Gustave LeBon: The Evolution of Forces ~ Part I

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 **Dr.
Gustave Le BON**

***The Evolution of Forces***

The International Scientific Series   
D. Appleton and Company ~ New York ~ 1908

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**Contents**

**[Preface](#pref)**

**Part I**   
**The New Principles**

**Book I**   
**The New Bases of the Physics of the Universe**

**[Chapter I ~ The Present Anarchy of
Science](#p1b1ch1)**

**[Chapter II ~ The New Doctrines](#p1b1ch2)**

**Book II**   
**The Irreducible Magnitudes of the Universe**

**[Chapter I ~ Time, Space, Matter and Force](#p1b2ch1)**
  
**1. The Conception of the Irreducible Magnitudes of the
Universe**   
**2. Measurement of the Same**

**[Chapter II ~ The Great Constants of the
Universe: Resistance and Movement](#p1b2ch2)**   
**1. Inertia or Resistance to Change**   
**2. Mass**   
**3. Movement and Force**

**[Chapter III ~ The Building-Up of Forces
and the Mechanical Explanations of the Universe](#p1b2ch3)**   
**1. The Cycle of Forces**   
**2. The Mechanical Explanations of the Universe**

**Book III**   
**The Dogma of the Indestructibility of Energy**

**[Chapter I ~ The Monistic Conception of
Forces and the Theory of the Conservation of Energy](#p1b3ch1)**
  
**1. The Conservation of Energy**   
**2. The Principles of Thermodynamics**

**[Chapter II ~ The Energetical Explanation
of Phenomena](#p1b3ch2)**   
**1. The Principles of Energetic Mechanics**   
**2. Quantity and Tension of Energy**   
**3. Transformation of Quantity into Tension, and Conversely**
  
**4. Part of Matter in Energetic Mechanics**

**[Chapter III ~ The Degradation of Energy
and Potential Energy](#p1b3ch3)**   
**1. The Theory of the Degradation of Energy**   
**2. Potential Energy**

**Book IV**   
**The New Conception of Forces**

**[Chapter I ~ The Individuation of Forces
and the Supposed Transformations of Energy](#p1b4ch1)**   
**1. The Transformations of Energy**   
**2. Forms of Energy in Matter**

**[Chapter II ~ The Changes of Equilibria of
Matter and the Ether Origin of Forces](#p1b4ch2)**   
**1. Alterations of Level as Generators of Energy**   
**2. Elements of Entity called Energy**

**[Chapter III ~ The Evolution of the Cosmos
 Origin of Matter and Universal Forces](#p1b4ch3)**   
**1. The Origin of Matter**   
**2. Formation of a Solar System**   
**3. Molecular and Intra-Atomic Energies**   
**4. Intra-atomic Energy Source of Universal Forces**

**[Chapter IV ~ The Vanishing of Energy and
End of Our Universe](#p1b4ch4)**   
**1. The Old Age of Energy and Vanishing of Forces**   
**2. Summary of Doctrine of Vanishing of Energy and Discussion
of Objections**   
**3. Periods of Evolution of World**

***[Part II ~ The
Problems of Physics](evforp2.htm)***

---



**Editors Preface**

In the following pages, Dr Gustave Le Bon develops further the
strikingly novel and original theories put forward by him in *The
Evolution of Matter* (Paris 1905). As in the last-named
work, he enunciated the doctrine, which he was the first to
deduce, that all matter is continually in a state of
dissociation and decay, so in this he goes in detail into the
corollary, there only briefly stated, that the atom is a great
reservoir of energy, and itself the source of most of the forces
of the universe. In support of this position, he calls in the
aid of his earlier researches into the nature of invisible
radiations, phosphorescence, and the Hertzian waves, all which,
with several related phenomena, he declares to be explicable by
the hypothesis that the atom, on dissociating, sets free, either
wholly or in part, the energy stored up within it on its
formation. Yet he is careful to declare that this is rather
suggested than demonstrated by his researches, and that the
conclusive proof of the validity of his assertion must be
delayed for the result of further experiments by himself or
others.

In the meantime, it is well to notice that both Dr Le Bons
original thesis and its corollary have received approval from an
unexpected quarter. Every new scientific theory, if sufficiently
far-reaching, is received with disapproval by those brought up
on the ideas it would supplant, and Dr Le Bons assertion of the
universal dissociation of matter formed no exception to this
rule. In France, as he reminds us in *The Evolution of Matter*,
his first discovery of the phenomena which he classed together
under the odd name of "Black Light", aroused a perfect storm of
obloquy which has long since died away. In England, whither his
theories penetrated only after they had been in great part
accepted by the scientific world, this was not the case; but two
members of the Cavendish Laboratory at Cambridge took upon
themselves, upon the appearance of *The Evolution of Matter*,
to assail its teaching as well as its novelty with ore virulence
than force (See the *Athenaeum* of Feb 17 and 24 and of
March 3, 10, 17, and 24, 1906; and the *Jahrbuch fur
Elektronik* ii (1905), p. 459 et seq.). It is therefore
pleasing to find Mr P. D. Innes, himself a member of the
Cavendish Laboratory, writing, with the apparent approval of its
Director, in the *Proceedings of the Royal Society* (A,
vol. lxxix, No. 4 (Sept 1907), p. 442.), with regard to
radioactive phenomena, that:

"The only theory which can satisfactorily account for the
phenomena observed is that of atomic disintegration, a process
that is apparently going on in several, if not all, of the
elements";

and further (p. 443):

"That there is a great store of energy in the atom seems now
beyond question, and if this reservoir could only become
available, all our present conditions might be completely
revolutionized."

This is exactly -- as any one can see for himself -- the
position taken by Dr Le Bon in *The Evolution of Matter*,
and further defined and emphasized by hi in the present work.
There seems therefore good reason to suppose that Dr Le Bons
later theories, as well as his earlier ones, are now widely
accepted by men of science, and that before long this acceptance
will be extended to all points of his doctrine.

It should be noted that the present work was written expressly
for the International Science Series, and was intended to appear
simultaneously in England and France. Difficulties connected
with the reproduction of the illustrations have caused the
appearance of this version to lag some months behind the French,
of which 8 editions of 1000 copies apiece have been rapidly
exhausted. The delay has not been useless, as it has enabled me
to add a few corrections and notes, together with indexes, which
are wanting in the French editions.

F. Legge   
Royal Institute of Great Britain (February 1908)

---



***Part I***   
***The New Principles***

**Book I**   
**The New Bases of the Physics of the
Universe**   
  
**Chapter I**   
**The Present Anarchy of Science**

Every philosopher devoted to the study of subjects with rather
vague outlines and uncertain conclusions, such as Psychology,
Politics, or History; who had a few years ago to peruse a work
on Physical Science, must have been struck by the clearness of
the definitions, the exactness of the demonstrations, and the
precision of the experiments. Everything was strictly linked
together and interpreted. By the side of the most complicated
phenomenon there was always figured its explanation.

If this same philosopher had the curiosity to look for the
general principles on which these precise sciences were founded,
he could not but be compelled to admire their marvelous
simplicity and their imposing grandeur. Chemistry and mechanics
had the indestructible atom for their foundation, physics the
indestructible energy. Learned equations, produced either by
experiments or by pure reasoning, united by rigid formulas the
four fundamental elements of things -- i.e., time, space, matter
and force. All the bodies in the universe, from the gigantic
star describing its eternal revolutions in space down to the
infinitesimal grain of dust which the wind seems to blow about
at will, were subject to their laws.

We were right to be proud of such a science, the fruit of
centuries of effort. To it was due the unity and simplicity
which everywhere reigned. A few minds enamored of formulas
thought it possible to simplify them further by taking into
account only the mathematical relations between phenomena. These
last appeared to them solely as manifestations of one great
entity, viz.: energy. A few differential equations sufficed to
explain all the facts discovered by observation. The principal
researches of science consisted in discovering new formulas that
from that moment became universal laws which nature was forced
to obey.

Before such important results, the philosopher bent low, and
acknowledged that if but little certainty existed in the
surrounding in which he lived, at least it could be found in the
domain of pure science. How could he doubt it? Did he not notice
that the majority of learned men were so sure of their
demonstrations that not even the shadow of a doubt ever crossed
their minds?

Placed above the changing flux of things, above the chaos of
unstable and contradictory opinions, the chaos of unstable and
contradictory opinions, they dwelt in that serene region of the
absolute where all uncertainty vanishes and where shines the
dazzling light of pure truth.

Our great scientific theories are not all very ancient and
great, since the cycle of precise experimental science hardly
covers more than three centuries. This period, relatively so
short, reveals two very distinct phases of evolution in the
minds of scholars.

The first is the period of confidence and certainty to which I
have just referred. In the face of the daily increase of
discoveries, especially during the first half of the last
century, the philosophical and religious dogmas on which our
conception of the universe had for so long been based, faded and
vanished completely. No complaint was raised. Were not absolute
truths to replace the former uncertainties of ancient beliefs?
The founders of each new science imagined that they had once for
all built up for that science a framework which only needed
filling in. This scientific edifice once built up, it would
alone remain standing on the ruins of the vain imaginings and
illusions of the past. The scientific creed was complete. No
doubt it presented nature as regardless of mankind and the
heavens as tenantless; but it was hoped to repeople the latter
at an early date and to set up for adoration new idols, somewhat
wooden perhaps, but which at least would never play us false.

This happy confidence in the great dogmas of modern science
remained unaltered until the quite recent day when unforeseen
discoveries condemned scientific thought to suffer doubts from
which it imagined itself forever free. The edifice of which the
fissures were only visible to a few superior intelligences has
been suddenly and violently shaken. Contradictions and
impossibilities, hardly perceptible at first, have become
striking. The disillusion was so rapid that, in a short space of
time, the question arose whether the principles which seemingly
constituted the most certain foundations of our knowledge in
physics were not simply fragile hypotheses which wrapped
profound ignorance in a delusive veil. Then that befell
scientific dogmas which formerly happened to religious dogmas so
soon as any one dared discuss them. The hour of criticism was
quickly followed by the hour of decadence, and then by that of
disappearance and oblivion.

No doubt those great principles of which science was so proud
have not yet perished entirely. For a long time they will
continue to be positive truths to the multitude and will be
propagated in elementary textbooks, but they have already lost
their prestige in the eyes of real scholars. The discoveries
just alluded to have simply accentuated the uncertainties which
the latest works had already commenced to reveal; and it is thus
that science herself has entered into a phase of anarchy from
which she might have been thought forever safe. Principles which
appeared to have a sure mathematical foundation are now
contested by those whose profession it is to teach and defend
them. Such profound books as *La Science et lHypothese*
of M. Henri Poincare give proofs of this on nearly every page.
Even in the domain of mathematics, this illustrious scholar has
shown that we only subsist on hypotheses and conventions.

One of M. Poincares most eminent colleagues in the institute,
the mathematician Emile Picard, has shown in one of his
publications how "incoherent" are the present principles of
another almost fundamental science -- mechanics. He says: At
the end of the 18th century, the principles of mechanics seemed
to defy all criticism, and the work of the founders of the
science of motion formed a block which seemed for ever safe
against the lapse of time. Since that epoch, searching analysis
has examined the foundations of the edifice with a magnifying
glass. As a matter of fact, where learned men like Lagrange and
Laplace deemed everything quite simple, we today meet with the
most serious difficulties. Every one who has had to teach the
first steps of mechanics, and who has troubled to think for
himself, has experienced how incoherent are the more or less
traditional explanations of its principles".

The principles of mechanics, which are apparently most simple,
writes Prof. Mach in his *History of Mechanics*, "are of a
very complicated nature. They are based on unrealized, and even
on unrealizable, experiments. In no way can they be considered
in themselves as demonstrated mathematical truths".

At the present time we possess three systems of mechanics, each
of which declares the other two to be absurd. Even if none of
them, perhaps, deserves this qualification, they may at least be
considered very incoherent, and as furnishing no acceptable
expantion of phenomena.

"There hardly now exist", writes M. Lucien Poincare, "any of
those great theories once universally admitted, to which, by
common consent, all searchers subscribed. A certain anarchy
reigns in the domain of the natural sciences, all presumptions
are allowed, and no law appears rigidly necessary... We are
witnessing at this moment, rather a demolition than a definite
work of construction... The ideas which to our predecessors
seemed strongly established are now controverted... Today the
idea that all phenomena are capable of mechanical explanations
is generally abandoned... The very principles of mechanics are
contests, and recent facts unsettle our belief in the absolute
value of laws hitherto considered fundamental".

Assuredly the great theories which dominated the science of
each epoch, and gave direction to its studies, did not remain
forever undisputed. After an existence generally pretty long,
they slowly vanished, but did not give place to new doctrines,
until these last were strongly founded. Today the old principles
are dead or dying, and those destined to replace them are only
in course of formation. Modern man destroys faster than he
builds. The legacies of the past are merely shadows. Gods,
ideas, dogmas, and creeds vanish one after the other. Before new
edifices capable of sheltering our thoughts can be built, many
ruins will have crumbled into dust. We are still in an age of
destruction, and therefore of anarchy.

Noting, fortunately, is more favorable to progress than this
anarchy. The world is full of things we do not see, and it is of
the erroneous or insufficient ideas imposed by the traditions of
classic teachings that the bandage is woven which covers our
sight. History shows to what degree scientific theories retard
progress so soon as they have acquired a certain fixity. A fresh
forward only becomes possible after a sufficient dissociation of
the earlier ideas. To point out error and to follow up its
consequences is at times as useful as discovering new facts.
Perhaps the most dangerous thing to the progress of the human
mind is to place before readers -- as is invariably the case
with all educational works -- uncertainties as indisputable
truths, and to presume to impose limits to science, or, as
Auguste Comte wished to do, to the knowable. The celebrated
philosopher even proposed the creation of an Areopagus of
scholars with the mission of fixing limits to the researches
which should be permitted. Such tribunals are, unfortunately,
already too numerous, and no one can be unaware how baneful has
been their influence.

There should therefore be no hesitation to examine closely the
fundamental dogmas of science for the sole reason that they are
venerated and at first sight appear indestructible. The great
merit of Descartes lay in his viewing as doubtful what down to
his time had been considered uncontested truth. Too often do we
forget the scientific idols of the present day have no more
right to invulnerability than those of the past.

The two dogmas of modern science formerly most respected were
those of the indestructibility of matter and energy. The first
was already 2000 years old, and all discoveries had only tended
to confirm it. By a marvelous exception, the strangeness of
which struck no one, while all things in the universe were
condemned to perish, matter remained indestructible. The beings
formed by the combinations of atoms had but an ephemeral
existence; but they were composed of immortal elements. Created
at the beginning of the ages, these elements defied the action
of centuries and, like the gods of ancient legends, enjoyed
eternal youth.

Matter was not, however, alone in possessing this privilege of
immortality. The Forces -- which are now termed Energy -- were
equally indestructible. This last might incessantly change its
form, but the quantity of it in the world remained invariable. A
form of energy could not disappear without being replaced by
another equivalent one.

I have devoted nearly 10 years of the experimental researched
summarized in my book, *The Evolution of Matter*, to
proving that the first of the above-mentioned dogmas can no
longer be maintained, and that matter also must enter into the
cycle of things condemned to grow old and die. But if matter be
perishable, can we suppose that energy alone enjoys the
privilege of immortality? The dogma of the conservation of
energy still retains so much prestige that no criticism seems to
shake it. In this work we shall have to discuss its value, and
this study will necessitate many others. My own experimental
researches have lead me to explore somewhat different chapters
of physics without much heeding what was taught regarding them.
Notwithstanding the necessarily fragmentary character of these
researches, they will perhaps interest those readers whose
scientific beliefs are not yet settled.

What has finally given very great force to certain principles
of physics and mechanics has been the very complicated
mathematical apparatus in which they have been wrapped.
Everything presented in an algebraic form at once acquires for
certain minds the character of indisputable truth. The most
perfect skeptic willingly attributes a mysterious virtue to
equations and bows to their supposed power. They tend more and
more to replace, in teaching, reason and experiments. These
delusive veils which now surround the most simple principles
only too often serve to mask uncertainties. It is by lifting
them that I have succeeded more than once in showing the frailty
of scientific beliefs which for many scholars possess the
authority of revealed dogmas.

