LAW; — ITS DEFINITIONS. 97 



of that smail number of elementary substances, 

 having fixed rules, too, limiting their combina- 

 tion, all the infinite varieties of organic and inor- 

 ganic matter are built up by means of nice ad- 

 justment. As all the faculties of a powerful mind 

 can utter their voice in language whose elements 

 are reducible to twenty-four letters, so all the 

 forms of Nature, with all the ideas they express, 

 are worked out from a few simple elements having 

 a few simple properties. 



Simple ! can we call them so ? Yes, simple by 

 comparison with the exceeding complication of 

 the uses they are made to serve : simple also, in 

 this sense, that they follow some simple rule of 

 numbers. But in themselves these laws, these 

 forces, are incomprehensible. That which is most 

 remarkable about them is their unchangeableness. 

 The whole mind and imagination of scientific men 

 is often so impressed with this character of ma- 

 terial laws, that no room is left for the perception 

 of other aspects of their nature and of their work. 

 We hear of rigid and universal sequence — neces- 

 sary — invariable; — of unbroken chains of cause 

 and effect, no link of which can, in the nature of 



