104 "BECOMING" 



completed our study of one we know all about two> be- 

 cause "two" is "one and one". We forget that we have 

 still to make a study of "and". Secondary physics is 

 the study of "and" — that is to say, of organisation. 



Thanks to clear-sighted pioneers in the last century 

 science became aware that it was missing something of 

 practical importance by following the inventory method 

 of the primary scheme of physics. Entropy became 

 recognised although it was not found in any of the com- 

 partments. It was discovered and exalted because it was 

 essential to practical applications of physics, not to 

 satisfy any philosophic hungering. But by it science 

 has been saved from a fatal narrowness. If we had kept 

 entirely to the inventory method, there would have been 

 nothing to represent "becoming" in the physical world. 

 And science, having searched high and low, would 

 doubtless have reported that "becoming" is an un- 

 founded mental illusion — like beauty, life, the soul, and 

 other things which it is unable to inventory. 



I think that doubts might well have been entertained 

 as to whether the newcomer was strictly scientific. 

 Entropy was not in the same category as the other 

 physical quantities recognised in science, and the ex- 

 tension — as we shall presently see — was in a very 

 dangerous direction. Once you admit attributes of 

 arrangement as subject-matter of physics, it is difficult 

 to draw the line. But entropy had secured a firm place 

 in physics before it was discovered that it was a measure 

 of the random element in arrangement. It was in great 

 favour with the engineers. Their sponsorship was the 

 highest testimonial to its good character; because at that 

 time it was the general assumption that the Creation was 

 the work of an engineer (not of a mathematician, as is 

 the fashion nowadays). 