---

  

**Chapter II**   
**The New Doctrines**

Newton, wrote Lagrange, was the greatest, and, at the same
time, the most fortunate of geniuses, for one does not more than
once in a way find a universe in want of a system.

In saying this, the illustrious mathematician was evidently
persuaded that the system of the universe must be considered as
established once and for all. This simple belief has no longer
many adherents. It now appears pretty clearly that we know very
little of the general laws of out universe. We can only dimly
see in the far-off future the epoch when these laws will be
established. It is, however, already felt that the actual
mechanism of the world differs greatly from that constructed by
the science of the past. We now feel ourselves surrounded by
gigantic forces of which we can only get a glimpse, and which
obey laws unknown to us.

Ideas necessarily follow one another in a chain. A new theory
cannot be started without bringing with it a series of equally
new consequences. After I had proved that the dissociation of
atoms was a universal phenomenon, and that matter is an immense
reservoir of an energy hitherto unsuspected in spite of its
colossal grandeur, I was naturally led to ask myself whether all
the forces of the universe -- notably solar heat and electricity
-- did not proceed solely from this reservoir of energy, and
therefore from the dissociation of matter.

As regards solar heat, the source of most terrestrial energies,
dissociation appeared sufficient to explain the maintenance of
the suns temperature on the hypothesis that the atoms of
incandescent stars must have contained more intra-atomic energy
than they possess when once grown cool. As regards electricity,
I recall the result of my experiments: -- that the particles
emitted by an electrified point are identical with those which
come forth from a radioactive body such as radium. This fact
proves that electricity also is a product of the
dematerialization of matter.

The phenomenon of the dissociation of atoms presented therefore
consequences of considerable importance, since it was possible
to regard it as the origin of the forces of the universe. Matter
became a simple reservoir of forces, and could itself be
considered as a relatively stable form of energy. This
conception caused the disappearance of the classic dichotomy
between matter and energy, and between matter and the ether. It
allowed us to connect the two worlds of the Ponderable and the
Imponderable, once considered very distinct, which science
believed she had definitely separated. Berthelot even asserted
at the recent inauguration of the Lavoisier monument, that the
distinction between ponderable matter and imponderable agencies
is one of the greatest discoveries ever made".

It now seems, however, that physicists should have seen a long
time ago -- that is, long before the recent discoveries -- that
matter and the ether are intimately connected, that they are
unceasingly interchanging energies, and are in no way separate
worlds. Matter continuously emits luminous or calorific
radiations, and can absorb them. Down to the absolute zero it
radiates continuously -- that is to say, it emits ethereal
vibrations. The agitations of matter propagate themselves in the
ether, and those of the ether in matter, and without this
propagation there would be neither heat nor light. The ether and
matter are one thing under different forms, and we cannot put
them asunder. If we had not taken as a starting point the narrow
view that light and heat are imponderable agents because they
appear to add nothing to the weight of bodies, the distinction
between the ponderable and imponderable, to which scholars
attach so much importance, would have long ago vanished.

The ether is doubtless a mysterious agent which we have not yet
learnt to isolate, but its reality is manifest, since no
phenomenon can be explained without it. Its existence now seems
to several physicists more certain than even that of matter. It
cannot be isolated, but it is impossible to say it cannot be
seen or touched. It is, on the contrary, the substance we most
often see and touch. When a body radiates the heat which warms
or burns us, what constitutes this heat, if it be not the
vibrations of the ether? When we see a green landscape on the
ground glass of a camera obscura, what constitutes this image,
if not the ether?

The theory of the dissociation of matter has not only served to
clear away the two great dichotomies, force and matter,
ponderable and imponderable, which seemed established forever.
The doctrine of the vanishing of matter by its transformation
into energy carries with it important consequences in regard to
current ideas of energy.

According to the most fundamental principles of mechanics, when
we communicate to a material body a determined quantity of
energy, this energy may be transformed, but the body will never
give back a quantity in excess of that received by it. This
principle was considered too self-evident ever to have been
disputed. In fact it was indisputable so long as it was admitted
that matter could only give up the energy transmitted to it and
was unable to create any. By showing that matter is an immense
reservoir of energy, I at the same time proved that the quantity
of energy it emits, under the influence of an outside force
acting on it as a kind of excitant, may far exceed that which it
has received.

With such a very slight excitement as that of a thin pencil of
invisible ultraviolet radiations, -- or even with no excitement
at all, we observe in the emission of spontaneously dissociating
bodies such as radium, -- we can obtain considerable quantities
of energy. No doubt, we do not create this liberated energy,
since it already exists in matter, but we obtain it under
conditions which the old laws of mechanics could never have
imagined. The idea that matte cold be transformed into energy
would have seemed absolutely absurd only a very few years ago.

It will be part of the science of the future to discover the
means of freeing, in a practical form, the considerable forces
which matter contains.

"Intra-atomic energy, scientifically brought into play",
recently wrote M. Ferrand, "will create the totally new science
of modern Energetics: it will give us the formula of the
thermodynamic potential of energy freed from matter. Turned
commercially to account, it is capable of turning upside down
the productive activity of our old world".

The researches which I have set forth in numerous papers for
the last 10 years have rapidly spread through the laboratories,
and have been largely utilized, especially by those physicists
who have not quoted them. Some of my propositions, considered
very revolutionary when first formulated, are now beginning to
be almost commonplace, although they are far from having yet
produced all their consequences. When those last are unfolded,
they will lead to the renewal of a great part of a scientific
edifice the stability of which seemed eternal.

It is useful to prove that this edifice, so stable in
appearance, is far from being so, and that things may be viewed
from very different points from those to which our regular
education has accustomed us. It is to the demonstration of this
that a portion of this work will be devoted.

The fundamental principles which will guide us are those
enumerated in my preceding work, which I repeat: --

1. Matter, hitherto deemed indestructible, slowly vanishes by
the continuous dissociation of its component atoms.

2. The products of the dematerialization of matter constitute
substances placed by their properties between ponderable bodies
and the imponderable ether -- that is to say, between two worlds
hitherto considered as widely separate.

3. Matter, formerly regarded as inert and only able to give
back the energy originally supplied to it, is, on the other
hand, a colossal reservoir of energy -- intra-atomic energy --
which it can expend without borrowing anything from without.

4. It is from the intra-atomic energy liberated during the
dissociation of matter that most of the forces in the universe
are derived, and notably electricity and solar heat.

5. Force and matter are two different forms of one and the same
thing. Matter represents a stable form of intra-atomic energy:
heat, light, electricity, etc., represent unstable forms of it.

6. By the dissociation of atoms -- that is to say by the
materialization of matter, the stable form of energy termed
matter is simply changed into those unstable forms known by the
names of electricity, light, heat, etc., matter therefore is
continuously transformed into energy.

7. The law of evolution applicable to living beings is also
applicable to simple bodies; chemical species are no more
invariable than are living species.

8. Energy is no more indestructible than the matter from which
it emanates.

---

  

**Book II**   
**The Irreducible Magnitudes of the Universe**

**Chapter I**   
**Time, Space, Matter and Force**

*1. The Conception of the Irreducible Magnitudes of the
Universe*

Time, space, matter and force form the elements of things, and
the fundamental basis of all our knowledge.

Time and space are the two magnitudes in which we confine the
universe. Force is the cause of phenomena, matter their web.

Three of these elements -- time, space, and force -- are quite
irreducible. Matter may be reconverted into force, not only
because it is, as I have proved, a particular form of energy,
but also because it is only defined, in equations of mechanics,
by the symbols fo force (1).

[(1) In the CGS system now generally adopted for the evaluation
of the magnitudes of physical quantities, we take into
consideration: (1) the fundamental quality, length, mass, and
time; and (2) the derived quantities. These last, which are very
numerous, comprise notably the derived quantities of geometry --
surface, volume, and angle; those of mechanics -- speed,
acceleration, force, energy, work, power, etc.; and those of
electricity and magnetism -- resistance, intensity, potential
difference, etc.]

Time, space, and force being irreducible, cannot be compared
with anything and are indefinable. We only know of them that
which our common sense tells us. So soon as, in order to define
these great entities, we endeavor to go beyond what is revealed
by ordinary observation, we meet with inextricable difficulties
and end by acknowledging, as do the philosophers, that they are
simply creations of the mind, and cover completely unknown
realities.

These realities are not knowable to us, because our senses ever
remain interposed between them and us. What we perceive of the
universe are only the impressions produced on our senses. The
form we give to things is conditioned by the nature of our
intelligence. Time and space are, then, subjective notions
imposed by our senses on the representation of things, and this
is why Kant considered time and space as forms of sensibility.
To a superior intelligence, capable of grasping at the same time
the order of succession and that of the co-existence of
phenomena, our notions of space and time would have no meaning.

It is, moreover, not space and time only, but all phenomena,
from matter which we think we know up to the divinities created
by our dreams, which have to be considered as forms necessary
for our understanding. The world constructed with the
impressions of our senses is a summary translation, and
necessarily a far from faithful one of the real world which we
know not. Time is, for man, nothing but a relation between
events. He measures it by the changes in position of a mobile
body, such as a star or a clock. It is only by a change, that is
to say, by movement, that the notion of time is accessible to
us. "In a world void of all kind of movement", says Kant, "there
would not be seen the slightest sequence in the internal state
of substances. Hence, the abolition of the relation of
substances to one another carries with it the annihilation of
sequence and of time". If there are no events there is evidently
no sequence, and consequently no time.

To immobilize the world and the beings which inhabit it would
be to immobilize time -- that is to say, to cause it to vanish.
If this fixedness were absolute, life would be impossible, since
life implies change; but neither could anything grow old. The
immortal gods who, according to the legends, never undergo
change, cannot know time. For them the clock of heaven marks
always the same hour. Change is therefore the true generator of
time [\*\* Ed.: -- see Kozyrev]. It is only conceivable, like
forces and all phenomena, under the form of movement. This
fundamental concept of movement will be found at the base of all
phenomena. It serves to define the magnitudes of the universe,
and can only be defined by them. It is not an irreducible
concept, for it is formed by the combination of the notions of
force, of matter, of space, and of time. It is evident that we
require the intervention of all these in order to define the
displacement of a body.

In physics the most variations of quantities are expressed by
reference to the variations of time. When the curve expressing
the relations of a phenomenon with time is known, science can go
back from the present to the past and can know the future.

The notion of space is as little clear as that of time.
Leibnitz defined it as the order of co-existence of phenomena,
time being the order of their succession. Space and time are
perhaps two forms of the same thing.

Space does not appear conceivable without the existence of
bodies. A world entirely void could not give birth to the idea
of space, and this is the reason philosophers refuse to space an
objective reality. In their view, space being, like time, a
quality, where there is neither phenomenon nor substance, there
is neither space nor time.

The above brief expose suffices to show how inexact and
limited are the ideas man can form as to the fundamental
elements of the universe. Our knowledge being only relative, we
only define with a known one. All knowledge therefore implies a
comparison, but to what can we compare the irreducible elements
of things? They condition phenomena, and remain hidden behind
them.

If the irreducible magnitudes of the universe are not known in
their essence, they at least produce measurable effects. We are
situated with regard to them like the railway porter who can
weigh with exactness parcels the content of which he is
ignorant.

It is of these measurements alone that science is composed. By
means of them are established the numerical relations which form
to one web of our knowledge, since the realities which uphold
them escape us. The properties of things are only properly
definable by measurement. The qualitative represents a
subjective appreciation which may vary from one individual to
another. The quantitative represents a fixed magnitude which can
be preserved, and which gives precision to our sensations. The
substitution of the quantitative for the qualitative is the
principle task of the scholar. "I often say", writes Lord
Kelvin, "that if you measure that of which you speak, and can
express it by a number, you know something of your subject; but
if you cannot measure it, your knowledge is meager and
unsatisfactory".

*2. The Measurement of the Irreducible Magnitudes of the
Universe*

By measuring and placing one on the other the heterogeneous
elements which form the web of things, science has managed to
create certain concepts, such as those of mass, kinetic energy,
etc., which we have to consider realities by reason of our
incapacity to imagine others.

These concepts vary with the way in which we bring together the
irreducible elements of things. Associate force with space, and
we create the science of energy. Associate space and time, and
we create the science of velocities -- that is to say,
kinematics. Associate force, space and time, and we create the
science of mechanical power. It is evident that, by thus acting,
we must associate very heterogeneous elements.

Force ( F = MA ) is a coefficient of resistance multiplied by
an acceleration. Work ( T = F x E ) is a force multiplied by a
length. Velocity ( V = L/T ) is a space divided by a time. Mass
(M = P/g) is a weight divided by a velocity, etc.) It is only by
the combination of these very different magnitudes, that it has
been possible to state precisely the concepts of mechanics on
which the interpretation of the phenomena of the universe is
still based.

To define completely a phenomenon there have to be associated
the three great coordinates of things -- time, space, and force.
If one or two of these only are measured, the phenomenon is only
partially known. The formation of the modern notions of energy
and of power furnishes excellent examples of this. They were no
precisely stated until to the vague idea of force considered as
the synonym of effort was added the notion of space, and then
that of time.

In mechanics, force is defined as a cause of movement; the unit
of force is represented by the acceleration produced on the unit
of mass. When a force displaces its point of application it
generates work. This last is the product of the force considered
as a cause of movement. The kilogram-meter has been chosen as
the unit of work. It is the work necessary to displace a
kilogram for the length of a meter. This unit of mechanical
energy is now used to measure all forms of energy.

Thus, by the sole fact that we have associated space with
force, we can measure this last and comprise it in a formula.
This enables us to understand how with an invariable quantity of
energy we can produce forces of variable magnitude. If, in fact,
we call the Force F, the Space E, and the work T, we obtain
according to the preceding definitions T = F x E. In this
formula, which defines the unit of work, the force F and the
space E can evidently be inversely varied without changing their
product -- that is to say, the work. We can therefore largely
increase the force on condition that we proportionately reduce
the space covered. It is this operation which is affected by
certain machines, such as the lever, which multiplies the force
but not the work. By the expenditure of one kilogram-meter,
hundreds of kilogram-meters can be raised, but what is gained in
force will be lost in the space covered, and the product F x E
will never exceed a kilogram-meter. Force therefore can be
multiplied, but not energy, of which the magnitude remains
invariable.

Into the unit of work there enter only the elements force and
space, but not the element time. One kilogram-meter may be
expended in one second or in a thousand years, and the results
will necessarily be very different I the two cases. This is very
well illustrated in the case of radium, of which one gram
contains thousands of kilogram-meters. Such a force appears
immense, but its production is in each instant so slight that it
would require thousands of years to liberate it entirely. It is
the case of a reservoir containing an immense quantity of water
which can escape by a drop at a time. Hence, by confining
ourselves to the association force and space, we have already
created a unit which permits us to evaluate in kilogram-meters
the power of any machine moved by any motor, but it does not
tell us if these kilogram-meters are produced in one minute or
in a year. We know therefore very little of the power of the
machine.

To ascertain this, it suffices to superimpose on the two
elements force and space, which give us the unit of work, the
element time. We shall then have what is called the unit of
power, which is the quotient of the work by the time. It shows
us the work produced in a given time. If we are told that a
machine produces a kilogram-meter, we know nothing as to its
power. If it be added that this kilogram-meter is produced in
one second, we are fully informed.

The kilogram-meter per second being too small a unit from the
commercial point of view, one 75 times larger has been adopted.
This is the horsepower, which represents 75 kilograms raised one
meter in one second (1).

[(1) In physics other units are often made use of, but we do
not alter what has been said. If, instead of being evaluated in
kilograms, the force is evaluated in dynes, and if the space,
instead of being evaluated in meters, is measured in
centimeters, the work, instead of being expressed in
kilogram-meters, is expressed in ergs.]

In this last unit are found collected, as will be seen, the
three irreducible elements of things -- time, space, and force.
Matter likewise figures init indirectly, for that which is
measured is the force employed to combat its inertia and to give
it certain movements.

