﻿440 Prof. J. Bayma on the Fundamental 



(p. 63), and will soon be convinced that they are not arbi- 

 trary assumptions, as advanced by the learned Professor. 

 He then adds : 



" The author also conceives that the mutual action of two mate- 

 rial points is in no degree and under no circumstances intercepted 

 by another intervening point. But we know that, in the case of 

 the molecular forces, the amount of vis viva expended in imparting 

 motion to one particle is abstracted from the force in action ; and, 

 according to Professor Bayma, the molecular forces are of the same 

 nature as the forces subsisting between the material elements. The 

 force of gravity, it is true, is not sensibly intercepted ; but this does 

 not prove that a tendency to interception does not exist ; for upon 

 the supposition of a wave-transmission of the force, the effective at- 

 traction of any molecule may be the mere differential of the actual 

 force transmitted, and, besides, in the circular revolution of a planet 

 the distance from the sun remains unchanged." 



The statement that in my opinion mutual action is never 

 intercepted by intervening matter is perfectly true : only the 

 writer might have noticed that I never confound action with 

 motion, and therefore though I hold that action cannot be in- 

 terfered with by intervening matter, I hold nothing of the sort 

 regarding motion. Had he made the same important distinc- 

 tion, he would have seen that his objection is a mere sophism. 

 We know indeed that " the amount of vis viva expended in im- 

 parting motion to one particle is abstracted from the force in 

 action " or more exactly from the body in motion-, but we do not 

 know that it is abstracted from the active power of the element 

 or from its action. Vis viva is a function of velocity; and velo- 

 city is neither action nor active power, as I have shown at length 

 in my treatise (pp. 19-25, also pp. 44, 45). The body in mo- 

 tion will therefore, by a loss of vis viva, lose motion, not action, 

 nor active power. 



The other statement, that, according to me, "the molecular 

 forces are of the same nature as the forces subsisting between 

 material elements," may be true or false, according as the word 

 " forces " is assumed to mean active powers or the result of their 

 combined exertions. In the first case the statement is true, be- 

 cause the action of the whole molecule proceeds from the same 

 powers which constitute the molecular system. In the second 

 case the statement is false, because the nature of the resultant 

 depends not only on the nature of the active powers, but also 

 on the nature of the actual composition or mechanical state of 

 the molecule : so that the resultant of their actions (which is 

 considered as the action of the molecule) widely differs from the 

 action of each element, and, unlike it, does not follow the New- 

 tonian law at molecular distances, as is well known. 



