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aesthetic in its intensity and quality. We feel the same sort of pleasurable 
shock as when from the crest of some melancholy pass we first see far 
below the sudden glory of plain, river and mountain.” ‘Rest content!” 
No wonder the Noebel prize in chemistry was awarded to Rutherford, a 
physicist. 
As to the second principle, the conservation of energy, some have 
had misgivings. It was Kelvin, I believe, who said that radium placed 
the first question mark after this great principle. Many have refused to 
believe in the electron and disintegration theories because they saw, or 
thought they saw, in these theories a contradiction of the principle of 
energy conservation. Personally I do not see. that there are necessarily 
any contradictions. But even if there were and we were therefore justi- 
fied in rejecting the theories proposed to explain the facts, we certainly 
should not be justified in rejecting the facts themselves. 
In this connection I am reminded of the story of a lawyer whose client 
was placed in jail for some very trivial offense. When the lawyer learned 
the nature of the charge he said to his client: “My friend, they cannot 
put you in jail on sucb a charge as that.” “Yes, but they have,” replied 
the prisoner. When our physicist says that radium cannot remain at a 
higher temperature than its surroundings and continue to radiate heat, 
as that would be contriry to the second law cf thermodynamics, the answer 
is, Yes, but it does. When he says that it cannot continue to radiate en- 
ergy without receiving energy from some other body, as that would be 
contrary to the principle of the conservation of energy, the answer is, Yes, 
but it does it. 
When some one says that helium or carbon dioxide cannot appear in 
sealed tubes which contained no trace of these substances to begin with, 
the answer is, Yes, but they do. 
Let us suppose that we have a mass of gunpowder and that it is possi- 
ble to, and we do, cause it to explode, Gne grain at a time, each grain firing 
its neighbor as in the fuse of a firecracker. The temperature of the mass 
of gunpowder will be higher than its surroundings, and it will give off 
heat and other forms of energy and continue to do so as long as the pow- 
der lasts. No one would think of calling this an exception to the law of 
the conservation of energy or the second law of thermodynamics. The 
source of the energy is the atomic potential energy of the powder itself. 
Let us suppose that we have a sphere with frictionless surface rotat- 
ing at an enormous speed. Suppose that particles of matter are thrown 
