THE DOCTRINE OF ENERGY 125 



ingly failed to explain how Space, Matter, and 

 Extension are related with Reality. You cannot 

 ignore this difficulty by saying that these are the 

 working conceptions of particular branches of 

 Physical Science. But when you realise that 

 physical phenomena, even the most permanent 

 and rigid, are by scientific demonstration but 

 transmutations of the real thing, you may then 

 understand that Space, Body, and Extension are 

 but the laws and conditions of the process. As 

 appearances, and within the realm of phenomena, 

 they seem still what they have always seemed. So 

 much we still concede without diminution or 

 obscurity ; and at the same time we can harmonise 

 them as they could never be harmonised before 

 with postulated Reality. 



It is the same with Time. The facts of memory 

 would seem to imply that there is no succession 

 in the Absolute. We are always present at all 

 times of our life. In recollecting a past event we 

 are contemplating no mere image, but the actual 

 past event itself. Our chronometry depends on 

 the annual motion of the Earth round the Sun. 

 It has thus a purely physical basis. 



We might illustrate the application of the 

 doctrine of Energy to every department of Meta- 

 physics. But such is not the object of the present 



