204 SIR WILLIAM CROOKES ON PSYCHICAL RESEARCH. 



formed. No work can be effected without using up a corresponding- 

 value in energy of another kind. But to us the other side of the 

 problem is even of more importance. Granted the existence of a cer- 

 tain kind of molecular motion, what is it that determines its direction 

 along one path rather than another ? A weight falls to the earth through 

 a distance of 3 feet. I lift it, and let it fall once more. In these 

 movements of the weight a certain amount of energy is expended in its 

 rise and the same amount is liberated in its fall. But instead of letting 

 the weight fall free, suppose I harness it to a complicated system of 

 wheels, and, instead of letting the weight fall in the fraction of a 

 second, I distribute its fall over twenty-four hours. No more energy 

 is expended in raising the weight, and in its slow fall no more or less 

 energy is developed than when it fell free; but I have made it do work 

 of another kind. It now drives a clock, a telescope, or a philosophic 

 instrument, and does what we call useful work. The clock runs down. 

 I lift the weight by exerting the proper amount of energy, and in this 

 action the law of conservation of energy is strictly obeyed. .But now 

 I have the choice of either letting the weight fall free in a fraction of 

 a second, or, constrained by the wheelwork, in twenty-four hours. I 

 can do which I like, and whichever way I decide, no more energy is 

 developed in the fall of the weight. I strike a match; I can use it to 

 light a cigarette or to set fire to a house. I write a telegram; it may 

 be simply to say I shall ])e late for dinner, or it may produce fluctua- 

 tions on the stock exchange that will ruin thousands. In these cases 

 the actual force required in striking the match or in writing the tele- 

 gram is governed b}- the law or conservation of energy; but the vastly 

 more momentous part, which determines the words I use or the mate- 

 rial I ignite, is beyond such a law. It is probable that no expenditure 

 of energy need be used in the determination of direction one way more 

 than another. Intelligence and free will here come into play, and these 

 mystic forces are outside the law of conservation of energy as under- 

 stood by physicists. 



The whole universe, as we see it, is the result of molecular move- 

 ment. Molecular movements strictly obey the law of conservation of 

 energy, ])ut what we call "law" is simply an expression of the direction 

 along which a form of energy acts, not the form of energy itself. We 

 may explain molecular and molar motions, and discover all the physical 

 laws of motion, but we shall be far as ever from a solution of the 

 vastly more important question as to what form of will and intellect 

 is behind the motions of molecules, guiding and constraining them in 

 definite directions along predetermined paths. What is the determin- 

 ing cause in the background? What combination of will and intellect 

 outside our physical laws guides the fortuitous concourse of atoms 

 along ordered paths culminating in the material world in which we live? 



In these last sentences I have intentionally used words of wide sig- 



