From this truth which transcends proof, we have seen that the general principles above set down, are deducible. That the power or force manifested to us in all phenomena, continues unaltered in quantity, however its mode of manifestation be altered, is a proposition in which these several propositions are involved. It was shown that on the Persistence of Force are based the demonstrations that Matter is indestructible and Motion continuous. When its proofs were examined, the correlation and equivalence of forces was found to follow from the Persistence of Force. The necessity we are under of conceiving Force under the two-fold form of attraction and repulsion, turns out to be but an implication of the necessity we are under of conceiving Force as persistent. On the Persistence of Force, we saw that the law of direction of Motion is dependent; and from it also we saw that the rhythm of Motion necessarily results. Passing to those changes of distribution which, by the Motion it generates, Force produces in Matter, it was pointed out that from the Persistence of Force are severally deducible, the instability of the homogeneous, the multiplication of effects, and that increasing definiteness of structure to which continuous differentiation and integration leads. And lastly we saw that Force being persistent, Evolution cannot cease until equilibrium is reached; and that equilibrium must eventually be reached.
So that given Force manifested in Time and Space, under the forms of Matter and Motion; and it is demonstrable, à priori, that there must go on such transformations as we find going on.
§ 142. See then the accumulation of proofs. The advance of human intelligence in establishing laws continually wider in generality, raises the presumption that there are all-comprehensive laws. Turning to the facts, we discern a pervading uniformity in the general course of things where this can be watched, and indications of such uniformity where it cannot be watched. Considering this uniformity analytically, we find it to result from certain simpler uniformities in the actions of Force. And these uniformities prove to be so many necessary implications of that primordial truth which underlies all knowledge – the Persistence of Force. The aspect of things raises a presumption; extended observations lead to an induction that fulfils this presumption; this induction is deductively confirmed; and the laws whence it is deduced are corollaries from that datum without which thought is impossible.
No higher degree of verification than this can be imagined. An induction based on facts so numerous and varied, and falling short of universality only where the facts are beyond observation, possesses of itself a validity greater than that of most scientific inductions. When it is shown that the proposition thus arrived at à posteriori, may also be arrived at à priori, starting from certain simple laws of force; it is raised to a level with those generalizations of concrete science which are accepted as proved. And when these simple laws of force are affiliated upon that ultimate truth which transcends proof; this dependent proposition takes rank with those propositions of abstract science which are our types of the greatest conceivable certainty.
Let no one suppose that any such degree of certainty is alleged of the various minor propositions brought in illustration of the general argument. Such an assumption would be so manifestly absurd, that it seems scarcely needful to disclaim it. But the truth of the doctrine as a whole, is unaffected by errors in the details of its presentation. As the first principles of mathematics are not invalidated by mistakes made in working out particular equations; so the first principles set forth in the foregoing pages, do not stand or fall with each special statement made in them. If it can be shown that the Persistence of Force is not a datum of consciousness; or if it can be shown that the several laws of force above specified are not corollaries from it; then, indeed, it will be shown that the theory of Evolution has not the certainty here claimed for it. But nothing short of this can invalidate the general conclusions arrived at.
§ 143. If these conclusions be accepted – if it be admitted that they inevitably follow from the truth transcending all others in authority – if it be agreed that the phenomena going on everywhere are parts of the general process of Evolution, save where they are parts of the reverse process of Dissolution; then it must be inferred that all phenomena receive their complete interpretation, only when recognized as parts of these processes. Regarded from the point of view here reached, each change that takes place, is an incident in the course of the ever-complicating distribution of Matter and Motion, except where it is an incident in the course of the reverse distribution; and each such change is fully understood, only when brought under those universal principles of change, to which these transformations necessarily conform. Whence, indeed, it appears to be an unavoidable conclusion, that the limit towards which Science is advancing, must be reached when these formulæ are made all-comprehensive. Manifestly, the perfection of Science, is a state in which all phenomena are seen to be necessary implications of the Persistence of Force. In such a state, the dependence of each phenomenon on the Persistence of Force, must be proved either directly or indirectly – either by showing that it is a corollary of the Persistence of Force, or by showing that it is a corollary from some general proposition deduced from the Persistence of Force. And since all phenomena are incidents in the re-distributions of Matter and Motion; and since there are certain general principles, deducible from the Persistence of Force, to which all these re-distributions conform; it seems inferrable that ultimately all phenomena, where not classed as consequences of the Persistence of Force, must be classed as consequences of these derivative principles.