We have just seen how, by enclosing in space and time that
mysterious Proteus called force, it is possible to grasp it and
know it under its deceiving forms. On penetrating further into
the inmost nature of phenomena, we shall see that space and time
not only serve to measure force, but that they also condition
its form and its magnitude.

---

  

**Chapter II**   
**The Great Constants of the Universe:
Resistance and Movement**

*1. Inertia or Resistance to Change*

Forces are known to us solely by the movements they generate.
Mechanics, which claims to be the foundation of the other
sciences and to explain the universe, is devoted to the study of
these movements.

The notion of movement implies that of things to move.
Observation sows that these things to move present a certain
resistance. The resistance of matter to movement or to a change
of movement is what is termed its inertia. It is from this
property that is derived the notion of mass.

We thus find ourselves in the presence of two elements, not
irreducible like those just studied, but fundamental. These are
movement and resistance to movement, or, in other words, change
and resistance to change. Inertia -- that is to say, the
aptitude of matter to resist movement or a change in movement --
is the most important of its properties, and even the only one
which allows us to follow it through all its modifications.
While its other characteristics, solidity, color, etc., depend
on several variable causes and consequently may change, inertia
depends on no factor and is unchangeable. Whether it be liquid,
solid or gaseous, whether it be isolated or in combination, the
same body possesses an unvarying quantity of inertia. Measured
indirectly by the balance, this allows us to follow it through
all its changes.

On this notion of the invariability of inertia, or, in other
words, of the mass, are based the edifices of chemistry and
mechanics. The preponderant part played by inertia in phenomena
is a matter of daily observation. It is by virtue of inertia
that the worlds continue to circulate in space, that a ball
hurled from a cannon by the explosion of gunpowder travels
several thousand meters. Inertia being opposed to a change of
movement, bodies would even continue their course indefinitely
if different antagonistic forces, such as the resistance of the
air, did not finally arrest them. A railway train would thus
continue to advance with the same velocity without the help of
any motor if its inertia did not unceasingly tend to be annulled
by various resistances, friction, etc., which the locomotive
only serves to overcome. The same inertia of matter forbids the
train stopping abruptly. To effect this, very powerful brakes
must be employed even if the engine has ceased working. Inertia
being opposed to movement as well as to change of movement, it
requires a very great force to start the train from its repose,
and one equally great to stop it when once in motion.

It results therefore from the principle of inertia that, when a
moving body tends to slacken speed from any cause whatsoever,
inertia tends to maintain that speed, since, by its definition,
it is opposed to change of movement. Conversely, when the speed
of the moving body increases, inertia comes in to retard this
acceleration for the same reason, viz., that it is opposed to
change of movement.

Electricity, which possesses, or at least appears to possess,
inertia, behaves like matter in motion. Its inertia acts in the
phenomena of induction exactly, as has been said above, by
opposing itself to change of movement -- that is to say, in the
converse direction to the cause which tends to produce its
slackening or acceleration. This is expressed by the law of
Lenz, which governs the phenomena of induction. It would perhaps
be possible to explain them on the principle of the equality of
action and reaction without invoking inertia at all. To measure
the inertia of matter is easy, to note its properties is
likewise easy, but to explain its nature is as yet impossible.

Newton, who was the first to study inertia scientifically,
considered it to be a force. "The force which dwells in matter",
he says, "is its power of resistance, and it is by this force
that every body perseveres of itself in its actual state of
repose or of movement in a straight line".

At the present day, the tendency is to admit that matter is
connected with the ether by lines of force, and that the whole
of the inertia of matter should be that of the ether gripped by
lines of force. But whether inertia be attributed to matter or
to the medium in which it is plunged, this does not bring us any
nearer to an explanation.

Perhaps the least improbable thing that may be said regarding
inertia is that matter, being, as I have shown, an immense
aggregate of forces, possesses certain relations of equilibrium
with the ether surrounding it. The movement of a body must break
up this equilibrium and create others, from which would result
the continuation of the movement and its resistance to change of
speed. In the internal equilibrium of a body in motion something
is probably changed.

To the notion of inertia there should, doubtless, be attached
the principle of the equality of action and reaction. Although
this is a fundamental principle in mechanics, it, too, is very
little explicable. It has been formulated by Newton as follows:
--

"A body exercising on another a pressure or traction, receives
from the latter an equal and opposite traction or pressure".
This would signify that if you exercise a traction of 100
kilograms on an infinitely rigid wall it will exercise the same
traction on you. The wall thus becomes, as M. Wickersheimer
points out, a metaphysical person entering into antagonism with
you. At bottom, mechanics, which seems to be the most precise of
sciences, the one most foreign to metaphysics, is the one which
contains most evident or hidden metaphysical notions. They
evidently cover profound but entirely unknown causes. Perhaps we
should explain the principle of equal reaction in the direction
contrary to action by considering certain forces as couples --
that is to say, as acting like a spring stretched between two
points. It is evidently impossible then to act on one without
the other reacting immediately. Gravity and electricity would
come under this head.

*2. Mass*

The mass which serves to characterize matter is only the
measure of its inertia -- that is to say, of its resistance to
movement. It is measured by seeking the magnitude of the force
which must be opposed to inertia in order to annul it. Gravity
has been chosen because it is easy to handle. We can by means of
weights, each of which represents a certain quantity of
attraction, measure the inertia of a certain portion of matter
placed on one of the scales of a balance.

The notion of mass was slow in establishing itself. Mach, in *his
History
of Mechanics*, points out that Descartes, Newton and
Leibnitz had only a very vague comprehension of it. Galileo
confused mass with weight, which many people do even at the
present time, although by reason of the units adopted, weight is
represented by a figure about 10 times greater than that
expressed by mass (1).

[(1) The distinction between weight and mass, formerly
considered synonymous, only became manifest when the observation
of the pendulum revealed that the same body may receive a
different acceleration of gravity in different parts of the
globe. It was in 1871 that it was noted for the first time in
astronomical observations that a clock giving the exact time in
Paris no longer did so in Guiana. To render its pace regular, it
is necessary to shorten the length of the regulating pendulum.]

The term mass is, moreover, employed at the present day in two
different senses. For physicists mass is a coefficient of
inertia, and for astronomers a coefficient of attraction. If the
attraction due to gravity were the same all over the globe, the
mass of a body, that is to say, the quantity of inertia it
possesses -- would be measured according to the force of
attraction necessary to annul it. Chemists, who have only to
compare the masses of bodies, proceed in no other way. For the
calculations of mechanics it was necessary to find another
element, because gravity alters with latitude and the height
from the earth. This last variation even shows itself at the
different stories of a house.

The weight of a body varies from one place to another, but the
acceleration which this body may take undergoes the same
variation. The ratio of these two magnitudes is therefore
constant at all points of the globe. It is this relation P/g
which always figures in the calculations of mechanics. Given the
value of the number g, it follows that in numerical expressions
the mass of a body hardly represents the tenth part of its
weight. The equation M = P/g which defines mass, refers to the
gravity; but as the weight may be replaced by any force F, which
produces an acceleration A, we obtain as a general expression of
mass M = F/A. This is the fundamental equation of mechanics. One
must not look too closely into its meaning.

Mass has been considered as an invariable magnitude down to the
recent researches mentioned in my last book. These last have
shown that not only does the mass vary by the dissociation of
atoms, but, further, that the products of this dissociation have
a mass varying with their velocity. This mass can even increase
to the point of becoming infinite -- that is to say, when the
velocity approached that of light. Nothing proves, moreover,
that it would not be the same with ordinary matter animated by a
like velocity.

Not only does the mass vary with the velocity, but it has
lately become a question whether it does not also vary with the
temperature. The question has not yet been elucidated. However
that may be, mass is not at all that invariable magnitude which
chemistry and mechanics formerly supposed it to be. The element
which science considered as the immovable pivot of phenomena,
the starting point to which it endeavored to refer all things,
has become a variable magnitude of which the apparent fixity was
only due to the imperfection of our means of observation.

The inertia of matter is still, however, the most stable thing
in the changing ocean of phenomena. This stability is not
absolute, but as regards our ordinary requirements the inertia
of matter can be considered as one of the great constants of the
universe.

*3. Movement and Force*

For half a century science thought she had discovered a second
constant element in the universe. This element is energy, of
which forces would be simple manifestations.

We will now examine only the fundamental elements of forces.
They are knowable to us by the movements they produce, and that
is why, in the classic mechanics, force is simply defined as a
cause of movement.

By virtue of their inertia alone, bodies would only assume a
uniform and rectilinear movement. Directly this movement is
accelerated, we recognize that a force has intervened. It is
solely this acceleration which mechanics measures and which
figures in its equations.

Force is therefore only known to mechanics through movement.
Movement is not an irreducible magnitude, since it is derived
from the four great elements of the universe -- time, space,
matter and force -- which alone enable it to be defined.

We have seen previously how by associating force and space the
unit of mechanical energy and of work has been constituted; we
shall see in a later chapter the transformations which the
modern notion of the conservation of energy has introduced into
the conceptions of force.

What precedes shows us how notions of movement and of
resistance are derived from those of force and mass, on which
the principles of mechanics were built up. The equation F = MA
defines force by the acceleration imparted to a body endowed
with resistance to movement.

To sum up, movement -- that is to say, change -- and inertia --
that is to say, resistance to change -- constitute the
fundamental elements accessible to mechanics. We will now see
how, by associating them, this science has sought to interpret
the phenomena of the universe.

---

  

**Chapter III**   
**The Building Up of Forces and the Mechanical
Explanations of the Universe**

*1. The Cycle of Forces*

We have just seen that on reducing to their essential elements
the forces of the universe there still remain resistance and
movement. Resistance is represented by the inertia of matter or
of the ether, and movement by the displacement of these
substances in space and time.

The magnitude of forces is determined by the velocity of
movements that they produce, their form by the nature of these
movements. The movements of matter are only apparent to us when
it comes into contact with an antagonistic factor which annuls
or diminishes its velocity. The earth, for instance, by reason
of its movements of rotation and of translation in space,
possesses an immense kinetic energy; but it is not noticed,
because out globe meets no obstacles in its path. Yet its
kinetic energy would be sufficient, perhaps, to reduce to vapor
any planet it chanced to strike. All things living on the
surface of our globe are carried along with it in its movement,
and possess in consequence a considerable kinetic energy. This
would appear if they were suddenly transported from on point on
the globes surface to another endowed with a different
velocity; for instance, from the pole to the equator. On
arriving at the equator they would be hurled into space with a
speed more than six times that of a railway train.

Independently of the movements of translation in a straight
line like that of a cannon ball, or of rotation like that of the
stars, matter and ether may show very different forms of
movement. There result from this forces very different in
aspect. We observe notably vibratory movements like those of a
tuning fork, and circular disturbances such as those produced by
casting a stone into the water, etc. Light and heat show exactly
these last forms of movement. It is not only the kind of
movements, but also the variations in velocity which condition
the nature of forces. The recent theories on electricity put
this last point well in evidence. They show, in fact, that
forces differing from each other so widely as magnetism, the
electric current, and light are generated by simple variations
in the movements of electric particles.

An electrified body in repose produces effects of attraction
and repulsion only, and possesses no magnetic property. Set it
in motion, and it is immediately surrounded by magnetic lines of
force, and produces all the effects of a current like that which
traverses telegraph wires. Let us vary by a sudden acceleration
the speed of the particles, and they immediately radiate through
the ether. Hertzian waves, calorific waves, and lastly light.
These forms of energy, although so different in kind, only
appear therefore as the consequence of simple changes of
movement.

The forces of nature probably contain other elements than
movement. These elements do not affect our reagents, and we are
therefore not cognizant of them. In the ocean of phenomena,
science can only pick out what is accessible to it.

*2. The Mechanical Explanations of the Universe*

That which precedes makes us feel in advance how fragmentary,
and consequently how insufficient, must be the final explanation
of phenomena which the science of mechanics proposes.

Naturally this conclusion is not the one arrived at by the
defenders of the doctrine which claims to explain everything by
means of the equations of movement. In no way stopped by the
excessive simplicity of their concepts, persuaded that all
phenomena were wrapped up in their formulas, they have known
neither mistrust nor uncertainty, and have imagined that they
had for all eternity built up an edifice of imposing grandeur.

For the majority of scholars, this sublime confidence still
endures. One of the most eminent among them, Cornu, the
Academician, at the Congres de Physique in 1900, delivered
himself as follows: --

"The spirit of Descartes soars over modern physics. What am I
saying? He is its shining light! The more we penetrate into the
knowledge of natural phenomena, the more developed and precise
is the audacious Cartesian conception of the mechanism of the
universe. There is in the physical world only matter and
movement".

At the very moment these words were uttered, the classic
edifice was furrowed by deep chasms. While the mathematicians
were drawing up formulas, the physicists were making
experiments, and these experiments fitted in less and less with
the formulas. These discrepancies, however, did not greatly
trouble the mathematicians. So soon as the equations no longer
agreed with the experiments, they rectified the equations by
imagining the intervention of "hidden movements" which
completely baffled observation. The process was evidently
ingenious, but evidently also a little childish. "Since", says
M. Duhem, "no condition, no restriction, is imposed on these
hidden movements, on what should we found the proof that a given
difference may not find in them its raison detre?".

Notwithstanding such subterfuges, the insufficiency of the
classical mechanics has every day become more manifest with the
progress of physics. "There exists", writes the author I have
just quoted, "a radical incompatibility between the mechanics of
Lagrange", that is to say, the classical mechanics, "and the
laws of physics; this incompatibility attacks not only the laws
of these phenomena in which the reduction to movement is the
object of hypothesis, but also the laws which govern perceptible
movements".

It is not wholly in the great questions relating to the
synthesis of the universe that the classical mechanics has shown
itself very insufficient, but also in apparently much more
modest problems like the theory of gases. It is by invoking the
calculation of probabilities, by imagining a kind of statistics
that it arrives at establishing extraordinarily complicated and
also extraordinarily uncertain equations which elude all
verification.

Professors who continue to teach the formulas of mechanics
renounce more and more their belief in them. This fictitious
universe, reduced to the points to which forces are applied,
seems to them very chimerical. "There is not a single one of the
principles of rational mechanics which is applicable to
realities", recently wrote to me one of the scholars who have
most deeply sounded the problems of mechanics, the eminent Prof.
Dwelshauwers Dery.

In fact, mechanics has fallen into a state of anarchy from
which it does not seem likely to emerge, notwithstanding the
numerous attempts made to transform it. At the present time
there exist three very different systems of mechanics: --

1. The classical mechanics, built up on the concepts of mass,
force, space and time.

2. The mechanics of Hertz, which discards the notion of force
and replaces it by hidden links, supposed to exist between
bodies.

3. The energetic mechanics, founded on the principles of the
conservation of energy, which we shall study later on. In this,
matter and force disappear. There is not in the universe any
other fundamental element but energy. This element is
indestructible, while unceasingly changing its aspect. The
various phenomena only represent mutations of energy.

We might, however, vary mechanical systems to infinity by
replacing the concepts of time, space, and mass by arbitrary
magnitudes and expressing phenomena as functions of these new
magnitudes. This is sometimes done by introducing into the
equations, instead of the coordinates of the classical
mechanics, the physical magnitudes such as pressure, volume,
temperature, electric charge, etc., which determine the state of
the body. From the principles derived from the study of the
dissociation of matter cited in a previous chapter, there might
be deduced a new mechanics in which matter would figure as the
source of the various forces of the universe. We should write in
the equations that such and such a force is simply matter minus
something, that inertia is a consequence of the relations of
equilibrium between intra-atomic energy and the ether, etc. We
should thus link force to matter, and we should express the
former as a function of the latter conformably with the
teachings of experiment.

But the moment has not arrived to translate into equations
magnitudes of which the relations are not yet fixed. It is not
very probable that this new mechanics would explain much better
than the old one the mysteries of the universe.

