go The Evolution Hypothesis. 



in the analysis of his ultimate principle to inextric- 

 able ambiguities. In conformity with his ontological 

 theory, he employs the word force to denote two- 

 things which are profoundly different force as it is 

 the object of consciousness and within the limits of 

 definite knowledge, and force as it lies beyond the 

 ken of knowledge and is for ever inscrutable. The 

 necessities of scientific reasoning demand the persist- 

 ence of a force that is within the reach of knowledge \ 

 the validity of the axiom as a universal and neces- 

 sary truth requires that we should take, not th& 

 knowable, but the absolute force as that of which 

 persistence is predicated. Hence an ambiguous use- 

 of the term which runs through Mr. Spencer's entire 

 system. His ordinary usage is to employ the word 

 in the sense of force as manifested and knowable. 

 For example, in dealing with the correlation of forces, 

 he says, "a certain amount of each is the constant 

 equivalent of certain amounts of others. Everywhere 

 throughout the cosmos this truth must invariably 



hold We must recognize the amounts of these 



forces as determinate as necessarily producing such 

 and such quantities of results, and as necessarily 



limited to those quantities Forces, unceasingly 



metamorphosed are nowhere increased or decreased." * 

 Elsewhere he affirms that this truth of the corre- 

 lation of forces " is a necessary corollary from the- 



* First Principles, 66, 67, 



