The Metaphysics of a Naturalist 
56 
capacity. The question which arises at once is, there are 
motions, motions of what?’’ But this is, as we have seen, per- 
haps simply the begging of the question. Is there any reason 
why a vibration must be a vibration of something? We learn of 
vibrations which pose for a time as essential properties of some 
portion of matter being transferred to some other portion of 
matter and there becoming properties of that object. Evidently 
this is a region of great obscurity which would be greatly simpli- 
fied if we could think of the force as the essential ^^sub- 
stance” and confine ourselves to the task of tracing its transfor- 
mations. This in fact is the present tendency of molecular physics, 
and atoms and molecules are soon to be recognized as convenient 
words to express states of aggregation of forces. We shall pro- 
ceed, so far as possible, from this point of view and in speaking 
of matter and organs, distinctly disavow the implication of reality 
in matter as apart from the expression of forces which constitute 
its properties. ” 
In like manner, we shall seek no special definition of cause” 
as distinct from the force. It is the nature of force to act and a 
non-acting force is non-existing force. A force can be altered but 
not neutralized. The search for the cause of a certain event is a 
tracing of the genealogy of its forces. 
Science has shown with a great deal of probability that forces are 
all convertible without loss. There are many facts which seem to 
show that the persistence of matter is relative and that the serial 
or periodic arrangement of the properties of the series of elements 
are hints of the dynamic progression of which they are the expres- 
sion. 
The physicist says he can ^^get it all back” without loss. But 
respecting transformation of energy Dr. Magnusson^^ finds that 
the old formulae (all including mass with its matter implications) 
directly contradict the conservation of energy and introduce 
time-elements in electro-dynamic equations where they mani- 
festly do not belong. His results materially strengthen the 
dynamic view; he cuts matter out of the dimensional equations, 
substituting for it energy in every case, with results which are 
very suggestive. 
“ Dimensional Equations and the Principle of the Conservation of Energy/’ 
Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods, vol. 1, no. 12, June 9, 1904, 
pp. 316-320. 