The fact that we only perceive in the universe matter and
movement does not authorize us to maintain that it is not
composed of anything else. We can only say that by reason of the
insufficiency of our senses and of our instruments we only
perceive that which presents itself in the form of matter and
movement. Twenty years ago, we might strictly have said that
there was nothing else. But the very unforeseen phenomena
revealed by the study of the dissociation of matter have proved
that the universe is full of formidable powers hitherto
unexpected, and has shown the existence of immense territories
completely unexplored. The edifice built by science which has so
long sheltered our uncertainty now appears like a fragile
shelter, of which the entire foundations have to be set up anew.

---

  

**Book III**   
**The Dogma of the Indestructibility of Energy**

**Chapter I**   
**The Monistic Concept of Forces and the
Theory of the Conservation of Energy**

*1. The Conservation of Energy*

The various forces of the universe were considered by the old
physicists as different from, and as exhibiting no connection
with each other. Heat, electricity, light, etc., seemed
unrelated phenomena.

The ideas which sprang up during the second half of the last
century differ much from this. After having settled that the
disappearance of one force was always followed by the appearance
of another, it was soon recognized that they all depended on the
transformation of one indestructible entity -- energy. Like
matter it might change its form, but the quantity of it in the
universe remained invariable. The various forces, light, heat,
etc., were only different manifestations of energy.

The idea that forces might be indestructible is of fairly
recent origin. The dogma of the conservation of energy only
boasts, in fact, about half a century of existence. Up to the
date of its discovery, science only possessed one permanent
element -- matter. For the last 60 years it has possessed, or
has thought it possessed, a second -- energy.

The principle of the conservation of energy presents itself in
a form so imposing and so simple, and answers so completely to
certain tendencies of the mind, that one would suppose that it
must have attracted keen attention the very day it was
promulgated. Quite other was its fate. For 10 years not a single
scholar in the world could be found who would even consent to
discuss it. In vain did its immortal author, Dr Mayer of
Heilbronn, multiply his memoirs (1) and his experiments. Mayer
died of despair and so unknown that when Helmholtz repeated the
same discovery a few years later, taking as a basis only
mathematical considerations, he did not even suspect the
existence of his predecessor. The critical mind is so rare a
gift that the most profound ideas and the most convincing
experiments exercise no influence so long as they are not
adopted by scholars enjoying the prestige of official authority.

[(1) The first paper of Mayer, "Remarks on the Forces of
Inanimate Nature", was published in 1842. His last, "Remarks on
the Mechanical Equivalent of Heat" was published in 1851.]

Nevertheless, it always happens in the long run that a new idea
finds a champion in some scholar possessing this prestige, and
then it rapidly makes its way. As soon as the grandeur of the
idea of the conservation of energy was understood by one such,
it had an immediate success.

It was especially the discussion of W. Thomson (Later Lord
Kelvin) and the experiments of Joule, confirming the results of
Mayer on the equivalence of heat and work, which attracted the
attention of specialists. The whole army of laborers of science
then pounced upon this subject, and in a few years the unity and
the equivalence of physical forces came to be proclaimed, though
on rather narrow grounds.

This generalization proceeded from experiments which in reality
did not include it. It was, in fact, deduced from the researches
made to determine the rise in temperature produced by the fall
of a weight to a given height into a liquid. It was noted that
in order to raise by 1 degree the temperature of a kilogram of
water it was necessary to let drop from a height of one meter a
weight of 425 kilograms. This number 425 was called the
mechanical equivalent of heat.

In this experiment and other similar ones we simply establish
that the different forms of energy can be transformed into
mechanical work; but nothing indicates any relationship between
them. We can, by making a machine to turn by human arms, steam,
the wind, electricity, etc., produce the same amount of work,
although its causes are perceptibly different. To speak of the
mechanical equivalent of heat only signifies that with 425
kilograms falling from a height of one meter we raise the
temperature of water by 1 degree. In reality, heat or any form
of energy is equivalent to work rather as a piece of 20 sous is
equivalent to the pound of beef one can buy with it.

Since the part of science is much more to measure things than
to define them, the acquisition of a unit of measure always
realizes for it an immense progress. Thanks to the creation of a
unit of energy or work, we have succeeded in stating exactly
notions which were formerly very vague. When, by means of any
form of energy, it is possible to produce a determined number of
calories or of kilogram-meters, our minds are made up as to its
magnitude. Practically it is always by means of the heat they
produce, measured by the elevation of the temperature of the
water of a calorimeter, that most chemical, electrical, and
other forces are calculated.

To the principle of the conservation of energy others have been
successively added which have allowed the laws of distribution
to be clearly established. Applied at first solely to heat --
that is to say, to that branch of physics called thermodynamics
-- they were soon extended to all forms of energy. Thus was
founded a particular science, Energetic Mechanics, which we will
briefly examine later on.

*2. The Principles of Thermodynamics*

Thermodynamics and energetic mechanics which is only the
extension of the first named, rest on the three principles (1)
of the conservation of energy, (2) of its distribution, or the
principle of Carnot, and (3) of the law of least action.

The first, already indicated above, is formulated as follows:
The quantity of energy contained in the universe is invariable.

Generalizing a little less confidently at the present time, we
limit ourselves to saying that, in an isolated system, the sum
of the visible energy and of the potential energy is constant.
In this form the principle evidently remains unassailable,
because the potential energy not being always available, we can
always attribute to it the value necessary to satisfy the
required ratio.

The second principle of thermodynamics, or principle of Carnot,
although it has become very complicated from the introduction
into it of very different things in a purely mathematical form,
is nevertheless completely contained in the following
enunciation given by Clausius: Heat cannot pass from a cold body
to a hot without work. This is now generalized thus: The
transport of energy can only be effected by a fall in tension.
This signifies that energy always goes from the point where the
tension is highest to that where it is lowest. The importance of
the principle of Carnot dwells in this generalization. It is
applicable not only to heat but to all known modes of energy --
calorific, thermal, electrical, or otherwise.

This passage of energy from the point where its tension is
highest to that where it is lowest is perfectly comparable to
the flowing of a liquid contained in a vessel communicating by a
tube with another vessel placed at a lower level. It may equally
be compared to the flowing of the water of a river into the sea.

Heat foes from a heated to a cold body, and never from a cold
to a heated body, by a law analogous to that which compels
rivers to flow down to the sea and prevents them from flowing
back to their source. To say that rivers flow down to the sea
and do not retrace their course is a simple translation of the
principle of Carnot.

Expressed in this way, it appears as a self-evident fact.
Carnot put it into almost as simple a form, and yet physicists
took nearly 25 years to grasp its full bearing. His
genius-inspired idea was just to compare a fall of great heat to
a fall of water, and all subsequent progress has consisted in
recognizing that the various forms of energy, electricity in
particular, obey, in their distribution, the laws which regulate
the flow of liquids. Let us see, however, exactly what Carnot
wrote: --

"The production of motive power is due, in steam engines, not
to an actual consumption of calorific, but of its transport from
a heated body to a cool body -- that is to say, to the
restoration of its equilibrium which is supposed to be broken by
one cause or another, by a chemical reaction such as combustion
or by some other... The motive power of heat may be compared to
that of a fall of water. Both have a maximum that cannot be
passed, and this irrespective of the machine employed to receive
the action of the water and the substance used to receive the
action of the heat. The motive power of a fall of water depends
on the height and the quantity of the liquid; the motive power
of heat depends likewise on the quantity of calorific used,
which we will call the height of its fall -- that is to say, the
difference of temperature of the bodies between which is
effected the exchange of calorific".

Carnot was not an experimenter. His brief memoir is based on
simple arguments, and can, in its essence, be brought down to
the short passage I have quoted. And yet, by the sole fact of
his principle being understood, the theoretical and practical
science of the last century was entirely overturned. No
physicist or chemist now enunciates a new proposition without
first verifying whether it is in contradiction to the principle
of Carnot. It might be said that never did so simple an idea
have such profound consequences. It will forever serve to show
the preponderant role of directing ideas in scientific
revolution, and also how slow is the acquisition of the most
simple generalization.

The second principle of thermodynamics has, in reality, much
greater importance than the first. Of which, moreover, it is
almost independent. Even if energy were not preserved, its
distribution would always take place, at least in the immense
majority of cases, in accordance with the principle of Carnot.

The generality of this principle permits it to be extended to
all the phenomena in the universe. It regulates their march, and
forbids them to be reversible -- that is to say, it condemns
them always to take the same direction, and consequently not to
go backwards up the course of time. If some magic power greater
than that of the demons of the mathematician Maxwell were to
compel the molecular edifices to pass again into their former
condition, it would slowly lead the world backward, and oblige
it to retreat up the course of ages, and would thus force its
inhabitants to assume successively the earlier forms in which
they appeared during the chain of geological periods.

The principle of Carnot was completed by that called the
principle of least action, or principle of Hamilton, which shows
us the road which is follows by molecules constrained by
superior force to transport themselves from one point to
another. He tells us that these molecules can only take one
direction, viz. the one which requires the least effort. This
again is one of those principles of very great simplicity and
yet immensely far-reaching. Reverting to the form given above to
the principle of Carnot, that rivers descend to the sea and do
not go back along their course, we may add that, by reason of
the principle of least effort, rivers flow to the sea by the way
which demands the least effort for the flow of water -- that is
to say, by the greatest slope.

---

  

**Chapter II**   
**The Energetical Explanation of Phenomena**

*1. The Principles of Energetic Mechanics*

It is one of the principles of thermodynamics, just briefly set
forth, that the science of energetic mechanics, which claims to
replace the classical mechanics, has been founded.

Energetic mechanics occupies itself solely with the measurement
of phenomena, and never with their interpretation. Nothing
inaccessible to calculation exists. Eliminating matter and
force, it studies nothing but the transformations of energy, and
only knows phenomena from their energetic actions. It measures
quantities of heat, magnetic fields, differences of potential,
etc., and confines itself to establishing the mathematical
relations between these magnitudes.

A few brief indication will suffice to show how, in this
theory, the forces of the universe are conceived. The energetic
theory is rather a method than a doctrine. Still it has
introduced into science certain important conceptions which I
will briefly state.

In energetic mechanics, energy is considered under two forms --
the kinetic and the potential. The first represents energy in
movement, the second energy at rest, but capable of acting when
the repose ceases. Such, for instance, is the force of a coiled
spring, of the weight of a wound-up clock, etc.

The potential and kinetic energy of a system may vary
inversely, but their sum remains constant within the system.
Kinetic energy depends on the position of the molecules and
their velocities, and is proportioned to the square of these
velocities. Potential energy  depends solely on the
position of the molecules. The principle of least action,
explained above, permits the equations of movement to be
established when the kinetic and potential energies are known.

*2. The Quantity of Energy and Its Tension*

Bringing precision into certain notions which are rather
confused in the old mechanics, the energetic theory has shown
that the energy of a body, whatever be the natural force to
which it is related, is the product of two factors, the one
tension or intensity, the other quantity. Tension regulates the
direction of the transport of energy. According to the forms of
energy, it is represented by a velocity, a pressure, a
temperature, a height, an electromotive force, etc. By returning
to the comparison of a force with the flow of a liquid which
served Carnot to explain his principle, it is easy to understand
the part played by these two factors -- quantity and tension. In
a reservoir, quantity is represented by the mass of the liquid,
tension by its height above the orifices through which it
escapes.

All forms of energy being known only by the work they produce,
and there being nothing to differentiate the work of the various
forces -- electrical, mechanical, thermal, etc. -- it follows
that they can all be expressed by the same unit of work, viz.
the kilogram-meter. For the sake of convenience others are
sometimes used, but they can always be reduced to
kilogram-meters. It is thus, for instance, that the joule used
in electricity as the unit of work represents about one-tenth of
the kilogram-meter. In the language of modern physicists, energy
has become synonymous with work reckoned in kilogram-meters.

The two factors quantity and tension are magnitudes to which we
can give no other definitions that their measurement. In
gravity, the quantity is represented by kilograms, the tension
by the number of meters in the height of the drop. Their product
represents the gravitic energy. In electricity, the quantity is
represented by the output of the source in coulombs, the tension
by the electric pressure in volts. In kinetic energy the
quantity is represented by the mass and the tension by the
velocity, etc.

In a general way, therefore, if we designate by E the energy
expressed in units of work, by Q the quantity, and by T the
tension, we have E = Q x T. It follows that Q = E/T. The
quantity is therefore represented by the energy divided by the
tension. (1)

[(1) In thermal energy the name of entropy is generally given
to the quotient Q/T, in which Q represents the thermal energy
and T the absolute temperature. This is expressed in a more
general way by the integral M/T. When a certain quantity of
thermal energy passes from a heated to a cold body, its entropy
diminishes, and that of the cold body increases. The entropy can
be varied without changing the temperature. It is therefore a
variable which under certain conditions may change in an
independent manner.

Out of this notion of entropy certain physicists seem desirous
of making a special physical magnitude which can be generalized
in the different forms of energy. We have seen that by the
artifice of expressing the most varied forms of energy in work
measured by kilogram-meters all energies are made equivalent,
which allows them to be added up arithmetically. But there is no
basis of equivalence for the factors of which they are composed.
It is therefore not possible to add up the entropies of the
different energies of a body to obtain one single total entropy.
It is easy to see that the factors of the different energies
express things very different in reality. In thermal energy, for
example, the factor tension is represented by a temperature; in
kinetic energy by a velocity; in gravitic energy by a height,
etc.

One can be sure that a notion is obscure when it is understood
in very different ways by the scholars who make use of it.
Poincare regards entropy as "a prodigiously abstract concept",
and it must be singularly so for the most celebrated physicists
to comprehend it in such different fashions. This can be
gathered from a long discussion published in the English
journals *Nature, The Electrical Review,* and *The
Electrician*, for 1900 and 1901. Eminent physicists
published therein the most contradictory opinions, and seemed,
moreover, astonished at their reciprocal ignorance of each
others ideas. To engineers, the concept of entropy is a very
simple matter calculable in figures because they have only
applied it to the case of steam engines. To them the entropy of
a body simply represents the variation (estimable in calories)
of its thermal energy available for external work by degree of
temperature and by kilogram of matter when heat is neither added
nor taken away from it. The difficulties relative to entropy are
derived from the impossibility of defining in what the different
forms of energy consist. So far as electricity and heat, for
instance, are concerned, one may remark with M. Lucien Poincare,
"that it is impossible to establish a connection translatable
into exact numerical ratios between a quantity of heat which is
equivalent to a quantity of energy and a quantity of electricity
which must be multiplied by a certain potential to express a
certain quantity of work".]

One finds indeed things which seem analogous in the different
forms of energy, but these analogies are often very superficial.
In electricity the resistance almost corresponds to mass in
kinetic energy, but to what does it correspond in thermal
energy? Is it the heat necessary to change the state of a body
without modifying its temperature, and to simply conquer the
resistance of the molecules to change? On these important points
the textbooks are silent. However that may be, in all forms of
energy these two elements, quantity and tension, of which the
product represents the work, are always found. Without tension
there could be no transmission of energy. It is especially in
electricity that the difference between the two factors quantity
and tension is clearly seen. The static machines in our
laboratories yield electricity under a very high tension since
it may reach as high as 50,000 volts; but their output is
insignificant, since it never amounts to more than a few
thousandths of an ampere. A galvanic battery, on the contrary,
has a high yield in amperes, while the electricity issues from
it at a very feeble tension hardly exceeding two volts.

The old electricians, who knew not these distinctions, thought
very erroneously that the static machines in our laboratories
were, by reason of the loud sparks they produced, powerful
generators of electricity. The tension is enormous, but the
quantity infinitesimal, so that the product of these two
magnitudes represents an insignificant amount of work. It is for
this reason that the sparks from these noisy machines produce
insignificant results, while with industrial machines where the
tension hardly exceeds 100 volts or so, but which give a high
output, the physiological, calorific, and luminescent effects
are considerable.

In the study of heat, the difference between the two magnitudes
tension and quantity can likewise be clearly shown. Tension is
represented by the temperature of a body, quantity by the number
of calories it can produce. A very simple example will show the
difference between the two factors.

Let us burn a match of fir-wood or a whole forest of the same
tree, and the thermometer thrust into the flame of the match or
into that of the forest will indicate the same temperature. It
is evident, however, that the quantity of heat generated in the
two cases will be far different. With the heat produced by the
combustion of the match we can only bring a few drops of water
to boiling point, while with the quantity of heat resulting from
the combustion of the forest, we could boil several tons of the
same liquid.

