434 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIV. No. 351. 



often the case, these assumptions introduce 

 new and more recondite difficulties, it must 

 be remembered that the fundamental hy- 

 pothesis — that matter consists of discrete 

 parts, capable of independent motions — is 

 forced upon us by facts and arguments 

 which are altogether independent of what 

 the nature and properties of these separate 

 parts may be. 



As a matter of history the two theories, 

 which are not by any means mutually ex- 

 clusive, that atoms are particles which can 

 be treated as distinct in kind from the 

 medium which surrounds them, and that 

 they are parts of that medium existing in 

 a special state, have both played a large 

 part in the theoretical development of the 

 atomic hypothesis. The atoms of Waters- 

 ton, Clausius and Maxwell were particles. 

 The vortex-atoms of Lord Kelvin, and the 

 strain-atoms (if I may call them so) sug- 

 gested by Mr. Larmor, are states of a pri- 

 mary medium which constitutes a physical 

 connection between them, and through 

 which their mutual actions arise and are 

 transmitted. 



PROPERTIES OF THE BASIS OF MATTER. 



It is easy to show that, whichever alter- 

 native be adopted, we are dealing with 

 something, whether we consider it under 

 the guise of separate particles or of differ- 

 entiated portions of the medium, which has 

 properties different from those of matter in 

 bulk. 



For if the basis of matter had the same 

 constitution as matter, the irregular heat 

 movements could hardly be maintained 

 either against the viscosity of the medium 

 or the frittering away of energy of motion 

 which would occur during the collisions be- 

 tween the particles. Thus, even in the case 

 in which a hot body is prevented from los- 

 ing heat to surrounding objects, its sensible 

 heat should spontaneously decay by a proc- 

 ess of self-cooling. No such phenomenon 



is known, and though on this, as on all 

 other points, the limits of our knowledge 

 are fixed by the uncertainty of experiment, 

 we are compelled to admit that, to all ap- 

 pearance, the fundamental medium, if it 

 exists, is unlike a material medium, in that 

 it is non-viscous ; and that the particles, if 

 they exist, are so constituted that energy is 

 not frittered away when they collide. In 

 either case we are dealing with something* 

 different from matter itself in the sense 

 that, though it is the basis of matter, it is 

 not identical in all its properties with mat- 

 ter. 



The idea therefore that entities exist pos- 

 sessing properties different from those of 

 matter in bulk is not introduced at the end 

 of a long and recondite investigation to 

 explain facts with which none but experts 

 are acquainted. It is forced upon us at 

 the very threshold of our study of nature. 

 Either the properties of matter in bulk 

 cannot be referred to any simpler structure, 

 or that simpler structure must have prop- 

 erties different from those of matter in bulk 

 as we directly knew it — properties which 

 can only be inferred from the results which 

 they produce. 



No a priori argument against the possi- 

 bility of our discovering the existence of 

 quasi-material substances, which are never- 

 theless different from matter, can prove the 

 negative proposition that such substances 

 cannot exist. It is not a self-evident truth 

 that no substance other than ordinary mat- 

 ter can have an existence as real as that of 

 matter itself. It is not axiomatic that 

 matter cannot be composed of parts whose 

 properties are different from those of the 

 whole. To assert that even if such sub- 

 stances and such parts exist no evidence, 

 however cogent, could convince us of their 

 existence is to beg the whole question at 

 issue; to decide the cause before it has 

 been heard. 



We must therefore adhere to the stand- 



