187 
63. But all this knowledge of matter is, as I have shown, 
the result of our knowledge of another property of matter, 
which we call gravitation of mass ; that which causes the apple 
to fall from the tree, that which has enabled mankind to 
construct the balance and the weights. 
64. But in all this we find not the slightest approach to 
what we call “ mind,” nor to the exercise of any power of 
organisation or of combination to serve one common purpose.* 
65. What, then, are we to say to force ? This, at all 
events as an abstract conception, can neither be weighed nor 
measured ; and the proper idea of force is surely destructive 
and not constructive. The common experience of mankind 
has ever looked upon the flash of lightning as the embodiment 
of force, and thus the thunderbolts were of old put into the 
hands of Jupiter Tonans. It is somewhat arrogantly said that 
the great achievement of the age is to have taken these 
weapons out of the hand of the Thunderer, and adapted them 
to our every-day purposes. 
66. Moreover, we are to teach all the young scholars in the 
proposed new Sunday schools that we know all about the 
lightning now, and that it is simply a display of electricity. 
But if any junior of inquiring mind asks, What, then, is electri- 
city ? he will probably be told that it is “ a name given to a 
series of phenomena,” and that “ it derives its name from the 
Greek word electron , amber, which, when well rubbed, 
has the power of attracting bodies.” He might be further 
told about “ an extremely subtle fluid ” ; but if the enfant 
terrible pursued his inquiries to the point whether this fluid 
was matter or no matter, he would surely be told that such 
subjects were beyond the grasp, at all events, of a Sunday 
scholar ! 
67. But if I put this inquiry to Modern Science, I shall 
doubtless receive a satisfactor} 7 answer, since whatever is 
capable of being measured, whether by Ells or by Ohms, f must 
certainly be ranked amongst phenomena of matter, though it 
be not ponderable. 
68. I put to myself the question Matter or no Matter ? 
whilst gazing on the crimson glories of the recently observed 
Aurora. I looked on it all as a display of terrestrial mag- 
netism. I turn to my books for an answer to the question, 
What is magnetism ? and I find that it is specially an 
* Exam, of Belfast Address , Trans, vol. x. p. 126. — See ante. 
t The unit of resistance of electricity is thus called after Ohm, a German 
electrician. — See Prescott, The Speaking Telephone p. 103. 
