Essay on Motion and Force. 



265 



The fact that a spring at a distance from the earth would 

 be less compressed by the weight of a body, than near to it, 

 only proves that that there is less motion imparted to the 

 body as it is removed from the earth's center, for I regard 

 the so called force of tension only as increased molecular 

 motion in a particular direction. The statement that 

 gravity is a force decreasing inversely as the square of 

 the distance increases, seems to me to convey utterly 

 erroneous ideas as to gravity, and to stand as a stumbling 

 block in the path of advancement. The fact that a 

 body moves less at a distance from the earth when free 

 to move, proves only that less motion is imparted to 

 it ; it does not prove that the force, if there be an occult 

 force, which produces that motion, is less, it shows only 

 that less of it is expended in producing that particular 

 motion ; and that a body weighs less, is only to say 

 that it moves less, since weight is the measure of the 

 earth's attraction, or in other words, the measure of the 

 motion which is induced in bodies at a distance from its 

 center. How would it be possible to demonstrate by 

 experiment that a body weighs less at a greater, than at a 

 less distance from the earth's center ? The balance 

 would not avail, for when equal weights are used, the 

 motion would be transferred to the final support, and 

 converted into so called tension, which has already 

 been glanced at. An instrument calculated to measure 

 this tension would then become necessary, and as this 

 instrument, if the views I have already advanced with 

 regard to this "mode of motion" be correct, can only 

 show how much motion has been transferred to it, we 

 therefore can only say, that at a distance from the earth, 

 a body left free to move, would move less than it would 

 move, if nearer to the earth's center, and if this and this 

 only is meant by the expression, the attraction varies 

 as the squares of the distances from the centers of attract- 

 ing bodies, I make no objection to the term thus freed 

 from the vague idea of occult varying force. All anal- 



