ENERGY
425
ENERGY
radium enables it, while slowly breaking down into
simpler substances, to continue expending itself in
heat for an extraordinarily long time. Such an excep-
tion, however, is a useful reminder of the unwarranted
rashness of those who, ignoring the true character and
(imitations of the law. would, in virtue of its alleged
universal supremacy, rule out of existence, whether in
living beings or in the universe as a whole, every agent
or agency which may condition, control, or modify in
any way the working of the law in the concrete. As
we have before indicated in regard to some changes of
a chemical and mechanical character in the living be-
ing, the principle of conservation may hold in much
the same way as in non-living matter; whilst, in regard
to other physiological or psycho-physical processes, the
necessary qualifications and limitations may be of a
different order. The kind of evidence most cogent in
regard to inanimate matter — both direct experiment
and verified deduction — is wanting here ; and many of
the vital processes, especially those connected with
consciousness, are so imlike mechanical changes in
many respects that it would be scientifically unjustifi-
able to extend the generalization so as to include them.
The possibility of reversion, for instance, applicable in
a cycle of changes in inanimate matter, is here un-
thinkable. We could conceivably recover the gaseous
and solid products of exploded gunpowder and con-
vert them into their original condition, but the effort
to imagine the reversion of the process of the growth
of a man or a nation brings us face to face with an
absurdity.
Philosophical Deductions. — The philosophical conclusions which some writers have attempted to deduce from the law affect the question of God's exist- ence and action in the world, the possibility of Divine interference in tlie form of miracles, the nature of the human soul, its origin and relation to the body, and its moral freedom.
The Materialistic Mechanical Theory, which seeks to conceive the world as a vast self-moving machine, self- e.xisting from all eternity, devoid of all freedom or purpose, perpetually going tlirough a series of changes, each new state necessarily emerging out of the previ- ous and passing into the subsequent state, claims to find its justification in this law of the conserv-ation of energy. To this it may be replied in general, as in the case of the old objections to Theism based on the inde- structibility of matter, that the constancy of the total quantity of energy in the world or the convertibility of different forms of material energj', does not affect the arguments from the evidences of intelligent design in the world, the existence of self-conscious human minds, and the moral law. These things are realities of the first importance which every philosophical creed that pretends to be a rational sj'stem of thought must attempt to explain. But the mere fact that the sum of material energies, kinetic and potential, in any isolated system of bodies, or even in the physical uni- verse as a whole, remains constant, if it be a fact, affords no rational account or explanation whatever of these realities.
Herbert Spencer's Doctrines — As Spencer is the best-known writer who attempts to deduce a philoso- phy of the universe from the doctrine of energj-, we shall take him as representative of the school. Though the term jorce is confined by physicists to a nar- rower and well-defined meaning — the rate of change of energy per distance — Spencer identifies it with energj', and styles the conservation or const ancj' of energj' the "Persistence of Force". To this general principle, he tells us, an ultimate analj'sis of all our .sensible expe- rience brings us down, and on this a rational sj-nthesis must build up. Consequentlj', from this principle his "Synthetic Philosophy" seeks to deduce all the phe- nomena of the evolution of the universe. With re- spect to its proof he assures us that "the principle is deeper than demonstration, deeper than definite cogni-
tion, deep as the verj' nature of the mind. Its author-
ity transcends all other whatever, for not only is it
given in the constitution of our consciousness, but it is
impossible to imagine a consciousness so constituted
as not to give it " (First Principles, p. 162). The value
of this assertion maj' be gauged from the fact that
Xewton and all the ablest scientists down to the mid-
dle of last centurj' were ignorant of the principle, and
that it required the labour of Maj'er, Joule, Helmholtz,
and others to convince the scientific world of its truth.
"Evolution is an integration of matter and concomi-
tant dissipation of motion during which matter passes
from an indefinite incoherent homogeneity to a definite
heterogeneitj', and during which the retained motion
undergoes a parallel transformation. Owing to the
ultimate principles the transformation among all kinds
of existence cannot be other than we see it to be. The
redistribvition of matter and motion must everj-where
take place in those ways and produce those traits
which celestial bodies, organisms, societies alike dis-
plaj', and it has to be shown that this universalitj' of
process results from the same necessity which deter-
mines each simplest movement around us. . . In
other words the phenomena of evolution have to be
deduced from the Persistence of 'Force'." Spencer's
proof is merelj' a description of the changes which
have taken place. He does not show, and it is impos-
sible to show, from the mere fact that the quantity of
energj' has to remain constant, that the particular
forms in which it has appeared — the Roman Empire,
Shakespeare's plays, and Mr. Spencer's philosophy —
must have appeared. The principle can onlj- tell us
that a constant quantitative relation has been pre-
served amid all the qualitative transformations of the
phj'sical universe, and that it will be preser\'ed in the
future. But it furnishes no reason for the order and
seeminglj' intelligent design which abounds, and it
offers not the faintest suggestion of an explanation
why the primitive nebulse should have evolved into
life, minds, art, literature, and science. To describe
the process of building a cathedral is not to deduce a
masterpiece of architecture from so manj- tons of stone
and mortar. To show even that the law of gravita-
tion prevailed during every event in the history of
England would not be a deduction of the history of
England from the law of gravitation. Yet this is pre-
cisely the sort of undertaking Spencer's "Sj'nthetic
Philosophy" is committed to in seeking to deduce the
present world from the conser\'ation of energj', and so
to dispense with an intelligent Creator. 'The same
holds for everj- other project of a similar kind. A more
remarkable feature still in Spencer's handling of the
present subject is that he seats this "Persistence of
Force" in the Absolute itself. It really "means the
persistence of some Power which transcends our knowl-
edge and conception. . . the Unknown Cause of the
phenomenal manifestations" of our ordinary expe-
rience. This is a complete misconception, misrepre-
sentation, and misuse of the principle of conservation,
as known to science. Maj'er and Joule never at-
tempted to establish that some noumenal power or
unknown cause behind the phenomena of the universe
has a constant quantity of energj' in itself. Nor is it
a self-evident datum of our consciousness that, if there
be such an unknown cause, its phenomenal manifesta-
tions must be always quantitativelj' the same
"throughout all past and future time". The scien-
tific principle merelj' affirms constant quantitative
equivalence amid the actual transmutations of certain
known ami knowable realities, heat, mechanical work,
and the rest. This, however, would afford no help to-
wards an explanation of the universe. Consequentlj',
it had to be transformed into something very dif-
ferent to serve as the basis of the Synthetic Philo-
sophy.
Professor OstwaU, on the other hand, apparentlj' opposed to mechanical theories, carries us little farther
