THE ASTRONOMICAL VIEW OF NATURE. 339 



matter to certain changing places in an empty space, 

 and to attach the forces of nature likewise to this dis- 

 tribution of matter. This was hardly the intention of 

 the author himself, who saw in the so - called law of 

 gravitation not a final explanation, but only a descrip- 

 tion of the phenomena of nature notably of the larger 

 phenomena. That behind the mathematical formula there 

 may be conditions which are capable of further analysis, 

 that the larger or molar phenomena of moving bodies 

 are made up of their smaller or molecular movements, 

 was well known to Newton. For before he approached 

 the great laws of the universe he had been occupied 

 with investigations which led him into the minutest 

 phenomena, those of light and colour. To him, indeed, 

 are owing some of the observations and methods by 

 which subsequently the greatest and the smallest meas- 

 urements of natural objects have been carried out. But 

 in exact science the deeper philosophical meanings dis- 

 appear where the strict mathematical deductions point 

 to definite conceptions, mark certain fixed paths of re- 

 search, and promise definite results. The eighteenth 

 century gradually settled down to a wholesale adoption 

 of the gravitation theory looked upon space as empty, 

 upon matter as subject to a definite though changing 

 distribution in space, and upon the forces of nature as 

 attached to certain moving centres, between which only 

 a mathematical, but no intelligible physical, connection 



whether it was empty or full 

 the two doctrines came into conflict. 

 That Newton's position was not a 

 final, but only a provisional one, 

 was overlooked ; he was accused of 

 introducing again the occult quali- 



ties of the scholastic philosophy, and 

 a great fight was started against his 

 views in the Academy of Sciences, 

 where Descartes' philosophy reigned 

 supreme. 



