40 SOME REMARKS ON THE 



Thus it appears, and tlie same remark might be educed from 

 other though similar considerations, that we are by no means 

 absolutely estopped by the imperfection of our mechanical phi- 

 losophy, from explaining phenomena really due to mechanical 

 forces, even when these phenomena are connected with subjects 

 not as yet fully comprehended : why then cannot some progress 

 be made in the mechanical explanation of chemical phenomena, 

 or of those, to mention no other class, which we are in the habit 

 of referring to vital action? In these cases, we see or seem to 

 see that the action of mechanical laws is modified or suspended ; 

 and though it is not demonstrably impossible that this is not 

 really the case, and that no other causes are at work beside the 

 "push and pull" forces of ordinary mechanics, yet we are at 

 least much tempted to believe, that the difficulties we meet with 

 do not arise from what may be called the disguised action of 

 mechanical forces but from the presence of an agency of a dis- 

 tinct nature. And to this view we find that most of those in- 

 cline who have made themselves familiar with the science of 

 chemistry or with that which has been called biology; and 

 further that, (with reference to the latter science) the insuffi- 

 ciency not only of a mechanical but even of a chemical phy- 

 siology has been generally admitted. 



Secondly, it is to be observed that even if it be considered 

 doubtful whether a mechanical philosophy be not after all 

 sufficient for the explanation of all phenomena, it is at least 

 certain that it has not been proved to be so: and that by reject- 

 ing other conceivable modes of action than those which are 

 recognised by it, we unnecessarily and arbitrarily limit the 

 problem which the universe presents to us ; falling thereby into 

 an error similar to that of the atomists, who starting from the 

 assumption that the ap^ai, or first principles of all things, are 

 atoms and a vacuum proceeded to construct an imaginary world, 

 in accordance with this arbitrary hypothesis. At the same time 

 it must be granted that a purely mechanical* system such as 

 that of Boscovich is more self-consistent and contains, so to 



The word mechanical is of course not used in antithesis to dynamical, in the 

 sense in which the latter is commonly employed by the philosophical writers of 

 Germany. The antithesis in question is foreign to the scope of the present essay, 

 and I have accordingly elsewhere used the word dynamical in its ordinary ac- 

 ceptation. 



