LAW; — ITS DEFINITIONS. 8l 



knowledge. What we always reach at last in 

 the course of every physical inquiry, is the recog- 

 nition, not of individual laws, but of some definite 

 relation to each other, in which different laws are 

 placed, so as to bring about a particular result. 

 But this is, in other words, the principle of Adjust- 

 ment, and adjustment has no meaning except as 

 the instrument and the result of Purpose. Force 

 so combined with Force as to produce certain 

 definite and orderly results, — this is the ultimate 

 fact of all discovery. 



And so we come upon another sense — the 

 Fourth sense, in which Law is habitually used in 

 Science, and this is perhaps the commonest and 

 most important of all. It is used to designate 

 not merely an observed Order of facts — not merely 

 the bare abstract idea of Force — not merely indi- 

 vidual Forces according to ascertained measures 

 of operation — but a number of Forces in the con- 

 dition of mutual adjustment, that is to say, as 

 combined with each other, and fitted to each 

 other for the attainment of special ends. The 

 whole science of Mechanics, for example, deals 



with Law in this sense — with natural Forces as 



F 



