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equal . This inequality of force at variable distances puts a 
negative on the possibility of what is called the conservation of 
force ; and, of course, on its dependent doctrine of the correla- 
tion of physical forces, about which I shall have presently more 
to say. 
The Divine Mind, having determined what shall be per- 
manently the absolute force of the several attractions, will in 
each case have adopted the law for varying its action which has 
been foreseen to be necessary for the universe as it is. lie 
might have established for distance between cause and effect 
any ratio other than that of the inverse square ; or even the 
law might have embodied some other command with which 
distance had nothing whatever to do. Thus while, as we know, 
it has been established that two masses of matter gravitate 
between cause and effect through a given distance with twice 
the force of one of them ; we are unable to perceive any 
reason why the gravitation should not have become on the 
coalescence of two equal masses, and by reason of it, four, or 
any number of times, instead of only twice as great. Of 
course, as a unit of matter gravitates with a unit of force, 
two similar units of force under the same relation of distance 
must — being entirely independent of one another — have a 
force of gravitation exactly twice as great ; but who can discern 
any necessity for the existing independence ? Dependence, or 
independence, is determined by the volition in exercise, and 
volition is subject to no necessity. Until we discovered by ob- 
servation what moral power had elected to do, the existence of 
any one law, or ratio, between force and matter could no 
more be anticipated by us than any other law or ratio ; and for 
those in nature we are without a reason, unless we find it in 
this — that the laws in operation are what they are because 
none other would have produced things as we actually find 
them, and as we can have no doubt they were intended to be. 
But it is plain that if the coalescence of a double quantity 
of matter in action had exhibited a four-fold force, the ratio 
would certainly not have furnished a warrant for regarding, as 
it is the common practice to do, matter and force as the simple 
measures of one another. It would have been as easy then as 
it is at present to ascertain the quantities of ponderable matter 
corresponding to amounts of gravitating force ; and we should 
have observed that they varied otherwise than in a simple 
ratio with one another. Now, although that is not the case 
with gravitation, it may be the case with one or other of the 
attractions, which we cannot know to be alike either in their 
laws or in their absolute forces, unless we learn it from ob- 
servation ; and observation teaches us a very different fact, as 