*3. Transformation of Quantity into Tension, and Conversely*

The product of the quantity by the tension -- that is to say,
the work -- is a constant magnitude; but it is possible, without
altering that product, to increase one of the factors and to
diminish the other. These are operation to which commerce has
recourse daily.

The hydraulic analogies given above -- and to which we should
always turn if we wish to thoroughly understand the distribution
of energy -- enable us to conceive how quantity can be
transformed into tension, or conversely, without varying their
total product. As regard a reservoir of liquid, for example, we
can see that without varying the weight of the liquid and by
simply modifying the height and width of the receptacle, we can
obtain at will a very great output with very feeble pressure,
or, on the other hand, a very small output with a very great
pressure.

The transformation of quantity into tension, and conversely, is
inconstant use in electricity. With a battery having a tension
of only a few volts, but an output in amperes fairly great, it
is possible, by passing the current through an induction coil,
to bring the electricity to a tension of more than 20,000 volts,
while greatly reducing its output. The converse operation may
likewise be effected. In certain industrial installations we
succeed in producing electricity under a tension of 100,000
volts, and then this tension, much too great to be of practical
use, is transformed so as to obtain a great output at a feeble
voltage. In all these operation, the product of the quantity by
the tension -- that is to say, of the coulombs by the volts --
remains invariable.

Judging by their effects, we might believe that quantity and
tension constitute two very different elements. They are in
reality but two forms of the same thing. The transformation of
quantity into tension results simply from the mode of
distribution of the same energy. The converse operation will
transform, on the contrary, tension into quantity. A coulomb
spread over a sphere of 10,000 kilometers radius will give only
a pressure of one volt. Let us spread the same quantity of
electricity over a sphere of a diameter 100,000 times less --
that is to say, of 100 meters, and this same quantity of
electricity will produce a potential a hundred thousand times
higher -- that is to say, a pressure of 100,000 volts.

It would be the same for any other form of energy -- for
instance, light. If we possess a pencil of light, lighting
feebly a surface of given extent, and wish to increase the light
of a part of this surface, we have only to concentrate the
pencil on a small space by means of a lens. The intensity of the
part lighted will be considerably increased, but the illuminated
surface will be notably reduced. By the same operation, we might
increase the temperature produced by a pencil of radiant heat to
the melting point of a metal. By a converse operation -- that is
to say, by dispersing a pencil of radiations by a prism or
diverging lens -- we increase the surface lighted or warmed, but
reduce the intensity by the unit of surface. None of the above
operations has varied the quantity of energy expended. Its
distribution alone has altered.

*4. The Part of Matter in Energetic Mechanics*

In the above summary, we have had recourse to the principles of
energetic mechanics especially. As a method of calculation they
are above criticism, but we must not try to get from them an
attempt at the explanation of phenomena. Moreover, the energetic
theory utterly rejects such explanations. Confining its role to
the measure of magnitudes subsequently connected together by
equations, it denies the existence of force, ignores matter, and
replaces them both by a single entity -- energy, the varieties
of which it limits itself to measuring.

"But then, it will be said", writes on of the defenders of the
doctrine (Prof Ostwald), "if we have to give up atoms and
mechanics, what image of reality will remain to us? But we need
no image and no symbol. The task of science is to establish the
relations between realities -- that is to say, tangible and
measurable magnitudes -- in such fashion that, some being given,
the others are deduced from them... Hereafter there is no need
to trouble ourselves about forces of which we cannot demonstrate
the existence, acting between atoms of which we are not
cognizant, but only to concern ourselves with the quantities of
energy brought into play in the phenomena under study. These we
can measure... All the equations which link together two or more
phenomena of different species are necessarily equations between
quantities of energy. There cannot be any other, for, besides
time and space, energy is the only magnitude which is common to
all orders of phenomena".

Nor did the classical mechanics bring matter into its
equations, since it only dealt with its effects, but it did not
deny its existence. Energetic mechanics, which finds it simpler
to ignore it than to seek to explain it, will never lead to any
very high philosophical conception. Science would hardly have
progresses if it had declined to try to understand what at first
seemed above its reach. Tendencies of the same nature formerly
existed in zoology, at the time when it was purely descriptive,
and refused to deal with the origin of beings and their
transformation. So long as such ideas prevailed, that science
made but trifling progress; but if this narrow conception had
not reigned for a long enough period, philosophical minds like
Lamarcks and Darwins would not have found the materials for
their synthesis. It would be impossible to multiply too
extensively the number of specialists whose lives are spent in
weighing or measuring something. From time to time an architect
appears who raises an edifice with materials which have been
patiently brought together by sleepless workmen. The disciples
of energetic mechanics are today accumulating documents of this
kind against the day when superior minds will appear who will
make good use of them.

In treating matter as a negligible quantity, energetic
mechanics has only taken on its shoulder a metaphysical
inheritance centuries old. For a long time it was one of the
regular recreations of philosophers to prove that matter and
even the universe did not exist, and to expatiate at length on
these negations. These inoffensive speculations lose all
interest as soon as one enters a laboratory. We are then indeed
compelled to act as if matter were a very real thing with which
the universe was built, and which is in consequence the
substratum of phenomena. We there have to distinguish very
clearly also the matter which can be weighted, and the different
forms of energy -- light, heat, etc. -- which cannot be weighed,
and are consequently added to bodies without increasing their
weight.

Notwithstanding therefore all the equations of energetics, the
great duality between matter and energy continued to exist.
Matter might be eliminated from calculations, but this
elimination did not make it vanish from reality.

The readers of my last work know how I endeavored to make this
classical dichotomy vanish by showing that matter was nothing
else than energy in a form which had acquired fixity. We have
taken from it none of the special properties which allow is to
affirm its existence as matter, but have simply shown that it
constitutes a form of energy capable of transforming itself into
other forms, and that it is, through its dissociation, the
origin of most of the forces of the universe, notably solar heat
and electricity. Far, then, from deciding on its non-existence,
we have been led to consider it as the principal element of
things.

---

  

**Chapter III**   
**The Degradation of Energy and Potential
Energy**

*1. The Theory of the Degradation of Energy*

The dogma of the indestructibility of energy no longer rests on
very safe arguments, but it is supported by some very strong
beliefs which put it above discussion. Very scarce are the
scholars who, following the example of the illustrious
mathematician Henri Poincare, have discovered its weakness and
pointed out its uncertainties.

From the time of the earliest researches into the relations of
heat and work, it was recognized that if it were possible to
transform a given quantity of work into heat, we possess no
means of effecting the converse operation without loss. The best
steam engines do not transform into work much more than one
tenth of the heat expended. Observation indeed shows that the
disappearance of any form of energy is always followed by the
apparition of a different energy; but this evolution is
accompanied by a degradation of the original energy, which
becomes less utilizable. The sole exception is perhaps gravitic
energy.

The indestructibility of energy did not, then, imply its
invulnerability. There would have to be several qualities of
energy, of which heat would be the lowest. The different
energies having an invincible tendency to transform themselves
into this low form of energy, it followed that all those in the
universe would finally undergo this transformation. As
differences of temperature equalize themselves by diffusion, and
as heat is only utilizable as energy on condition of its being
able to act on bodies of lower temperature, it follows that when
all particles of matter contain energy at the same low degree of
tension, no exchange could take place between them. This would
be the end of out universe. From a highly differentiated state,
it would have passed gradually to a non-differentiated state.
Its energy would not be destroyed, since by definition it is
supposed to be immortal. It would become simply unusable, and
would remain unutilized until the day when our world would meet
with another at a lower level of energy, with which it would in
consequence exchange something. In the theory which we shall now
deduce from our researches, things would have a little
differently.

*2. Potential Energy*

The concept of potential energy is only the extension of facts
of elementary observation. I have already said that in the
theory of conservation of energy this latter presents itself in
two forms, kinetic energy or energy of movement and potential
energy. In an isolated system these two forms of energy may vary
in opposite directions, but their sum remains constant. If
therefore we call the kinetic energy of a system C, and the
potential energy P, we obtain C + P  = constant.

Evidently nothing is simpler and the classic example of the
weight of the wound-ip clock well illustrates this apparent
simplicity. So long as the weight does not act, the kinetic
energy employed in winding it up remains stored up in the
potential state. So soon as the weight commences to descend,
this potential energy passes into the kinetic state, and at any
moment of its course the sum of the kinetic energy expended and
that of the potential energy not yet used is equal to the total
energy primarily employed to raise the weight.

In such elementary cases as this, there is no difficulty in
distinguishing the kinetic from the potential energy; but once
we go beyond these very simple examples, it becomes possible, as
Poincare has shown, to separate the two forms of energy, and
consequently to ascertain the total energy (chemical,
electrical, etc) of a system. The formulas end by including such
heterogeneous things, that energy can no longer be defined.

"If we wish", he says in *La Science et lHypothese*, "to
enunciate the principle of the conservation of energy in all its
generality, and to apply it to the universe, we see it, so to
speak, vanish, and there remains but this -- there is something
which remains constant. But is there even any sense in this?".

Very fortunately for the progress of science, when the
consequences of the principle of conservation of energy were
developed, its champions did not look so closely into the
matter. Disdaining objections, they established a principle
which has rendered immense services by the researches of which
it was the origin. What it has especially shown is that the work
expended to produce a certain effect -- a new chemical
equilibrium, for instance -- is not lost, but is recovered when
the body returns to its primitive state. It is nearly thus,
moreover, that the principle of the conservation of energy is
now regarded. It brings us back, then, to saying that the work
yielded by a spring when released is equal to the power absorbed
in compressing it. And we thus stumble once more on one of those
truths of commonplace obviousness which often form the web of
the greatest scientific principles.

However this may be, the faculty which physicists have
arrogated to themselves of considering the energy which appears
to be lost as having passed into its potential state, will
always remove the principle of the conservation of energy from
experimental criticism. Latent potential energy plays the part
of those "hidden forces" by the intervention of which the early
mechanics succeeded in fitting into its equations the
experiments which escaped them. The moment conservation of
energy is admitted as a postulate, we must suppose that that
which appears lost is to be found somewhere else, and the abyss
of potential energy provides it with an inviolable shelter. But
if we start from the contrary postulate, that energy can be used
and lost, we are compelled to acknowledge that the second
postulate would have in its favor at least as many facts as the
first.

These are, moreover, barren discussions, since experiment is
incapable of throwing light on this question. We had, therefore,
to retain the principle of the conservation of energy until,
after having penetrated further into the intra-atomic universe,
it had benn clearly set forth in what way energy becomes lost.
This is a point of which the solution can be dimly seen, and I
will presently examine it.

It would be equally useless to dwell on facts which agree very
badly or not at all with the principle of the permanence of
energy, since it is enough to imagine any hypothesis whatever to
make them fit in with this principle. Thus a way of explaining
how the mass of a body can immensely increase with its velocity,
as has been proven by experiments with radioactive particles,
will certainly be found. It has indeed been explained how a
permanent magnet may be for an indefinite space of time
traversed by currents without its becoming heated by the
friction, which would lead to the loss of its magnetism. It was
enough to suppose that either it had no resistance -- that is to
say, to confer on it a property that the non-instantaneous
nature of the propagation of light proves not to exist.

These unverifiable hypotheses have always allowed a theory to
be saved so long as it is a fertile one. Many hypotheses in
physics, such as that of the kinetic theory of gases, would
probably quickly vanish if the experiment could throw light on
them. These molecules unceasingly bustling against each other
with the velocity of a cannon ball, without becoming heated,
thanks to an elasticity supposed to be infinite, having perhaps
but a very remote resemblance to the reality. The theory is
rightly retained because it is a fruitful one, and because no
possible experiment enables us to prove its inaccuracy.

We have seen how the theory of the degradation of energy and
its transformation into inaccessible potential energy allows us
to withdraw the principle of the conservation of energy from the
criticism of experiment. This theory has satisfied the immense
majority of physicists, but not all. We know what Poincare
thinks of it. He is not the only one to have stated doubts.
Quite recently, M. Sabatier, Dean of the Faculty of Sciences at
Montpellier, propounded in an interesting inaugural lecture with
the title "Is the Material Universe Eternal?", the question
whether it was quite certain that there was not a real and
progressive loss of energy in the world; and more recently
still, in a memoir on the degradation of energy, one of our most
far-seeing physicists, M. Bernard Brunhas, expressed himself as
follows: --

"What is our warrant for the statement that the universe is a
limited system? If it be not so, what signify these expressions:
the total energy of the universe, or the utilizable energy of
the universe? To say that the total energy is preserved but that
the utilizable energy diminishes, is this not formulating
meaningless propositions?

"It would not be absurd to imagine a universe where, after the
example of our solar system, the total internal energy might go
on diminishing while the fraction remaining would constantly
pass into an unusable form, where energy would be lost and at
the same time degraded.

"The law of the conservation of energy is only a definition:
the proof of this is that when a new phenomenon comes to
establish a discord in the equation of energy, there is set up
for it a new form of energy defined by the conditions of
reestablishing the compromised inequality".

And in answer to a letter in which I set forth my ideas on this
point, the same physicist wrote to me: --

"The nothing is lost should be deleted from the exposition of
the laws of physics, for the science of today teaches us that
something is lost. It is certainly in the direction of the
leakage, of the wearing away of the worlds, and not in the
direction of their greater stability, that the science of
tomorrow will modify the reigning ideas".

I have faithfully set forth, in this and the preceding
chapters, the theories which rule science at present. My
criticisms have not interfered with the faithfulness of my
exposition. Their object was simply to show that the current
theories contain some very weak points, and that consequently it
is permissible to replace them, or at least to prepare for their
replacement. No longer fettered by the weight of early
principles now sufficiently shaken, we can proceed to examine
whether, in place of being indestructible, energy does not
vanish without return, like that matter of which it is only the
transformation.

---

  

**Book IV**   
**The New Conception of Forces**

**Chapter I**   
**The Individualization of Forces and the
Supposed Transformation of Energy**

*1. The Transformations of Energy*

No one at the present day is unaware -- and the first savages
who succeeded in obtaining fire by rubbing together two bits of
wood might have suspected the fact -- that with a given form of
energy other forms may be produced. Yet the theory of the
equivalence of forces and their transformations was only clearly
formulated at the date of the discoveries relating to the
conservation of energy.

The most elementary textbooks now teach that all the forces of
nature are interchangeably transformable, and are only
transformations of a single entity, viz.: energy.

In his work on *The Evolution of Physics*, Poincare has
summed up the existing ideas as follows: --

"The physicists of the end of the 19th century were brought to
consider that in all physical phenomena there occur apparitions
and disappearances which are balanced by various energies. It is
natural, however, to suppose that these equivalent apparitions
and disappearances corresponding to transformations, and not to
simultaneous creations and destructions. We thus represent
energy to ourselves as taking different forms -- mechanical,
electric, calorific, and chemical -- capable of changing one
into the other, but in such a way that the quantitative value
always remains the same".

It is easy to comprehend the origin of this theory, but when we
go deeper into it we discover neither the necessity nor the
exactness of it. All that can be said in its favor is, that it
escapes the test of experiment. It is certain that the various
forms of energy appear to transform themselves, or better, that
from any form of energy others can be produced. But these are
merely apparent transformations like the turning of money into
goods. For a 5-franc piece we obtain a meter of silk; but nobody
thinks that the silver of which the coin is made transforms
itself into silk. Yet a like transformation is admitted when we
are assured that the friction of a rod of resin with a strip of
flannel has been turned into heat and electricity. The modern
theory of the equivalence and the transformation of energies
seems indeed to be only an illusion arising from the fact that
in order to measure them, we have chosen the same unit, viz.,
that of work estimated in kilogram-meters or in calories.

