PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. — SECTION I. 21 



in this connection it must be noted that the pressure in the higher 

 regions of the sun's atmosphere is small compared with the pressure 

 near or at the surface, so that pressure as well as temperature may 

 have an important influence on the evolution of the more complex 

 from the simple matter. It may be of interest to note that a bright 

 line is present in the spectrum of the sun's atmosphere which does 

 not appear to be produced by any kind of terrestrial matter. To 

 the substance producing this line the name coronium has been 

 given. It will be remembered that helium was the name given by 

 Lockyer to an unknown element observed in the sun's spectrum. 

 At that time helium was unknown on the earth, but we now find 

 that it is present in practically everything terrestrial — probably 

 celestial as well. Coronium again, while not yet isolated on the 

 earth, appears to be widely diffused in space, as is shown by the 

 spectra of comets' nebulae, and even in the light reflected from the 

 sky itself, so that coronium may be with helium, either one of the 

 initial or, it is fair to add, one of the final conditions of matter. 



What, then, are the conclusions that can be drawn at the present 

 time as to the nature of matter ? Perhaps it is wrong to use the 

 word conclusion, because all over the world the problem is being 

 attacked from all points of view, and even at this moment some 

 momentous discovery may be on the eve of birth. 



The chemists of last century spoke of matter as being 

 indestructible and, of course, increatable. Its form could be 

 changed, but the great aim of the chemist was to show that after 

 he had put matter through any series of changes, the ultimate 

 mass was the same as the original mass. Has this doctrine been 

 in any way overturned ? If matter has been destroyed, where has 

 it gone — if matter has been created, from what has it been made ? 

 It is, I think, absolutely certain that matter has not been 

 destroyed, although we certainly have succeeded in breaking down 

 the unity of the atom ; with regard to the second part of the 

 question, we certainly cannot say that new matter has been 

 created, but mass has been created if the results of the experi- 

 mental work on the corpuscles of the vacuum tube and of radium 

 have been correctly interpreted. If mass has been created, out 

 of what has it been formed ? The only answer at present is, out 

 of negative electricity. What, then, constitutes negative 

 electricity ? The answer must be that it is some peculiar modifi- 

 cation of the omnipresent ether, not differing essentially from the 

 ether itself, yet certainly existing in some modified form. As 

 Lodge has rather neatly expressed it, 



" The negative corpuscle may be regarded as being analagous to a knot 

 formed on a piece ol string — that is, something which differs in structure 

 from the string and yet is essentially string itself." 



According to Kelvin matter may be regarded as something 

 analagous to a knot in the ether. (We must trust to the intuition 

 of scientific men ; theories need not be abandoned because they 

 appear absurd.) Although we hold that matter is indestructible, 

 we may still consider the feasibility of matter or mass being made 

 from corpuscles, that is ether, that is the progenitor of matter 



