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attractive power residing in the magnet. But then what is 
that extraordinary white beam which I saw traversing the 
heavens at the same time ? Was that material ?* 
69. So that I must tell the boys that, in the lightning we 
behold embodied force , in the Aurora embodied power ; but 
if I ask after embodied mind in man, I shall, like the trouble- 
some boy, be driven on to the question of embodied not mind 
in the birds which, before my eyes, are feasting on provision 
hung up for them during the frost. I watch their ways with 
much amusement, and, if I were a Greek, should say they 
display much nous (vovg ), though I grant no mind [mens). 
70. My object in this paper is to show that, contrary to 
Professor Huxley’s theory, the constitution of matter is a 
legitimate subject of inquiry ; and that, pursuing the research 
on the lines of common sense, we arrive at some certain 
knowledge of its properties, and attain to a strong presumption 
of accuracy as to our conception of its constitution. The 
resulting knowledge that we obtain shows us matter as 
subordinated in all things to the disposal of an Infinite Mind, 
— in its orderly arrangement affording scope for devout 
admiration ; but as regards any possibility of deducing the 
properties of mind from those of matter, everything shows 
that the attempt must fail. Instead of Will and Choice we 
encounter Destiny; instead of power of combination and 
organisation, we meet with an all but infinite individuality, — 
every atom acts on its neighbours according to fixed pro- 
perties and laws. 
71. Ponderable matter, then, stands in the same relation 
to us that it does to its Creator, — the subject materia which 
we (as formed in the image of God) may, in proportion to our 
knowledge of its properties, mould at our will. 
72. I assert nothing, because we know nothing distinctly, 
about imponderable matter. In this direction there lies a 
whole world open to our inquiry, concerning which our present 
acquaintance is like that of children, deriving their knowledge 
of the ocean by wading fearfully amongst its tiny waves.f On 
* I suppose so, though the discussion in the pages of Nature h&s not led to a 
very definite result ; but I find a definition in Uanot’s Elements des Physiques, 
translated by Dr. Atkinson, 1879, which would, at all events, apply. It is 
this : — a That which possesses the properties whose existence is revealed to 
us by our senses, we call matter or substance 99 ; but what, then, is it 
that proceeds from the end of the fingers, as represented at p. 825 of this 
work, and attracts the electric (magnetic) stream within a Geissler’s tube ? 
The repulsion by the flat hand, as I have seen it, is, if possible, even more 
curious. 
t In Nature, pp. 304-6 and 328-30, of the present year (1883), is a report 
