2 THE NEW KNOWLEDGE. 



far as we understand the physical universe, there is noth- 

 ing, ancf into which the universal content of the mind of 

 man, so far as it concerns things outside itself, may be stowed 

 away. For the sake of our atom, we must define these three 

 entities, and, until the progress of our book warrants it, 

 we must define them by means of the current conceptions. 



MATTER. 



What matter is, in itself and by itself, is quite hopeless 

 of answer and concerns only metaphysicians. The "Ding 

 an sich" is forever outside the province of science. If all 

 men stopped to quarrel over the inner inwardness of things, 

 progress, of course, would cease. Science is naive; she 

 takes things as they come, and rests content with some 

 such practical definition as will serve to differentiate matter 

 from all other forms of non-matter. This may be done, 

 strictly provisionally in this place, by defining matter as 

 that which occupies space and possesses weight. Using 

 these two properties it is readily possible to sift out matter 

 from all the heterogeneous phenomena that present them- 

 selves to the senses, and that, in this place, is what we want. 

 Thus, wood, water, copper, oil and air are forms of matter 

 for they evidently possess weight and fill space. But light, 

 heat, electricity and magnetism we cannot consider to fill 

 so many quarts or weigh so many pounds. They are, there- 

 fore, forms of non-matter. In like manner, things such 

 as grace, mercy, justice and truth, while they are existing 

 entities as much as matter, are unquestionably non-matter 



We have, consequently, in this definition, a ready touch- 

 stone for distinguishing matter from non-matter. 



Now, governing matter in all its varied forms, there is 

 one great fundamental law which up to this time has been 

 ironclad in its character. 