Under its most dissimilar forms, energy is simply defined as
equivalent to a certain amount of mechanical work, and to the
modern physicist energy and work have always been synonymous,
although they are in reality very distinct things. We should
have a very poor idea f the comparative value of a horse, a
Negro, and a white man, if we confined ourselves to measuring
the number of kilogram-meters that each could produce. Little
can be known of things from simply measuring one of their
quantitative elements. We must indeed be satisfied with such
indications when others cannot be obtained; but in that case we
must resign ourselves to acknowledging the insufficiency of our
knowledge.

Movement, electricity, heat, etc., being evidently very
different things, its seems natural to say that the different
forms of energy are too dissimilar to be transformed one into
another, but that the same effect may come from different
causes. A motor is set in movement by various agents such as
steam, electricity, manual labor, or wind, which are not akin to
each other, although they produce identical effects. When
movement or any kind of force produces heat, does this signify
anything else than that with dissimilar means we obtain the
variations of molecular equilibrium from which heat results? A
transmutation such as that of movement into electricity or light
would assuredly be more marvelous than that of simple bodies --
of, for instance, lead into gold.

I will not dwell further on this theory, which is little in
conformity with the teachings of the present day. I should even
have judged it useless to formulate it if chance had not brought
before my eyes a memoir by Prof Ostwald, who arrives by other
roads at the same conclusion as myself. These are his words:--

"As is well known, we distinguish since Hamiltons time two
kinds of physical magnitudes -- scalars and vectors. These two
kinds of magnitudes are essentially different in their nature,
and the one can never be represented by the other. I am
persuaded that there exist a greater number of magnitudes of
different kinds, and I believe I am justified in admitting that
the different forms of energy are all characterized by
magnitudes possessing such an individuality. Let this be
confirmed, and the fact that up to the present mechanics has
been unable to give a complete image of nature will appear as a
necessity. Such a notion would be as precious for science as
was, in its time, the notion of the individuality of chemical
elements, and the modern adepts of mechanical theories, by
claiming to reduce all forms of energy to mechanical energy,
would no more have done useful work than did the alchemists who
sought to turn lead into gold. That, in the course of such
labor, all kinds of discoveries, as interesting as they were
unexpected were made, is only one likeness the more to the often
fertile activity of these obstinate gold-seekers".

*2. Under What Forms Energy Can Exist in Matter*

I have already examined this question in my last work, and I
arrived at the conclusion that the energies manifested by matter
are the consequences of the movements of its elements. It must
be thanks to their rapidity that matter contains a very great
quantity of energy in a very small volume. It is known that the
liberation of one gram of hydrogen in the decomposition of water
corresponds to a production of electricity equal to 96,000
coulombs -- say, an output of nearly 27 amperes an hour.

It does not appear that chemists consider in this light the
manifestations of energy of which matter may be the seat. While
careful to affirm that energy is in no way anything material,
they treat it exactly as if it were a kind of fluid absorbed and
restored by bodies as a sponge imbibes a liquid and gives it out
when being squeezed. They constantly speak, in fact, of heat
being absorbed or given out by a combination, and all
thermochemistry is founded on the measurement of these
absorptions and liberations. In reality, bodies in their
transformation absorb nothing at all. When we are told that a
body absorbs heat to transform itself, this simply signifies
that in order to compel its elements to modify their equilibria
they have had to expend energy. This energy will be restored on
their return to their primary equilibria, just as a spring
produces when released an amount of work, equal to that expended
in its compression.

This image of a spring, rude as it may be, makes us clearly
understand that the absorptions or liberations of heat by
chemical compounds during their transformation are only
displacements of energy following on changes of equilibrium. It
will be easily recognized that a spring on its release produces
a power equal to that expended to set it. It is to this
elementary fact that the whole science of thermochemistry and
also the principle of the conservation of energy may be
referred. Carbon, the combustion of which -- that is to say, its
combination with oxygen -- generates a quantity of heat, offers
us the type of those bodies supposed to be capable of absorbing
energy and then of retaining it. Chemists tell us with regard to
coal that "the heat of combustion represents stored-up solar
energy". It would seem that the coal has stored heat as a
reservoir stores water.

In reality, it has stored nothing during its formation; but,
being a body with a strong affinity for the oxygen of the air,
and producing, when in combination with it, equilibria which are
accompanied by a great liberation of heat, we utilize this last
to produce water-vapor, the elastic force of which sets in
motion the pistons of our steam engines. If the air, instead of
oxygen, had contained only nitrogen, coal would never have been
considered as a storehouse of energy. It does not, in reality,
contain it any more than a crowd of other bodies more abundant
in nature, such as aluminum and magnesium. These metals, if not
already engaged in certain combinations, would produce, by
uniting with oxygen, heat as utilizable as that generated by the
oxidation of carbon.

The reader who bears in mind my theory of intra-atomic energy,
according to which all atoms are a colossal reservoir of energy,
will no doubt object that, apart from any combination, any body
whatever is thus a reservoir of forces. But these forces have
not been utilized up to the present. Only molecular and not
intra-atomic reactions are recognized by chemistry and commerce.
They were thus the only ones we had to deal with in the
preceding remarks.

---

  

**Chapter II**   
**The Changes of Equilibria of Matter and of
the Ether as the Origin of Forces**

*1. Alterations of Level as Generators of Energy*

Physicists measure forces and energy, but do not define them.
For them force is simply the cause of a movement, and they
evaluate its magnitude by the acceleration it produces. When a
force displaces its point of application over a certain length,
it gives a determined amount of work. This mechanical work being
the unit with which all forms of energy are measured, the effect
has finally become confused with the cause, and for many
physicists work and energy have become, as has been said,
synonymous. Forces form part of the irreducible elements of the
universe. Not being, like time and space, comparable to
anything, we cannot define them. We shall here only attempt to
put in evidence a general condition of their manifestation.

All the forces of nature are generated by disturbances of
equilibrium in either the ether or matter, and disappear when
the disturbed equilibria are restored. Light, for instance,
which is born with the vibrations of the ether, ceases with
them.

Two bodies charged with heat, electricity, movement, etc.,
cannot, whatever be the difference of magnitude of these bodies,
act on each other and produce energy, save when the elements
with which they are charged are out of equilibrium. From this
defect of equilibrium results what is called tension, or, again,
potential. In heat, tension is represented by the difference of
temperature; in electricity, by the electromotive force; in
energy of movement, by the velocity; in gravity, by the drop,
etc.

This break of equilibrium excites a sort of flow of energy. It
takes place from the point where the tension is highest towards
that where it is lowest, and continues till the equilibrium is
reestablished -- that is to say, until there is an equality of
level between the two bodies in question. We may therefore
consider as generators of energy a liquid passing from a higher
to a lower level; heat passing from a hot to a cold body;
electricity flowing from a body with a high potential to one
with a low potential; movement transmitted from a body animated
by velocity to another with less velocity, etc. Thus energy
depends on the state of the bodies in presence. There is only an
exchange between them if they are out of equilibrium -- that is
to say, if they possess different tensions. One of the bodies
present then loses something which it yields to the other until
their tensions are equalized. In order that they may then
generate a new quantity of energy, they must be put in presence
of a third body, which is out of equilibrium with them.

Generally speaking, that which substances yield up to each
other during these exchanges are forms of movement. All the
modes of energy are known and measured by these movements.

According to the media in which the disturbances of equilibrium
manifest themselves, and according to their form, they are
termed heat, electricity, light, etc.

The disturbances of equilibrium which generate forces are
themselves the consequence of other disturbances. They follow,
by substituting themselves for, on another, which is why a force
only appears at the expense of another force, which is at the
same time annulled.

Taking these facts as starting point, we could formulate in the
following way the principle of the conservation of energy. In a
closed system and equilibrium cannot be destroyed without being
replaced by another equivalent form of equilibrium. These things
happen as if all the elements of the universe were related to
each other in such a way as to constitute a sort of articulate
system. Nothing, however, indicates that the universe is a
closed system, and the fact that energy is always degraded when
transformed -- that is to say, becomes less and less utilizable
-- seems to show that the springs of our supposed articulate
system cannot work without losing something.

This essential notion of the disturbance of equilibrium as the
origin of energy may be put in evidence by a few examples. Let
us place on the same level two receptacles full of water and
connected by a tube. Being in equilibrium they cannot produce
any energy. Raise one of the receptacles above the other, and
the equilibrium of their contents is at once disturbed, and part
of the liquid flows from the higher to the lower receptacle
until the equilibrium is again established. During this
interruption, and only while it lasts, will the water be able to
do work -- to lift a piston, for example.

It is exactly the same with heat, electricity, or any other
energy. Two bodies heated to the same temperature represent two
reservoirs on the same level, or two equal weights on the
scale-pans of a balance, and there results from this no
manifestation of energy. If, on the contrary, the temperature of
one of the bodies is lower than that of the other, there will be
a disturbance of equilibrium and a production of energy until
the two bodies arrive at the same calorific level.

It is the same with electricity. There can be no production of
electrical energy without an interruption of equilibrium.
Whatever the quantity of electricity with which we charge a
body, it will produce no energy if it be in relation with
another at the same potential -- that is to say, at the same
electrical level.

Our instruments of measurement -- thermometers, galvanometers,
manometers, etc., simply indicate energetic differences of
level, to which we give the names of temperature, pressure,
voltage, etc., existing between some source of energy and an
arbitrary zero taken as point of reference. If the bulb of a
thermometer were at the temperature of the source to be measured
-- that is to say, in equilibrium with it -- it is evident that
the column of mercury would remain motionless. What a voltmeter
measures is likewise the difference of level between a source of
electricity and itself. Our instruments, like our senses, are
only sensitive to differences.

Thus, then, without an alteration of level of the ether of
matter there can be no possible manifestation of energy. If the
sun possesses throughout its mass a uniform temperature of 6000
degrees, and there could exist in it beings capable of
supporting that heat, it would represent to them no energy.
Having no cold bodies at their disposal, they could produce no
fall of heat, a condition indispensable for the production of
thermal energy.

Let us now suppose that, instead of finding themselves at a
uniform temperature of 6000 degrees, these imaginary beings live
in a world of ice at the uniform temperature of zero, but
possess in a corner of their world still colder an unlimited
provision of liquid air. Contrary to those plunged in a medium
at 6000 degrees, they would find in the blocks of ice around
them a considerable source of energy. By plunging these latter,
in fact, into the liquid air at 180 degrees, they would obtain a
considerable alteration of temperature. At the contact of the
ice, which is to liquid air a very hot body, this latter would
immediately boil, and its vapor could be employed to put motors
in operation. The inhabitants of that world would therefore
replace the coal of our steam engine by blocks of ice, which
they would consider, certainly with more reason than we do coal,
reservoirs of energy.

With this ice and this liquid air, it would be very easy for
them to produce the highest temperatures. The tension of the
vapor obtained could be employed, in fact, to drive dynamos, by
means of which can be obtained electric currents capable of
producing temperatures sufficient to fuse and volatilize all
metals.

That which has just been said concerning interruptions of
equilibrium as the condition of the production of energy,
applies to all its forms, including that possessed by bodies in
motion. It can only be born from the encounter of bodies not
having the same tension -- that is to say, the same velocity --
and which cannot therefore be put in equilibrium. If the
hunters bullet kills the animal flying before him, it is
because the velocities of the two are different. If these were
equal, the bullet would evidently have no effect. Equalities of
velocity render manifestations of kinetic energy impossible.

The locomotive, notwithstanding its mass, can do nothing to the
fly which hovers in front of it at the same rate of speed. The
effects of masses, endowed with kinetic energy, on the bodies
they meet, result solely from the inertia of matter, which
prevents its instantaneously adopting the velocity of the
elements which act upon it. If bodies were not possessed of
inertia -- that is to say, of resistance to movement -- they
would simply take the velocity of the masses striking them, and
would not be destroyed by them.

Kinetic energy, therefore, on final analysis, represents
movement which passes or tends to pass from one body to another.
It is the same, moreover, with thermal energy. It manifests
itself by molecular movements from a heated body to the elements
of a cold body, the movements of which have less velocity. It is
always movement which is transmitted in order to make itself
equal with another movement, and to be in equilibrium with it.

Into the disturbances of equilibrium which I have invoked in
order to explain the origin of energy, the notion of quantity
has not entered. The quantity of heat, electricity, movement, or
gravity possessed by the bodies put in motion matters little.
They will only act on each other if the movement, the
electricity, or the heat, with which they are charged, have
different tensions. Whether one or one hundred kilograms are
placed in the two pans of a balance, it will remain motionless
as long as there is no difference between the two weights. All
the manifestations of energy are subject to the same law. Bodies
in the presence of each other can, I repeat, only yield
something to one another if they are at different tensions.

Differences of tension -- that is to say, of equilibrium-- are
the first condition of all productions of energy, but the
magnitude of this energy results evidently from the masses
brought into play by the differences of tension. It is evident
that a weight of 100 kilograms falling from a height of 100
meters will produce more energy than 1 kilogram falling from the
same height. The magnitude of the energy is therefore
necessarily represented by the product of two factors --
quantity and tension. Tension represents a difference of level.
Whether applied to very great or very small masses, it is the
fundamental condition of the production of energy.

We see, finally, that all the forms of energy are transitory
effects resulting from the interruption of equilibrium between
several magnitudes -- weight, heat, electricity, or velocity. It
is therefore quite erroneous to speak of energy as a kind of
entity having a real existence analogous to that of matter. The
considerations just set forth allow is to imagine a world the
physicists of which would accept the second principle of
thermodynamics, but would reject the first -- that is to say,
that of the conservation of energy. Let us suppose a universe
with an invariable temperature where the sole source of energy
known is that of the waterfalls coming from immense lakes
situated on mountain tops, such as one sometimes meets with in
different regions of the earth. The learned men of such a work
would no doubt have discovered pretty quickly the possibility of
converting into heat, light, and electricity the energy of these
waterfalls, but they would also have established by experiment
that they could not without enormous leakage restore the water
to its original level with the forces produced by its own flow.
They would thus be led to believe that energy is a thing which
is used up and lost, and that the energy of their world would be
exhausted when all the water of the lakes should have descended
to the plains.

*2. Of What Elements the Entity Called Energy are Composed*

It may be objected to the preceeding remarks, that it is not
because a thing does not produce any effect that it does not
exist. A weight held up by a thread is still a weight. Heat not
in action is still heat; a force annulled by the action of
another force does not on that account lose its existence. But
when we reflect on the phenomena called heat, gravity,
electricity, etc., we recognize that they are only known and
measured as disturbances of equilibrium, and have, outside of
these disturbances, no existence verifiable by our senses or
instruments. Heat produces kinetic energy by its fall; but heat
which does not change its level is no more energy than the tile
fixed on a roof. No doubt the sun warms us, and there we see an
energy which seems to be quite independent and to have an
existence of its own. And yet all the energy produced results
solely from a difference of temperature -- that is to say, of
equilibrium -- between the caloric effects of the rays emitted
by the star which warms us and the bodies which receive them.
Let any body at the same heat as itself be brought as near as
you please to the sun, and there will be no possible exchange of
what we call caloric energy.

Physicists argue, moreover, exactly as if they admitted all
this. They are fully aware that there must be alterations of
level to effect work, and that no work can be manifested when
the alteration of level has ceased. But as it would be possible
to produce a flow of energy with a fresh alteration of level,
they assert that this energy which is not manifested exists in a
potential state.

All these concepts of potential energy, unusable energy,
degraded energy, etc., are the consequences of a confusion of
ideas, according to which energy is a sort of substance of which
the existence is as real as that of matter. This invisible
entity, the secret mover of things, is supposed to circulate
unceasingly through the universe by constantly transforming
itself. This hypothesis was, moreover, necessary when matter was
believed to be an aggregate of inert elements only able to
restore the energy it received, and incapable of creating any.
Something was indeed necessary to animate it, and it was that
something which constituted energy.

If this mysterious entity was necessary for the epoch when a
superior cause had to be imagined for the animation of inert
matter, its existence has no object at the present day. Instead
of imagining an unexplained power perpetually circulating
through the world without ever being exhausted, I say: --

At the origin of things there was condensed in matter, under
the form of movement of its elements, an enormous but yet
limited quantity of energy. This phase of concentration was
followed by a period of expenditure of the accumulated energies,
on which the sun and analogous stars have now entered. The
disintegration of their atoms is the origin of all the natural
forces now utilized. These atoms form an immense reservoir, but
one which must inevitably exhaust itself. Then that which we
call energy will, like matter, have disappeared forever.

