AND ITS SELF-CONSERVATION. 257 



into a compound have not merely served as centers for 

 one another while remaining external and qualitatively 

 indifferent to each other. On the contrary,, they have 

 become completely fused. Each thus becomes internal to 

 the other, while yet it remains external. Hence, their 

 fused unity presents the realized possibilities of both 

 within the range of their mutual relation, and the com- 

 pound thus appears as something wholly new in its quali- 

 tative character.* 



And yet even here the new relation is no sooner estab- 

 lished than activity, as producing further change of rela- 

 tion between the elements thus combined, falls into abey- 

 ance; or rather, it remains only as preserving the balance 

 of relations, and so resisting further change. What 

 has been accomplished appears to be nothing else than 

 the production of a state of indifference or equilibrium 

 a mere dead result (typical, it would seem, of a prospect- 

 ively "dead universe"). And one begins once more to 

 inquire with not unnatural concern, whether, indeed, 

 such dead result is, after all, the ultimatum of the results 

 to be produced by the spontaneous energy of the primal 

 cause of things. 



But here it is to be observed again that this spontane- 

 ous energy is, from its very nature, incessant in its activ- 

 ity; from which fact it could hardly be inferred that a 

 mere dead result is ever to follow. Besides, the perma- 

 nence of the chemical compound in any given case is 

 largely a question of relative affinity. Let another element 

 appear, having for either of those in the compound an 

 affinity stronger than that between those of which the 



* As already intimated, we can really know an element only by tracing it 

 through all its relations, as actually exhibited in the compounds formed by 

 its union with other elements. 



