improvement Era Vol. XVIII NOVEMBER, 1914 No. 1

The Story of the Crystal A Parable Based on Nature's Laws is to be Found within.

BY DR. JAMES E. TALMAGE

Do you know what a crystal is ? Many of us may have seen the beautiful cubes that form when salt solidifies from the brine the lustrous octahedrons into which alum shapes itself as the substance separates from a saturated solution and we may have ;

seen, if so we^ surely have admired, the rhombohedrons of calcite, occurring in the best condition as Iceland spar, and the clear hexagonal prisms of quartz with their pyramidal terminations, each of three or six faces. All of these, the cubes, the octahedrons, the rhombs, and the prisms are crystals, and the geometric forms named are but a few of the multitudinous shapes that are assumed, under certain favorable conditions, when matter returns to the solid state after solution, fusion, or sublimation. Most solids possessing definite chemical composition tend toward the crystal state. Thus, in addition to the examples already cited, sucrose or cane sugar, tartaric and citric acids, sodium carbonate or washing soda, and sodium bicarbonate or baking soda, may be named as substances common in the home, each of which readily crystallizes provided the conditions are suitable. Gypsum, which is known to many in its massive state only, as plaster-stone or as alabaster, tends toward, and under favorable conditions will attain, the splendid form and state of selenite, which is crystallized gypsum, and which occurs in the vein-cavities and caverns of the earth as monoclinic prisms and other related shapes. When the prisms are very thin and are closely crowded in parallel position, the resulting mass is the rich and lustrous satin spar.

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4 IMPROVEMENT ERA The six-sided prisms of quartz, already referred to as occurring in association with terminal pyramids, are specifically known as rock crystal and it is interesting to note that in reference to ;

this substance the term "crystal" was originally applied. The name is derived from "krystallos," the Greek word for "ice ;" and was given to these colorless transparent prisms of quartz on the false basis of a fanciful theory that they were masses of ice that had been frozen by cold so intense as to render thawing-out impossible. As in part stated above, there is a very general tendency toward crystallization by such chemical substances, either elements or compounds, as are ordinarily solid. Needless to say, the tendency is not always realized; indeed, only under particular conditions do solids actually attain the crystal state. Yet the tendency is ever operative and there is something inspiringly grand ;

in the tendency itself, — the effort, as we would say were we speaking of living organisms; and in fact there may always be recognized the great and the grand, the noble, the true and the good, in every uplifting tendency, in every effort toward the purer and the better. The mud in the puddle is an uninviting mixture nevertheless ;

the constituent parts thereof, the silica of the sand grains, the calcium carbonate of the ground-up limestone, the more compli- — cated silicates of the clay, each of these tends toward, may we — not say, figuratively at least yearns toward, the state of symmetry in form and structure that is manifest in the crystal alone. If these substances, the chemical ingredients of the dirty, slushy mud, were free to follow their own drift, free to obey unhindered the laws of their inanimate existence, they would all crystallize and from the mud would come lustrous prisms of quartz, brilliant rhombs of calcite, crystals of feldspar, pyroxene, or possibly some of the silicate gems. What are these particular and indispensable conditions under which crystals may form? Broadly speaking they may be summarized thus : a state of molecular freedom, whereby the ultimate particles of the substance are made able to move among themselves. It is known that the axle of a railway locomotive or car may become in time granular, and in consequence very likely to break under any sudden or unusual strain. When the axle was first fashioned it was of fibrous, not granular texture but the shaking ;

and the jolting, the bumping and the jarring to which it is subjected in long continued travel may bring the particles into the crystalline state. The metal then consists of distinct grains, each a tiny incipient crystal. The granular or crystalline state and the state of actual crystallization fully attained are well illustrated by a lump of loaf-sugar and a cluster of sugar crystals as seen in

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THE STORY OF THE CRYSTAL 5

rock candy. Reverting to the instance of the car axle, we may say that the metal had availed itself of every little jolt or jar to bring its atoms into crystalline relationship with one another. Then some day we hear of an awful disaster. A train is wrecked many people are injured or killed investigation shows a defective ;

axle, one that had become granular through long use. Gaged by the standard of human interest the accident was most deplorable and distressing viewed from the side of natural law it was but ;

an incident connected with the irrepressible effort of homogeneous solids to attain the crystalline condition. In a lump of rock-salt the tendency toward crystallization is just as real as in salt suspended in water as brine, but the bonds of solidity, the mysterious force we call cohesion, hinders free movement of the atomic particles, and so prevents the orderly molecular arrangement that is characteristic of the crystal state. Solution is one of the processes by which the molecules of a solid are so freed from cohesion as to be able to move without hindrance and another process of similar effect is fusion or melting ;

under heat. There are many substances for which no physical solvents are known ; that is to say we are unable to dissolve them without first converting them into compounds that are soluble. To this class belong the metals. There are substances that will dissolve in any of several solvents, and others, for each of which but a single solvent is known. Thus, common salt, alum, and sugar are readily soluble in water ; and, from the aqueous solution, crystals of the respective substance may be obtained. Camphor is but sparingly soluble in water but easily so in alcohol and from ;

the alcoholic solution camphor 'may be made to crystallize. Carbon is soluble in molten iron, and may crystallize out from such solution as graphite or as the diamond, each of which is in composition pure carbon. Silicon goes into solution in molten zinc, and crystallizes therefrom in brilliant needle-like forms. Through the examples cited, certain facts have been established, — that fusion and solution are conducive to crystal formation by affording to the molecules, or ultimate particles of the melted or dissolved substance, freedom to move and further- ;

more, that in order to effect the solution of any substance, be it an element or a compound, the particular solvent suitable thereto must be employed. Like all other operations in Nature, the crystallizing process arouses the wonder and taxes the understanding of the observant student. There is something seemingly supernatural in the shaping of the cubes of salt in a saturated brine, as also in the formation of crystals through cooling and solidification following fusion. Even the unscientific observer sees that the crystal is a manifestation of order the molecular arrangement is according ;