By thus reasoning we only appeal to conceivable phenomena. Our
explanation brings us to the brief enunciation of a limited
provision of forces stored up in matter at the time of its
formation, which produce, when this last disintegrates,
different energies having only momentary existence. This is very
simple, whereas the entity, supposed to be immortal, termed
energy is completely incomprehensible. Science has not driven
forth the gods from their ancient empire to replace them by
metaphysical processes still more unintelligible than they.

---

  

**Chapter III**   
**The Evolution of the Cosmos -- Origin of
Matter and of the Forces of the Universe ~**

*1. The Origin of Matter*

The origin of things and their end are the two great mysteries
of the universe which have cost religions, philosophies, and
science the most meditation and thought. As these mysteries
appear unfathomable, many thinkers turn away from them. But the
human mind has never resigned itself to ignorance. It invents
chimeras when it is refused explanations, and these chimeras
soon become its masters.

Science has not yet lighted torches capable of illuminating the
darkness which envelops our past and veils the future. It is
able, however, to project some beams into this deep night.

If everything proceeds from the ether and afterwards returns to
it, we are forced to inquire first of all how a substance so
immaterial can transform itself into heavy and rigid bodies,
such as a rock or a block of metal.

The ideas I have set forth on the structure of matter allow us
in some degree to understand this and to deduce from them the
following theory: --

Bodies are constituted by a collection of atoms, each composed
of an aggregate of rotating particles, probably formed by
vortices of ether. By reason of their velocity these particles
possess an enormous kinetic energy. According to the way in
which their equilibria are disturbed they generate different
forces -- heat, light, electricity, etc.

It is probable that matter owes its rigidity only to the
rapidity of the rotary motion of its elements, and that if this
movement stopped it would instantaneously vanish into ether
without leaving a trace behind. Gaseous vortices, animated by a
rapidity of rotation on the order of that of the cathode rays,
would in all probability become as hard as steel. This
experiment is not realizable, but we can imagine its results by
noting the considerable rigidity which is acquired by a fluid
animated by great velocity.

Experiments made in hydroelectric factories have shown that a
liquid column only 2 centimeters in diameter, falling through a
tube of the height of 500 meters, cannot be broken into by a
violent blow from a saber. The arm is stopped as if by a wall
when it arrives at the surface of the liquid. Prof. Bernard
Brunbes, who witnessed this experiment, is persuaded that if the
velocity of the liquid column were sufficient a cannon ball
would not go through it. A layer of water a few centimeters
thick, animated by a sufficient velocity, would be as
impenetrable to shells as the steel plates of an ironclad.

Lat us give to the above column of water the form of a vortex
ring, and we shall get an image of the particles of mater and
the explanation of its rigidity.

This enables us to understand how the immaterial ether, when
transformed into small vortex-rings animated by sufficient
velocity, may become very material. It will also be understood
that, if these whirling movements were stopped, matter would
instantaneously vanish by return to the ether.

Matter, which seems to give us the image of stability and
repose, only exists, then, by reason of the rapidity of the
rotary movement of its particles. Matter is velocity, and, as a
substance animated by velocity is also energy, matter may be
considered a particular form of energy.

Velocity being the fundamental condition of the existence of
matter, we may say that this last is born so soon as the vortex
rings of the ether have acquired, by reason of their increasing
condensation, a rapidity sufficient to give them rigidity.
Matter grows old when the speed of its elements slackens. It
will cease to exist so soon as its particles lose their
movement.

We are therefore brought to this first essential notion:
Particles of a substance, however minute we may imagine them to
be, may, by the sole fact of their velocity, acquire a very
great rigidity and become transformed into matter. Let us now
examine how, with these two elements, particles of ether and
velocity, it is possible to understand the genesis of a
universe.

*2. The Formation of a Solar System*

The fist scientific theory on the origin of the world was, as
we know, formulated by Kant and developed by Laplace. According
to this last, our solar system with its retinue of planets must
be derived from a primal nebula similar to those observed in
space. Agglomerated under the influence of gravitation, which
would thus be the primitive force, it formed a central globe
animated with a movement of rotation, whose particles by
constant attraction have drawn closer and closer together.

By reason of the increasing rapidity of its rotation, following
on its condensation, this first nucleus of the sun became
flattened, and at a certain moment there were detached from it
by centrifugal force rings similar to those existing round
Saturn.

Continuing their movement of rotation, these rings finally,
still under the influence of centrifugal force, broke into
fragments. From these fragments, projected into space, were born
the planets which revolve round the sun. Incandescent at first
like this last, but cooling relatively quickly by reason of
their small volume, they at length became inhabitable by living
beings.

Laplace stopped his investigation at the cooled planet, and did
not busy himself wither with the elements which formed it nor
with those which might enter into the constitution of other
solar systems.

It is now possible to go further, and to apply to atoms the
laws which seem to have presided at the birth and formation of
our universe.

It is now admitted that atoms are formed of numerous particles
revolving round one or several masses with a velocity of the
order of light. The atom may therefore be compared to a sun
surrounded by its retinue of planets. Its small size does not
prevent such a comparison. In an immensity without limits
extreme littleness does not sensibly differ from extreme
greatness. Beings sufficiently small would consider the
planetary system formed by the elements of an atom as important
as are to us the gigantic stars of which astronomy observes the
march.

In the study of the evolution of worlds it is today easy to go,
as has been said above, far beyond Laplace. No one could suspect
in his time that spectrum analysis would make known the
composition of the sun, and would reveal therein elements
identical with those of our globe -- an evident proof that the
terrestrial elements are derived from those of the sun.

Spectrum analysis has, moreover, enabled us to follow the
genesis of the elements which compose the various worlds. The
variation of the spectra of the stars in the red and the
ultraviolet regions indicates their temperature, and
consequently their relative age; while the other spectral rays
make known their composition. We have thus determined the bodies
appearing in the stars with the variations of temperature
corresponding to different phases of evolution. In the youngest
stars -- that is to say, the hottest -- there hardly exists
anything but a few gases, principally hydrogen; then, as these
stars become cooler, there successively appear the simple bodies
we know, beginning with those of the lowest atomic weight.

Since astronomy has learnt to fix by photography the image of
the stars, it has established that their number is much larger
than it once thought. It now estimates at more than 400 millions
the number of luminous stars, planets, and nebulae existing in
the firmament, without speaking, naturally, of those that are
invisible and consequently unknown. Spectrum analysis shows that
they are at very different stages of evolution. Their past must
be of fearful length, since geologists estimate the existence of
our planet at several hundred million years.

During these accumulations of ages unknown to history, the
millions of stars with which space is peopled must have begun or
ended cycles of evolution analogous to that now pursued by our
globe. Worlds peopled like ours, covered with flourishing cities
filled with the marvels of science and the arts, must have
emerged from eternal night and returned thereto without leaving
a trace behind them. The pale nebulae with shadowy forms
represent perhaps the last vestiges of worlds about to vanish
into nothingness or to become the nuclei of a new universe.

How can the worlds undergo the phase of descending evolution
succeeding that of ascending evolution briefly pointed out in
this chapter? This we shall soon study.

We will especially bear in mind from what has been said that
the transformations revealed by observation of the stars point
out the general march of the evolution of worlds. It is always
enclosed in that fatal cycle of things -- birth, growth, decline
and death.

Whether it is the transformation of worlds or that of the
beings living on their surface that is the question, slowness is
always the law of evolution. In order to succeed in forming
beings gifted with the small amount of intelligence possessed by
man, nature has caused to evolve through thousands of centuries
the animal forms which preceded him. Her transformations are
only realized at the cost of very slow efforts. She cannot
create a world in seven days like the god of early legends. If
mighty divinities reign in some distant region, they are not
sovereign divinities, for Time dominates them, and they can do
nothing without him.

*3. Molecular and Intra-Atomic Energies*

In order to avoid all confusion in what is to follow, we must
first clearly separate molecular from intra-atomic energies.
These are probably close relations between them.

Molecular energies are the only ones hitherto known to science.
They generate cohesion, affinity, and chemical combinations and
decompositions. The manifestations of intra-atomic energy
sometimes accompany them, as in the phenomena of incandescence,
but they formerly escaped all investigation.

It is solely to molecular energies that the laws of
thermodynamics and of thermochemistry have been applied. They
always come back to this: A material body can emit no energy but
that which it has first received.

The forces manifested in all chemical and industrial operations
represent simply restitutions or displacements of energy; and it
is conceived that, under such conditions, the quantity of this
last remains invariable. These operations are identical with
those effected by the introduction into reservoirs of various
shapes of a certain quantity of water contained in another
reservoir. This substitution naturally does not change the
weight of the liquid.

Science, then, has only examined those intra-molecular energies
with which bodies can be charged. This study has led to matter
being considered as entirely distinct from energy, and simply
serving as its support. Matter, when heated or electrified,
could indeed absorb energy; but it restored this borrowed energy
afterwards, as a sponge does the water it has absorbed, without
ever increasing its quantity.

Matter being only the support of energy, we seemed perfectly
justified in establishing a difference profound and, as it was
thought, irreducible between matter and energy.

*4. Intra-Atomic Energy as the Source of the Forces of the
Universe*

The readers of my last work know how I sought to cause this
great dichotomy to disappear by showing that matter, far from
only being able to restore the energy borrowed by it from
without, is, on the contrary, a colossal reservoir of forces. It
is itself only a particular form of energy characterized by its
relative fixity and its concentration in immense quantity but in
small volume. The energy accumulated in 1 gram of any matter
represents as much as about 3 billion kilograms of coal. I
showed finally that this intra-atomic energy was the source of
solar heat, of electricity, and of most of the forces of the
universe.

Intra-atomic energy is, moreover, very stable or the world
would long ago have vanished. It is even so sable that chemists
considered the aggregation of energy called matter to be
absolutely indestructible. We have now learnt to dissociate
matter, but only in extremely feeble quantities. It may,
however, be hoped that the science of the future will find means
to disaggregate it more thoroughly. It will then have at its
disposal an immense source of forces. I have shown in my former
work that by artificial means very stable bodies can be
rendered  -- surface for surface -- 40 times more
radioactive than substances spontaneously dissociable, such as
uranium.

The study of intra-atomic energy, which is now only beginning,
has enabled us to penetrate into an entirely new world where the
ancient laws of chemistry and of physics are no longer
applicable. One of the most important of these differences is
the following: --

In handling intra-atomic energy we can only draw from an
isolated material system a quantity of energy at the most equal
and never superior to the amount primarily supplied to it. In
the manifestations of intra-atomic energy, we observe just the
contrary. Matter is able to liberate spontaneously large
quantities of energy either without any aid from without, as is
seen in highly radioactive bodies such as uranium and radium, or
under such feeble influences as a ray of light. With a very
minute quantity of energy we can therefore produce a very large
quantity, which fact is contrary to principles formerly
considered indestructible.

When seeking, in my previous work, for the causes of solar heat
and of the incandescence of the nocturnal stars, I showed that
intra-atomic energy greater than that which exists on the cooled
globes ought to suffice for the maintenance of these stars
temperature. Studying subsequently the properties of the
emissions from the isolated poles of an electrical machine, I
showed their identity with the products of dissociation of
radioactive bodies. Electricity might, then, be considered as
one of the manifestations of intra-atomic energy. And it is thus
that its part in natural phenomena, so unsuspected a few years
ago, appeared to me entirely preponderant. Our sun, in the phase
of the world into which it has entered, only expends the
energies accumulated by its atoms during an earlier phase of
concentration.

This dissociation of the provision of intra-atomic energy
accumulated in matter at the commencement of things explains the
origin of the forces of the universe. At those far-off epochs of
the chaos of our solar system of which the nebulae show a
confused image, the ether slowly condensed. The localized
vortices of ether, forming probably the primitive elements of
matter, accumulated by the increasing velocity of their rotation
the intra-atomic energy of which we note the existence. To the
phase of concentration succeeded, later on, a phase of
dissociation. Our universe has entered upon a new cycle and the
energy slowly accumulated in the atom has commenced to liberate
itself by reason of its dissociation. The solar heat, whence is
derived the greater part of the energies of which we make use,
represents the most important manifestation of this
dissociation.

Although this provision of intra-atomic energy is immense, it
is not infinite, and its emission, consequently, cannot last
forever. The planets surrounding the stars have cooled because
this energy is reduced. The sun itself must be subject to the
same law. When its intra-atomic energy has been dissipated, it
will cease to light the planets around it, and the earth will
become uninhabitable, unless science discovers the means of
easily liberating the immense quantity of intra-atomic energy
still contained in matter. But even should its succeed in this,
it will but retard the repose, since the provision of
intra-atomic energy is limited.

Thus, then, the sun, the generator of most of the terrestrial
energies, only expends the forces slowly accumulated in matter
at the epoch when within the primordial clouds of the ether the
atoms stored up the energies they were one day to restore.

How can this intra-atomic energy, the source of solar heat,
electricity, and most of the forces of the universe, be
dissociated and lost? We will new examine this point.

---

  

**Chapter IV**   
**The Vanishing of Energy and the End of Our
Universe**

*1. The Old Age of Energy and the Vanishing of Forces*

We have just seen that intra-atomic energy is a limited
magnitude, which is reduced day by day. How can it be lost?
Having already treated this question in my last work, I will
only summarize what I have already there explained.

To say how matter finally vanishes is to explain how forces
vanish, since matter is a special form of energy, only differing
from others by its relative fixity and its very great
concentration in a very feeble volume.

I have shown that one of the most constant products of the
dissociation of matter was the so-called particle of
electricity, deprived, according to the last researches, of all
material support, and considered as constituted solely by a
vortex-ring of ether.

The experiments previously described have shown that these
particles emit lines of force, and are always accompanied in
their various manifestations by those vibrations of the ether
called Hertzian waves, radiant heat, visible light, invisible
ultraviolet light, etc.. These vibrations represent for us the
vanishing phase of the elements of the atom and the energies of
which they are the seat.

How can the vortex-rings of ether and the energies generated by
them lose their individuality and vanish into the ether? The
question reduces itself to this: How can a vortex formed in a
fluid disappear into this fluid by causing vibrations in it?

Stated in this form the solution of the problem is fairly
simple. It can be easily seen, in fact, how a vortex generated
at the expense of a liquid can, when its equilibrium is
disturbed, vanish in spite of its theoretical rigidity by
radiating away the energy it contains under the form of
vibrations of the medium in which it is plunged. It is in this
way, for instance, that a waterspout formed by a whirl of liquid
loses its existence and disappears in the ocean.

In the same manner, doubtless, the whirls of ether constituting
the elements of atoms can transform themselves into vibration of
the ether. These last represent the final stage of the
dematerialization of matter and of its transformation into
energy before its final disappearance.

Thus, then, when the atoms have radiated all their energy in
the form of luminous caloric, or other vibrations, they return,
by the very fact of these radiations following on their
dissociation, to the primitive ether whence they came. Matter
and energy have returned to the nothingness of things, like the
wave into the ocean.

The defenders of the postulate of the conservation of energy
will evidently answer to the above, that energy being, by the
hypothesis, supposed to be indestructible, by vanishing into the
ether is not lost, and remains in the potential state, drowned
in its immensity. Thus regarded, the theory of the conservation
of energy evidently represents nothing but an unverifiable
conception, especially created by our desire to believe that
there exists in the universe something immortal. Not wishing to
consent to being only a flash in the infinite, we dream of a
movement that shall last forever.

But even if, in accordance with the preceding hypothesis,
energy should continue to circulate in some form or other in
space, yet, cast forth from the sphere of our universe, it would
no longer forma part of it, and in one way or another the energy
of the universe would have vanished. It is to this point, which
is moreover fundamental, that we limit our demonstration.

It does not seem at first sight very comprehensible that worlds
which appear more and more stable as they cool could become so
unstable as to afterwards dissociate entirely. To explain this
phenomenon we will inquire whether astronomical observations do
not allow us to witness this dissociation.

