THE LAW OF SUBSTANCE. 233 



atmospheric air ; on that hypothesis a sphere of ether 

 of the size of our earth would weigh at least two 

 hundred and fifty pounds (?). 



VI. — The etheric consistency may probably (in 

 accordance with the pyknotic theory) pass into the 

 gaseous state under certain conditions by progressive 

 condensation, just as a gas may be converted into a 

 fluid, and ultimately into a solid, by lowering its 

 temperature. 



VII. — Consequently, these three conditions of matter 

 may be arranged (and it is a point of great importance 

 in our monistic cosmogony) in a genetic, continuous 

 order. We may distinguish five stages in it : (1) 

 the etheric, (2) the gaseous, (3) the fluid, (4) the 

 viscous (in the living protoplasm), and (5) the solid 

 state. 



VIII. — Ether is boundless and immeasurable, like 

 the space it occupies. It is in eternal motion ; and 

 this specific movement of ether (it is immaterial 

 whether we conceive it as vibration, strain, condensa- 

 tion, etc.), in reciprocal action with mass-movement 

 (or gravitation), is the ultimate cause of all pheno- 

 mena. 



" The great question of the nature of ether," as 

 Hertz justly calls it, includes the question of its 

 relation to ponderable matter ; for these two forms 

 of matter are not only always in the closest external 

 contact, but also in eternal, dynamic, reciprocal 

 action. We may divide the most general phenomena 

 of nature, which are distinguished by physics as 

 natural forces or " functions of matter," into two 

 groups ; the first of them may be regarded mainly 

 (though not exclusively) as a function of ether, 

 and the second a function of ponderable matter — 



