II PSEUDO-SCIENTIFIC REALISM 77 



moving in this fashion, and sometimes move in a 

 contrary direction, are implied in the words " free 

 to move/' If it is a law of nature that bodies 

 tend to move towards one another in a certain 

 way ; it is another and no less true law of nature 

 that, if bodies are not free to move as they tend 

 to do, either in consequence of an obstacle, or of 

 a contrary impulse from some other source of 

 energy than that to which we give the name of 

 gravitation, they either stop still, or go another 

 way. 



Scientifically speaking, it is the acme of absurd- 

 ity to talk of a man defying the law of gravitation 

 when he lifts his arm. The general store of 

 energy in the universe working through terrestrial- 

 matter is doubtless tending to bring the man's 

 arm down; but the particular fraction of that 

 energy which is working through certain of his 

 nervous and muscular organs is tending to drive 

 it up, and more energy being expended on the 

 arm in the upward than in the downward direc- 

 tion, the arm goes up accordingly. But the law 

 of gravitation is no more defied, in this case, than 

 when a grocer throws so much sugar into the 

 empty pan of his scales that the one which 

 contains the weight kicks the beam. 



The tenacity of the wonderful fallacy that the 

 laws of nature are agents, instead of being, as they 

 really are, a mere record of experience, upon 

 which we base our interpretations of that which 