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6 IMPROVEMENT ERA to system the symmetry of the crystal is the result of freedom, ;

the fruition of liberty. Hence we have come to say in simile and metaphor, when our ideas on any given subject have been collated and reduced to order and system, that they are crystallized. The figure is a good one, based as it is on sound analogy. To insure the crystallization of ideas through solution, the solvent chosen must be the right one, however rare or precious aye, though it ;

be the attar of our sweetest fancies, the distillate from false though most-beloved traditions and to effect crystallization of thought ;

through fusion, the requisite temperature must be attained what- — ever the sacrifice or cost in fuel, though we have to cast into the furnace our fondest superstitions, precious prejudices, and even our very passions of hatred or love. When a great truth enters one's soul for the first time, the man erroneously calls it a new truth it may give rise to mental ;

disturbance and possible disruption because it is plainly opposed to the man's earlier conceptions. He has to break down his stubborn traditions, his selfish predilections with pestle and mortar ;

he must grind them to powder, that thus triturated they may the more readily be dissolved or fused. True faith, genuine hope, trust in God, are solvents of rare efficacy; and prayer is the most potent of all. These will in time bring into solution even the most resisting and rebellious thoughts or, in the furnace, they ;

will develop such heat of conviction as to reduce to quiescent fusion even the most refractory of false beliefs. In the beaker or the crucible shall form new thoughts, freshly crystallized, lustrous, symmetrical, true. Away back in the last quarter of the eighteenth century there was an exhibition of crystallization of thought and principle on a colossal scale therein the nation participated and at the process ; ;

as at the result the whole world wondered. From the hot solution of united determination there developed gradually the glorious system of government embodied in the Constitution of the United States. The heat necessary to the process was the fire of battle, the fuel was human flesh the only effective solvent was rich, red, ;

human blood. Oh what a scene did the laboratory present !

The sickening fumes of powder, the shattering impact of bullet, ball, and shell, the stench of gore the whole rendered more ter- ;

rifying by shrieks and moans, cries that seemed to have been ripped out of the heart, some like curses, others like prayers. And the heat, — Oh the heat It was beyond all that had been ever ! !

conceived in the mind of man as possible to earth. The effect of it all was to dissolve in the blood-filled cauldron, to fuse in the

flesh-fed furnace, the faith, the hopes, the desires of the people, as well as their antagonisms, their prejudices and their hates. What came from the melting pot and the cauldron? Forms of symmetry and beauty, which in both outward shape and internal

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structure showed forth order, system, and an approach to the relatively perfect.The ideas of the nation were crystallized, and there apeared the highest type of national government the world had seen. Who shall say that from the present death-struggle in Europe, the great world war in which slaughter has set a new record for history, there shall not crystallize out from the blood and the fire, higher conceptions of human rights, and a truer realization of God's purposes with respect to man ? There has been no dearth of blood, no lack of heat nor shall the result fail ;

to show forth the glory of the great Chemist, who guides the reactions in cauldron and crucible, and who shall bring from the gory magna a better realization of the truth that men are brothers and that God is Father over all.

Self and Rum 'Twas Self and Rum — two captains bold —in mutual friendship true, They met, and tales of crime they told, as pals are wont to do. With guarded words in whispered tones they claimed Satanic pow'r The God to cast from off his throne, divest him of his dow'r. "I teach mankind the art of war; to plunder, rob and kill. I spread destruction near and far, then make them pay the bill. I leave instead of golden grain a stream of crimson blood. My name is Self! my point to gain I slay the pure and good. "To aim with tact each piercing dart requires a master mind, One schooled in all the magic art of earth and hell combined. The feudal spring I now control, for all thus schooled must know That he who wrecks immortal souls must reason overthrow. "I take the young with brain and brawn, selecting all the best; I leave the weak, the cripoled one, the youth with hollow chest. Should some survive and peace possess, forget in time war's pain, Their hearts I fire with selfishness, then lo, there's war again." The other brought from sin's archives his tale of bloodless wars, More deadly in their wreck of lives with deeper-furrowed scars. "I study, too, the magic art," he said, "which makes it plain That if I would control the heart I must deceive the brain. "I feed upon man's vital ceils; his frame with palsy quakes; His mind I fill with thoughts of hell! his brain with coiling snakes! I ply my alchemistic skill, and souls once pure and fair Are warpt, defiled and changed, until God's image mocks Him there. "My wasting curse, when once begun, continues night and day. It blights in embryo the man who bears potential sway. — Nor sex, nor age my conscience stings no sentimentalist I Though dearly to this life they cling I curse them let them die, "The rich, the poor, the high, the low — my wreck exception scorns; 'Tis mine man's peace to overthrow and crown his head with thorns. I spurn the blood of battle fields and count it pigmy strife. My name is Rum! behind my shield no friends, no God, no life! MESA, ARIZONA M. A. STEWART