A KINETIC THEORY OF MATTER. 235 



To return to elasticity : if we could make 'out 

 of matter devoid of elasticity a combined system 

 of relatively moving parts which, in virtue of 

 motion, has the essential characteristics of an 

 elastic body, this would surely be, if not positively 

 a step in the kinetic theory of matter, at least 

 a finger-post pointing a way which we may hope 

 will lead to a kinetic theory of matter. Now 

 this, as I have already shown, 1 we can do in 

 several ways. In the case of the last of the com- 

 munications referred to, of which only the title 

 has hitherto been published, I showed that, from 

 the mathematical investigation of a gyrostatically 

 dominated combination contained in the passage 

 of Thomson and Tait's Natural Philosophy 

 referred to, it follows that any ideal system of 

 material particles, acting on one another mutually 

 through massless connecting springs, may be 



1 Paper on " Vortex Atoms," Proc. R. S. E., Feb. 1867 ; abstract 

 of Lecture before Royal Institution of Great Britain, March 4, 1881, 

 on "Elasticity viewed as possibly a Mode of Motion" (included in 

 the present volume) ; Thomson and Tait's Natural Philosophy, 

 second edition, Part I. 345 viii to 345 xxvii ; "On Oscillation 

 and Waves in an Adynamic Gyrostatic System " (title only) Proc. 

 R. S. E., March, 1883. 



