194 ALFRED T. SCHOFIELD^ ESQ., M.D., M.R.C.S., ON 



together of themselves." When you come to th'nk of it, the 

 only thing that gravity would do, under those circumstauces, 

 would be to keep everything at absolute rest eternally. It is 

 the reductio ad absurdum behind which one c muot get. If yoii 

 will permit me I will follow that out a little further. If they are 

 moving, where are they moving — round, up or down, or right or 

 left, in space ? Gravity cannot get to action until some larger mass 

 is formed — until the "definite coherent heterogeneity" has been 

 formed. For gravity cannot be the cause of its own antecedent con- 

 ditions. Besides which I might remark if these atoms are moving, 

 they are moving in parallels and they would never go out of the 

 parallel, and gravity would not account for that. Now I will just 

 say this also — that there is another resource and that is that the 

 atoms are free-will atoms. Since you and I are only made of 

 organic matter, and since it is certain that you and I have got free 

 will and go here and there and do what we wish; therefore it is 

 only fair for the materialist to say that tlie atoms of which the 

 body is composed are free-will atoms. Professor Clifford said 

 that " every atom has a piece of mind stuff in it " ! — another 

 redvxtio ad absurdum I would ask you to take notice of. 



Finally, I would like to state that which I think is held by most 

 members of the Society — that the " I know " of science leads us 

 into so many unthinkable notions that I think we may say the 

 "I believe" of religion satisfies the reason in a far mo e 

 satisfactory and perfect way. 



Professor E. Hull, LL.D., F.R.S. — I would refer to one poirt 

 that Dr. Gerard Smith has mentioned, and that is with regard to 

 gravitation. Gravitation is a force ; but the effect of gravitation 

 by itself would, I think, go even further than he stated. It seems 

 to me that if matter had been universally disseminated in that 

 manner, and the force of attraction had been universally present 

 v«'ith each particle of matter, the result of that would have been to 

 produce one single solid mass of immovable matter in the centre 

 of the universe. You requii'e something more than the force of 

 gravitation, yon require motion, which, in the solar system is 

 opposed to gravitation, i.e., a centrifugal motion, acting in con- 

 junction with gravitation, in order to keep the whole sj'stern in its 

 normal and natural condition. But gravitation, by itself, would 

 hive had the effect of causing every particle to draw every 

 other particle to itself, and thus form a centre round which all 



