182 THE INDESTRUCTIBILITY OF MATTER. 



something — the reason, namely, that nothing cannot be- 

 come an object of consciousness. The annihilation of Mat- 

 ter is unthinkable for the same reason that the creation of 

 Matter is unthinkable. 



It must be added that no experimental verification of the 

 truth that Matter is indestructible, is possible without a 

 tacit assumption of it. For all such verification implies 

 weighing, and weighing implies that the matter forming 

 the weight remains the same. In other words, the proof 

 that certain matter dealt with in certain ways is unchanged 

 in quantity, depends on the assumption that other matter, 

 otherwise dealt with, is unchanged in quantity. 



§ 54. That, however, which it most concerns us here 

 to observe, is the nature of the perceptions by which the 

 permanence of Matter is perpetually illustrated to us. 

 These perceptions, under all their forms, amount simply to 

 this — that the force which a given quantity of matter exer- 

 cises, remains always the same. This is the proof on which 

 common sense and exact science alike rely. When, 



for example, an object known to have existed years since is 

 said to exist still, by one who yesterday saw it, his assertion 

 amounts to this — that an object which in past time wrought 

 on his consciousness a certain group of changes, still exists, 

 because a like group of changes has been again wrought on 

 his consciousness: the continuance of the power thus to 

 impress him, he holds to prove the continuance of the ob- 

 ject. Even more clearly do we see that force is our ulti- 

 mate measure of Matter, in those cases where the shape 

 of the Matter has been changed. A piece of gold given to 

 an artizan to be worked into an ornament, and which when 

 brought back appears to be less, is placed in the scales; 

 and if it balances a much smaller weight than it did in its 

 rough state, we infer that much has been lost either in 

 manipulation or by direct abstraction. Here the obvious 

 postulate is, that the quantity of Matter is finally de- 



