ANNUAL ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. XX XIII 
latter concept is no less mythic than that of the Indian who believes 
that the vacuity between them exerts the pull. 
It is fortunate for science that every discovery and every induc- 
tive hypothesis is rigidly criticised, as this leads to the careful 
examination of the verity of facts discerned and of the legitimacy 
of hypotheses derived therefrom. Against the kinematic theory of 
force much good rhetoric has been hurled, which may be somewhat 
imitated in the following manner : 
Here is a quotation from Bagehot, with an interpolation of my 
own: “This easy hypothesis of. special creation [occult force] has 
been tried so often, and has broken down so very often, that 
in no case probably do any great number of careful inquirers very 
firmly believe it. They may accept it provisionally, as the best 
hypothesis at present, but they feel about it as they cannot help 
feeling as to an army which has always been beaten; however 
strong it seems they think it will be beaten again.” 
The venerable gentlemen who constitute the elder school tell us 
that motion is not persistent; that energy constitutes a class of 
things including two groups, the forces on the one hand and the 
motions on the other; that the total amount of energy is persistent, 
but that the total amount of motion is changeable. And by their 
definition force is that which produces motion, 7. e. force can create 
or destroy motion. But manifestly where there is more motion there 
must be less force, therefore force can destroy itself; and when there 
is more force and less motion, force can create itself. 
The moon that passes through the sky of the gentlemen of the 
old school is moon from the eastern to the western horizon. Then 
the dragon, which exists not, destroys the moon and thus creates 
itself, and passing through the cave from west to east it mounts to 
their horizon, and in the twinkling of an eye commits suicide by 
creating a moon. It is not strange that the thaumaturgics of such 
philosophy should lend signal aid to its rhetoric. 
The use of hypothesis in science is not only legitimate but an 
absolute necessity. The science of psychology, as distinguished 
from metaphysic speculation, points out this fact: that all increase 
of knowledge is dependent upon hypothesis. Objective impressions 
made by the phenomena of the universe upon the organ of the mind 
are discerned only by the aid of comparison, and are added to 
knowledge only by being combined with previously discerned phe- 
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