116 



liim that we do not wisli to unite the ideas of force and its 

 destruction, but of motion and its cessation, which, in our 

 unphilosophic minds, are very closely united.* 



34. We must do Mr. Spencer the j ustice of saying that he uses 

 in one place the phrase '^persistence of force with a meaning 

 differing widely from the continuity of motion or energy, but 

 witli a meaning shared, I will venture to say, by no other writer 

 on the subject. " Thus by the persistence of force,^^ he says, 

 " we really mean the persistence of some power which transcends 

 our knowledge and conception. The manifestations, as occur- 

 ring either in ourselves or outside of us, do not persist; but 

 that which persists is the unknown cause of these manifesta- 

 tions. In other words, asserting the persistence of force is but 

 another mode of asserting an unconditioned reality, without 

 beginning or end.^' As the only reality answering to this 

 description is God, Mr. Spencer asserts, and in this we are at 

 one, that amid all changes, all beginnings, and all endings, 

 there is one great Reality, the same yesterday, to-day, and for 

 ever, the I AM/' But to call God's unchanging existence 

 the persistence of force is not the ordinary usage of language. 

 It would be well, however, if all students of nature remembered 

 the great fact, that the one force of the universe is the will 

 of God, and that though heaven and earth may pass away, one 

 jot or tittle of that will can never pass till all be fulfilled. 



35. From what has been already advanced, it will be at once 

 evident that the Conversion of Forces is an important element 

 in the hypothesis we are combating. It is very clear that 

 motion ceases to exist as light, heat, or sound ; but, if it still 

 exist as motion, it must be in some other mode. One mode 

 called by one name, — as heat, for example, — becomes another 

 mode, we are told, called by another name, such as light. We 

 must understand clearly that it is conversion, and not condition, 

 which is insisted on, at least by Dr. Tyndall and others. One force 

 being the condition of the existence of another force, is a very 

 diff'erent thing from one force becoming another force. The 

 former we readily assent to ; but about the latter we are in very 

 considerable doubt. It may be true ; but we think it still 

 needs further proof. We are, however, in this safe position in 



* While we are compelled to differ from Dr. Tyndall on these theoretic 

 points, we would express our unqualified admiration of his great abilities as 

 an experimenter, and our sincere gratitude to him for making known the 

 results of his investigations, in language so beautiful, clear, and precise as to 

 captivate while he instructs ; and win students to the study of nature, who, 

 but for him, might have gone to the grave caring nothing for God, and less 

 for His works. 