§ 144. Of course this development of Science into an organized aggregate of direct and indirect deductions from the Persistence of Force, can be achieved only in the remote future; and indeed cannot be completely achieved even then. Scientific progress, is progress in that equilibration of thought and things which we saw is going on, and must continue to go on; but which cannot arrive at perfection in any finite period, because it advances more slowly the further it advances. But though Science can never be entirely reduced to this form; and though only at a far distant time can it be brought nearly to this form; yet much may even now be done in the way of rude approximation. Those who are familiar with the present aspects of Science, must recognize in them the broken outlines of a general organization. The possibility of arranging the facts already accumulated, into the order rudely exhibited in the foregoing pages, will itself incline them to the belief that our knowledge may be put into a more connected shape than it at present has. They will see the probability that many now isolated inductions, may be reduced to the form of deductions from first principles. They will suspect that inferences drawn from the ultimate laws of force, will lead to the investigation and generalization of classes of facts hitherto unexamined. And they will feel, not only that a greater degree of certainty must be acquired by Science, as fast as its propositions are directly or indirectly deduced from the highest of all truths; but also that it must so be rendered a more efficient agent of further inquiry.
To bring scientific knowledge to such degree of logical coherence as is at present possible, is a task to be achieved only by the combined efforts of many. No one man can possess that encyclopedic information required for rightly arranging even the truths already established. But as progress is effected by increments – as all organization, beginning in faint and blurred outlines, is completed by successive modifications and additions; advantage may accrue from an attempt, however rude, to reduce the facts already accumulated – or rather certain classes of them – to something like co-ordination. Such must be the plea for the several volumes which are to succeed this.
§ 145. A few closing words must be said, concerning the general bearings of the doctrines that are now to be further developed. Before proceeding to interpret the detailed phenomena of Life, and Mind, and Society, in terms of Matter, Motion, and Force, the reader must be reminded in what sense the interpretations are to be accepted. In spite of everything said at the outset, there are probably some who have gained the impression that those most general truths set forth in the preceding chapters, together with the truths deducible from them, claim to be something more than relative truths. And, notwithstanding all evidence to the contrary, there will probably have arisen in not a few minds, the conviction that the solutions which have been given, along with those to be derived from them, are essentially materialistic. Let none persist in these misconceptions.
As repeatedly shown in various ways, the deepest truths we can reach, are simply statements of the widest uniformities in our experience of the relations of Matter, Motion, and Force; and Matter, Motion, and Force are but symbols of the Unknown Reality. That Power of which the nature remains for ever inconceivable, and to which no limits in Time or Space can be imagined, works in us certain effects. These effects have certain likenesses of kind, the most general of which we class together under the names of Matter, Motion, and Force; and between these effects there are likenesses of connection, the most constant of which we class as laws of the highest certainty. Analysis reduces these several kinds of effect to one kind of effect; and these several kinds of uniformity to one kind of uniformity. And the highest achievement of Science is the interpretation of all orders of phenomena, as differently-conditioned manifestations of this one kind of effect, under differently-conditioned modes of this one kind of uniformity. But when Science has done this, it has done nothing more than systematize our experience; and has in no degree extended the limits of our experience. We can say no more than before, whether the uniformities are as absolutely necessary, as they have become to our thought relatively necessary. The utmost possibility for us, is an interpretation of the process of things as it presents itself to our limited consciousness; but how this process is related to the actual process, we are unable to conceive, much less to know.
Similarly, it must be remembered that while the connection between the phenomenal order and the ontological order is for ever inscrutable; so is the connection between the conditioned forms of being and the unconditioned form of being, for ever inscrutable. The interpretation of all phenomena in terms of Matter, Motion, and Force, is nothing more than the reduction of our complex symbols of thought, to the simplest symbols; and when the equation has been brought to its lowest terms the symbols remain symbols still. Hence the reasonings contained in the foregoing pages, afford no support to either of the antagonist hypotheses respecting the ultimate nature of things. Their implications are no more materialistic than they are spiritualistic; and no more spiritualistic than they are materialistic. Any argument which is apparently furnished to either hypothesis, is neutralized by as good an argument furnished to the other. The Materialist, seeing it to be a necessary deduction from the law of correlation, that what exists in consciousness under the form of feeling, is transformable into an equivalent of mechanical motion, and by consequence into equivalents of all the other forces which matter exhibits; may consider it therefore demonstrated that the phenomena of consciousness are material phenomena. But the Spiritualist, setting out with the same data, may argue with equal cogency, that if the forces displayed by matter are cognizable only under the shape of those equivalent amounts of consciousness which they produce, it is to be inferred that these forces, when existing out of consciousness, are of the same intrinsic nature as when existing in consciousness; and that so is justified the spiritualistic conception of the external world, as consisting of something essentially identical with what we call mind. Manifestly, the establishment of correlation and equivalence between the forces of the outer and the inner worlds, may be used to assimilate either to the other; according as we set out with one or other term. But he who rightly interprets the doctrine contained in this work, will see that neither of these terms can be taken as ultimate. He will see that though the relation of subject and object renders necessary to us these antithetical conceptions of Spirit and Matter; the one is no less than the other to be regarded as but a sign of the Unknown Reality which underlies both.