We consider the thermodynamics of a horizon surface from the viewpoint of the vacuum tension $tau =(c^4/4G )$. Numerically, $tau approx 3.026times 10^{43}$ Newton. In order of magnitude, this is the tension that has been proposed for microscopic string models of gravity. However, after decades of hard work on string theory models of gravity, there is no firm scientific evidence that such models of gravity apply empirically. Our purpose is thereby to discuss the gravitational tension in terms of the conventional Einstein general theory of relativity that apparently does explain much and maybe all of presently known experimental gravity data. The central result is that matter on the horizon surface is bound by the entropy-area law by tension in the closely analogous sense that the Wilson action-area law also describes a surface confinement.
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