6io 
The Vehicle of Force. 
[O&ober, 
If we approach this subject more closely, we at once per- 
ceive that at least two of the four special manifestations of 
this force spring from motive conditions. These four mani- 
festations are Eleftricity, Magnetism, Chemism, and Gravi- 
tation. Chemism, however, has probably nothing special in 
itself, but is more likely a result of the other three, modes of 
energy; as are also the cohesive and adhesive displays. of 
force. ? But of the three other manifestations of directive 
force there is abundant reason to believe that eledtricity and 
magnetism are modes of motion, while we are as yet un- 
aware of the cause of gravitation. If the electric and 
magnetic energies, then, arise from special conditions of 
motion, and if their sole manifestation— beyond that, ol 
motive vigour — is attractive and repulsive force, we certainly 
have some warrant to conclude that this force is an attribute 
of the special motions with whose birth it is born, and with 
whose death it dies. 
We may safely take it for granted that the directive energy 
is not an attribute of both matter and motion, arising from 
the innate constitution of matter, and also from the innate 
energy of motion. Such an attribute cannot possibly belong 
to two distinct ultimates of Nature— to concrete matter and 
to abstract motion. It must appertain to one only. But it 
we impute it to matter there arise certain mysteries which 
still remain unsolved, despite numberless attempts to ex- 
plain them First, how it can exist in two diredtly oppo- 
site forms ; secondly, how it can increase and diminish in 
quantity ; thirdly, how it can be transferred from one sub- 
stance to another ; and finally, how it can utterly disappear 
in one form without any apparent change into another form. 
If on the contrary, it belong to motion, all these difficulties 
at once vanish. Motion readily assumes diredtly opposite 
conditions ; it readily varies in quantity in any substance or 
part of a substance ; it is readily transferred from one body 
to another ; and, finally, it may so change as to produce 
neutral relations, with complete disappearance of directive 
force. Thus the many objections which apply to matter as 
the vehicle of force all disappear if we ascribe this attribute 
to motion. . . T 
Such a transfer of directive force is one of the. most com- 
mon manifestations of electricity. Static eleCtric force, for 
instance, spreads from a point over the whole surface ol a 
conduaing body, and leaps from one conduaor to another, 
carrying with it, in all its movements, attraaive and repul- 
sive vigour. Now the transfer of elearicity is simply the 
transfer of a mode of motion ; therefore the force transferred 
