278 POWER AND RESISTANCE. 



motion of a pendulum ; if a pendulum be set in 

 motion by an impelling force, the medium of 

 air through which it is made to move perpetu- 

 ally opposes motion, without giving it : if re- 

 action were equal to action, the pendulum 

 would press the air, as much as the air presses 

 the pendulum, and motion perpetual might be 

 produced. Motion perpetual might be pro- 

 duced, if we suppose that which is impossible, 

 that resistance could be taken away, not only 

 from the friction at the point of suspension, but 

 in the medium through which the arch is de- 

 scribed ; if the reacting power of an elastic 

 body be 20, the resistance of the medium 5, the 

 body acted upon can only be 15. The action 

 produced in consequence of reaction, can, 

 therefore, neither be equal, nor greater; it 

 must, therefore, be less; if it were otherwise, 

 instead of the motion in a ball excited to 

 move, being forced ultimately to cease, it would 

 mof e for ever, and an infinite variety of effects 

 produced which these false assumptions pre- 

 suppose. 



On the truth or error which exists in the 

 assumptions, or principles, from whence differ- 

 ent sciences are derived, depend altogether the 

 truth, or error, of the conclusions which are 

 made. Instead of Sir I. NEWTON'S Laws of 

 Nature, as they have been called, being rules 