We know that the stability of a body in motion, such as a top
or a bicycle, ceases to be possible when its velocity of
rotation descends below a certain limit. Once this limit is
reached it loses its stability and falls to the ground. Prof
J.J. Thomson even interprets radioactivity in this manner, and
points out that when the speed of rotation of the elements
composing the atoms descends below a certain limit they become
unstable and tend to lose their equilibrium. There would result
from this a commencement of dissociation with diminution of
their potential energy, and a corresponding increase of their
kinetic energy sufficient to launch into space the products of
intra-atomic disintegration.

It must not be forgotten that the atom being an enormous
reservoir of energy is by this very fact comparable with
explosive bodies. These last remain inert so long as their
internal equilibria are not disturbed. So soon as some cause or
other modifies these, they explode and smash everything around
them after being themselves broken to pieces.

Atoms therefore which grow old in consequence of the diminution
of a part of their intra-atomic energy gradually lose their
stability. A moment then arrives when this stability is so weak
that the matter disappears by a sort of explosion more or less
rapid. The bodies of the radium group offer an image of this
phenomenon -- a rather faint image, however, because the atoms
of this body have only reached a period of instability when the
dissociation is rather slow. It probably precedes another and
more rapid period of dissociation capable of producing their
final explosion. Bodies such as radium, thorium, etc., represent
no doubt a state of old age at which all bodies must arrive some
day, and which they already begin to manifest in our universe,
since all matter is slightly radioactive. It would suffice for
the dissociation to be fairly general and fairly rapid for an
explosion to occur in a world where it was manifested.

These theoretical considerations find a solid support in the
sudden appearances and disappearances of stars. The explosions
of a world which produces them reveal to us, perhaps, how the
universes perish when they become old.

As astronomical observations show the relative \*\*\*  these
rapid destructions, we may ask ourselves whether the end of a
universe by a sudden explosion after a long period of old age
does not represent its most general ending. These abrupt
annihilations manifest themselves as the sudden apparition in
the heavens of an incandescent star, which pales and vanishes
sometimes in a few days, leaving generally no trace behind it,
or at most a faint nebula.

When the new star first appears, its spectrum, at first
analogous to that of the sun, proves that it contains metals
similar to those of our solar system. Then, in a short time, the
spectrum is transformed, and becomes finally that of the
planetary nebulae -- that is, it only contains rays of a few
simple elements, some of which are unknown. It is therefore
evident that the atoms of the temporary star have been rapidly
and profoundly transformed. This downward evolution is the
converse of that indicated in the upward evolution of stars.
These contain, when very hot, simple elements which become more
and more complicated and numerous as they continue to cool.

These transitory stars, resulting no doubt from the sudden
explosion of a world accompanied by the disintegration of its
atoms, are not rare. Hardly a year passes without some being
observed either directly or by the study of photographic plates.
One of the most remarkable was the one recently observed in the
constellation of Perseus. In a few days it attained a brilliancy
which made it the most brilliant star in the sky; but 24 hours
later it began to pale, its spectrum was slowly transformed, and
became, as said before, that of the planetary nebula -- an
evident proof, I repeat, of atomic dissociation. At the very
moment when this transformation was taking place, photographs of
long exposure showed nebulous masses round the star, produced no
doubt by atomic dissociation, which rapidly left it behind at a
speed of the order of light -- that is to say, analogous to that
of the Beta particles emitted by radioactive bodies when
disintegrating. The astronomers were, then, enabled to be
present at the rapid destruction of a world.

*2. Summary of the Doctrine of the vanishing of Forces and
Discussion of Objections*

The account of the general evolution of worlds to which this
and the preceding chapter have been devoted, includes facts of
experiment or of observation which I have endeavored to connect
by hypotheses. I will sum up this account by a recapitulation
showing the different phases of evolution of a system analogous
to ours and to those which continue to be born and transformed
in the firmament.

*3. The Periods of Evolution of a World*

(1) Phase of Chaos or of the Birth of Energy -- Formation, by
the action of gravitation or of unknown causes, of clouds and
ether. Under their influence inequalities are established whence
result differences of potential. The ether condenses into
scattered particles which assume the form of vortex-rings.
Animated at first by rather slow movements, they contain but
very little energy.

(2) Phase of Nebulae or of Concentration of Energy -- The
whirls of ether accelerate their movements. Thence attractions
result which agglomerate them into nuclei, the future germs of
matter. A general concentration of the mass is established. A
nebula is formed, vague at first in shape, which ends by
becoming spherical, and will eventually be the origin of a solar
system. In proportion as the particles of this mass condense,
the ether-whirls precipitate their movements, agglomerate and
form the nuclei of atoms which, by reason of the increasing
rapidity of their rotation, become more and more saturated with
energy.

(3) Phase of Stellar Incandescence or of Expenditure of Energy
-- This phase is that of the formation of a sun and analogous
stars. By continuous condensation, the atoms have finally
acquired a quantity of intra-atomic energy which they can no
longer contain and therefore radiate in the form of heat, light,
or various forms of electricity, of which heat is perhaps only a
secondary manifestation. The temperature of the orb is
excessive. The future atoms are not yet individualized.

(4) Phase of the Commencement of Stellar Refrigeration and of
the Individualization of Matter -- By reason of the continuity
of its radiation, the temperature of the orb becomes lower,
although it still remains incandescent. The elements of the
atoms form new equilibria, and give birth to the various simple
bodies which differentiate and multiply in proportion as the
cooling of the star increases.

(5) Phase of Planets, or of Refrigeration and of the
Equilibrium of Intra-Atomic Energy -- The planets, detached by
the centrifugal force of the central sun round which they
continue to revolve, become cooler by reason of the relative
smallness of their volume, and finally reach a temperature low
enough for life to be possible on their surface. The energies
accumulated in the form of matter have attained a phase of
stable equilibrium. Fixity succeeds to mobility. The worlds are
about to become inhabitable for long series of ages.

(6) Phase of Final Dissociation of Intra-Atomic Energy and
Return of the World to the Ether -- While maintaining themselves
in equilibrium for long centuries, the atoms have not ceased to
radiate slightly, and in consequence of this radiation and of
the reduction of the speed of rotation of their elements which
ensues, they lose some of their stability. Then commences a
period of disaggregation, which increases very quickly in
proportion as the stability of the intra-atomic elements
decreases. Progressive at first, it afterwards becomes
instantaneous; at a certain period of old age, the elements
return to the ether whence they came.

To this period of final destruction succeeds, perhaps, in the
course of ages, a new cycle of birth and of evolution, without
its being possible to assign a term to these destructions and
recommencements, probably eternal (1).

[(1) The above rather reminds one of the "retour eternal" of
Nietzsche; it is an hypothesis, moreover, void of importance,
which I formulated long before that author, as Prof.
Lichtenberger recalls in a book devoted to the doctrines of the
philosopher.]

The above account, deduced from researches related in my
preceding volume, may be summarized in a few lines. I borrow
these from one of the scholars who have had the kindness to
analyze my doctrine:--

"We imagine the world to be formed at first of diffuse atoms of
ether which, under the action of unknown forces, have stored up
energy. This energy, one of the forms of which is matter,
dissociates and appears in various forms -- electricity, heat,
etc., so as to bring matter back to ether. Nothing is created
signifies that we cannot create matter. Everything is lost
means that matter disappears entirely, as does matter by its
return to the ether. The cycle is therefore complete. There are
two phases in the history of the world: 1, Condensation of
energy under the form of matter; 2, Expenditure of this energy".

This conception of the concentration of energy at the origin of
a world and of its expenditure in a subsequent phase of its
existence has been disputed by a distinguished physicist, M.
Bernard Brunhes, in a recent memoir. The following is the
objection he makes to it: --

"The concentration of cosmic matter and the dissociation of
matter are two phenomena which appeared opposed to each other,
but which possess a common characteristic. Both liberate heat
and correspond to a degradation of energy. Be therefore assured
that if any radioactive body whatever has been produced which
has stored up an enormous provision of reserve energy, it is by
favor of a still greater degradation of energy... Matter which
dissociates at the end of transformations which seem to bring it
back to the starting point will have undergone a definite loss
of utilizable energy".

The above exception is supported by the principle of Carnot;
but a principle applicable to the downward phase of evolution is
not necessarily applicable to its earlier upward phase.

The illustrious mathematician Maxwell had already shown by a
much bolder hypothesis than mine -- since it implies the
existence of very subtle demons -- how the principle of Carnot
might be violated and the course of things retraced. We must
wait till we are better acquainted with the laws of nature
before supposing that she has not found out the means of
bringing out of the gloomy void of the ether the forces
condensed in the atom. If hypotheses analogous to mine are
rejected, we must return to that of a creator drawing forth
worlds from his will -- that is to say, from a nothing much more
mysterious still than the substratum from which I have
endeavored to raise them. The gods having been eliminated from
nature, where our ignorance alone had placed them, we must try
to explain things without them. Evidently since the dawn of
geological times, phenomena seem to have always evolved in
accordance with the second law of thermodynamics; but this law
is, I repeat, one of the period of the wearing out of a universe
and not of the ages during which the energies now expended were
condensed -- since we must admit that our solar system has had a
beginning like all the analogous systems of which astronomy has
noted the evolution. It is likewise necessary to admit that a
concentration of energy was first formed. N. Brunhes, moreover,
himself recognizes this in a passage of his memoir, which
constitutes the best answer I can make to him: --

"There is no inconsequence in imagining that the present period
of degradation has been preceded and may be followed by periods
in which the energy utilizable may increase instead of
diminishing".

It is, moreover, as the same author points out, at a similar
conclusion that Boltzmann arrived in his great work on the
theory of gases. The march of the world in the direction opposed
to the present evolution no longer appears to him as an absolute
impossibility, but simply as a very faint probability which may
nevertheless have been realized during the succession of ages.

It is to these brief and uncertain notions that all we can say
regarding the evolution of the worlds in the infinite duration
of time is reduced. We will now leave these mysterious regions
to return to those in which experiments can serve as a guide.
The study of the actions of light on a fragment of metal, which
was the origin of my researches, led me into very different
fields of physics. I will now conduct the reader into these, and
examine a few new problems.

As the general conclusion of this first part of my work, I
shall formulate the following proposition: --

Energy is not indestructible. It is unceasingly consumed, and
tends to vanish like the matter which represents one of its
forms.

---



***[Part II](evforp2.htm)***
  
***[The Problems of
Physics](evforp2.htm)***

**Book I**   
**The Dematerialization of Matter and the
Problems of Electricity**

**Chapter I ~ The Genesis of Current Ideas on Relations of
Electricity & Matter**

**1. Part of Electricity in Transformation of Chemical
Compounds**   
**2. The Like in Dissolution of Simple Bodies**

**Chapter II ~ The Transformation of Matter Into Electricity**

**1. Transformation of Matter into Energy**   
**2. Electrification by Influence**   
**3. Different Forms of Electric Influence**   
**4. Mechanism of Leak from Insulating Bodies**   
**5. Difference of Tension Between Electricity Produced by
Chemical Changes & by Friction explained**

**Chapter III ~ The Problems of Magnetism, Magnetic Induction
& Lines of Force**

**1. Problem of Magnetism**   
**2. Problem of Origin of Lines of Force**

**Chapter IV ~ The Electric Waves**

**1. Properties of Electric Waves**   
**2. Sensitiveness of Matter to Electric Waves**   
**3. Propagation of Electric Waves to a Distance & Their
Utilization**

**Chapter V ~ The Transparency of Matter to Electric Waves**

**1. History of Experiments on Transparency**   
**2. Transparency of Dielectrics to Same**

**Chapter VI ~ The Different Forms of Electricity & Their
Origin**

**1. Does Electricity Exist in Matter?**   
**2. Various Forms of Electricity**

**Book II**   
**The Problems of Heat and Light**

**Chapter I ~ The Problems of Heat**

**1. Old and New Ideas on the Causes of Heat**   
**2. Changes of State Under Heat & Energy Resulting
Therefrom**   
**3. Can Heat be the Measure of all Forms of Energy?**   
**4. The Conception of the Absolute Zero**

**Chapter II ~ Transformation of Material Movements into
Ethereal Vibrations & Radiant Heat**

**1. Nature of Radiant Heat & Transformation by Matter of
Ethereal Vibrations**   
**2. Permanence of Radiation of Matter**   
**3. Electric Emissions which Accompany Heat**

**Chapter III ~ Transformation of Matter into Light**

**1. Emission of Light by Matter**   
**2. Influence of Wavelength & Amplitude on Light**   
**3. The Invisible Spectrum**   
**4. Distribution of Energy Throughout Spectrum**   
**5. Absorption of Light by Matter**   
**6. Chemical and Photographic Action of Light**

**Chapter IV ~ The Dematerialization of Matter by Light**

**1. Dissociation of Matter by Different Radiation of Solar
Spectrum**   
**2. Origin of Phenomena Exhibited by Radium**

**Book III**   
**The Problems of Phosphorescence**

**Chapter I ~ Phosphorescence Produced by Light**

**1. Different Forms of Phosphorescence**   
**2. Action of Different Parts of Spectrum on Phosphorescent
Bodies**   
**3. Phosphorescence of Diamond**   
**4. Intensity of Phosphorescence & Temperature**   
**5. Decay of Phosphorescence by Action of Time**

**Chapter II ~ Phosphorescence Produced by Heat**

**1. Method of Observation**   
**2. Properties of Bodies Phosphorescing by Heat**   
**3. Analogies between Phosphorescence by Light & Heat**

**Chapter III ~ Phosphorescence from Other Causes than Above**

**1. Phosphorescence by Impact & Friction**   
**2. By X and Cathode Rays & High-Frequency Effluves**   
**3. By Chemical Reactions**   
**4. Phosphorescence of Living Beings**   
**5. Of Gases**

**Chapter IV ~ The Causes of Phosphorescence**

**1. Phosphorescence as a Manifestation of Intra-Atomic Energy**
  
**2. Chemical Reactions Causing Phosphorescence**

**Book IV**   
**Black Light**

**Chapter I ~ Invisible Phosphorescence**

**1. Divisions of Black Light**   
**2. History of Invisible Phosphorescence**   
**3. Properties of Invisible Phosphorescence**   
**4. Transformation of Invisible Phosphorescence into Visible**
  
**5. Invisible Phosphorescence Preceding Visible**   
**6. Comparative Effects of Infrared Rays and Heat on
Phosphorescence**   
**7. Radiations of Metals and Non-Phosphorescent Bodies**

**Chapter II ~ The Infrared Rays & Photography through
Opaque Bodies**

**1. Visibility through Opaque Bodies**   
**2. Photography through Same**   
**3. Instantaneous Photography in Dark**   
**4. Transparency of Different Bodies to Infrared Rays**   
**5. Use of Invisible Rays to Make Distant Bodies Visible**

**Chapter III ~ The Part Played by the Various Luminous
Radiations in Vital Phenomena**

**1. The Part of Light in Vital Phenomena**   
**2. Observation of Effects of Solar Spectrum in Plant Life**
  
**3. New Method of Study of Physiological Action of Infrared
Rays**

**Chapter IV ~ The Antagonistic Properties of Some Regions of
the Spectrum**

**1. Rays Which Illuminate & Rays Which Extinguish**   
**2. Opposite Properties of Different Regions of the Spectrum**

**Book V**   
**Forces of Unknown Origin & Hidden
Forces**

**Chapter I ~ Universal Gravitation & Hidden Forces**

**1. Causes of Gravitation**   
**2. Consequences of Gravitation**   
**3. Forces Dimly Seen**

**Chapter II ~ The Molecular & Intra-Atomic Forces**

**1. Attractions and Repulsions of Material Elements**   
**2. Molecular Equilibria**   
**3. The Force and the Form**

**Chapter III ~ The Forces Manifested by Living Beings**

**1. Living Matter and Cellular Life**   
**2. Instability the Condition of Life & Intra-Atomic
Energies**   
**3. Forces Which Regulate the Organism**   
**4. Morphogenic Forces**   
**5. Interpretation of Vital Phenomena**

**Index of Subjects [Not included]**

**Index of Names [Not included]**

---