INERTNESS OF MATTER. 5 



their playthings remaining at rest where they are 

 placed, that if found elsewhere they ask, " Who 

 moved them ? " with the conviction that they 

 could not have moved themselves. Whenever 

 any portion of matter is seen in motion, some 

 external cause of motion is looked for. From 

 generation to generation, these observations of 

 the inertness of matter are so uniformly con- 

 firmed, without a single instance to the contrary, 

 that the doctrine of the inertness of matter, and 

 of its incapability to turn aside from a movement 

 in a straight line, or to stop itself, is adopted as an 

 axiom of Mechanical Philosophy, for the same 

 reason that the axiom of its incapability to put 

 itself in motion is adopted, a lack of proof to 

 the contrary. To admit the existence of self- 

 directive powers in matter, would be equivalent 

 to admitting that molecules .have volitions and 

 wills of their own. 



The stoppage of bodies in motion is always the 

 result of a transfer of the motion to other bodies ; 

 for an impulse of mechanical force is as inde- 

 structible as the matter to which it is imparted. 



The theories of Lucretius and Eruno, of Darwin and Spencer, may be 

 wrong. Here I should agree with you ; deeming it, indeed, certain that 

 these theories will undergo modifications. But the point is, whether 

 right or wrong, we ask the freedom to discuss them." "It is by an 

 inscrutable mystery that life is developed, species differentiated, and 

 mind unfolded. In fact, the whole process of Evolution is the mani- 

 festation of a power absolutely inscrutable to the intellect of man. 

 As little in our day, as in the days of Job, can man by searching find, 

 out this power. There is, you will observe, no very rank materialism 

 here." TyndaWs Belfast Address. 



