Thoughts on Art and Life Part 19

What is force? I say that force is a spiritual, incorporate and invisible power, which for a brief duration is produced in bodies that by accidental violence are displaced from their natural state of inertia.

[Sidenote: Origin of Force]

19.

Force arises from dearth or abundance; it is the child of physical motion and the grandchild of spiritual motion, and the mother and origin of gravity. Gravity is confined to the elements of {149} water and earth, and this force is infinite, because infinite worlds could be moved by it if instruments could be made by which the force could be generated. Force, with physical motion, and gravity, with resistance, are the four accidental powers by which all mortal things live and die.

Force has its origin in spiritual motion, and this motion, flowing through the limbs of sentient animals, enlarges their muscles, and thus enlarged the muscles are shrunk in length and contract the tendons with which they are connected, and this is the cause of the strength in human limbs. The quality and quant.i.ty of the strength of a man can generate a further force, which will increase in proportion to the duration of the motions produced by them.

[Sidenote: Aspects of Force]

20.

Gravity, force and casual motion together with resistance are the four external powers by which all the visible actions of man live and die.

[Sidenote: Of Inertia]

21.

A motion tends to be continuous; a body set in motion continues to move as long as the impression of the motive power lasts in it.

[Sidenote: Can Man imitate a Bird's Flight?]

22.

The bird is an instrument which operates by mathematical laws, and man can reproduce all {150} the movements of this instrument, but cannot attain to the intensity of its power; and can only succeed in acquiring balance. Thus we will say that such an instrument constructed by man lacks only the soul of the bird, and the soul of man must counterfeit the soul of the bird. The spirit in the frame of the bird doubtless would respond to needs of that frame better than would the spirit of man, whose frame is different, more especially in the almost insensible motions of balance; and since we see the bird make provision for the many sensible varieties of movement, we can conclude by such experience that man can acquire knowledge of the more markedly sensible of these movements, and that he will be able to make ample provision against the destruction of that instrument of which he has made himself the spirit and the guide.

[Sidenote: Of Inertia]

23.

A natural and continuous motion seeks to preserve its course along the line of its starting-point, that is to say, let us call starting-point whatever place in which it varies.

24.

Everything maintains itself by motion. And if it were possible to describe a diameter of air on the sphere of the earth, like to a well, which would extend from one superficies to the other, {151} and if a weighty body were dropped into this well, the body would seek to remain stationary at the centre, but so strong would be the impetus that for many years it would prevent it from so doing.

[Sidenote: Transmission of Motion]

25.

Impetus is a virtue created by motion and communicated by the motive force to the object moved, and this object acquires motion in proportion to the energy of the impetus.

[Sidenote: Matter is Inert]

26.

No lifeless matter moves of itself, but its motion is caused from without.

27.

All elements displaced from their natural place seek to return to it, and more especially fire, water and earth.

28.

All matter universally seeks to maintain itself in its natural state; hence, water in motion seeks to maintain its course according to the force by which it is propelled, and if it meets with opposition it finishes the length of the course it began in a circular and reflex motion.

[Sidenote: Conception of Energy]

29.

Impetus is the impression of motion conveyed by the motive power to the object moved. Every {152} impression tends to permanence or seeks to attain permanence. That every impression seeks after permanence is proved by the impression made by the sun on the eye which regards it, and in the impression of sound made by the hammer which strikes a bell.

Every impression seeks after permanence, as is shown in the image of impetus communicated to the object moved.

30.

A weight seeks to fall to the centre of the earth by the most direct way.

[Sidenote: In Praise of the Sun]

31.

If you look at the stars, warding off the rays (as may be done by looking through a small hole made by the extreme point of a fine needle placed so as almost to touch the eye), they will appear so small as to seem as though nothing could be smaller; it is owing to their great distance that they appear so small, for many of them are very many times larger than the star which is the earth with its water. Now reflect what appearance this our star must have from so great a distance, and then consider how many stars might be placed--both in longitude and lat.i.tude--between those stars which are sown in the dark s.p.a.ce. I can never refrain from blaming many of the ancients who said that the size of the sun was no greater than {153} it appears; among whom was Epicurus. I believe he founded his reasoning on a light placed in our atmosphere equidistant from the centre of the earth, which, to any one looking at it, never appears to diminish in size from whatever distance it is seen.

32.

I shall reserve the reasons of its size and power for later. But I greatly marvel that Socrates should have depreciated such a body, and that he should have said that it resembled an incandescent stone; and he who opposed him as regards this error acted rightly. But I wish I had words to blame those who seek to exalt the worship of men more than that of the sun, since in the universe there is no body of greater magnitude and power to be seen than the sun. And its light illumines all the celestial bodies which are distributed throughout the universe; and the vital spark descends from it, because the heat which is in living beings comes from the soul, and there is no other centre of heat and light in the universe, as will be shown later; and it is certain that those who have elected to worship men as G.o.ds--as Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, &c.--have fallen into a profound error, since even if a man were as great as our earth, he would have the appearance of a little star, which appears like a dot in the universe; and moreover these men are mortal, and decay and corrupt in their sepulchres.

{154}

33.

Epicurus perhaps saw the shadows of columns on the walls in front of them equal to the diameter of the column which cast the shadow; and since the breadth of the shadows are parallel from beginning to end he considered that he might infer that the sun also was directly opposite to this parallel, and consequently no broader than the column; and he did not perceive that the diminution of the shadow was insensibly small owing to the great distance of the sun. If the sun were smaller than the earth, the stars in a great portion of our hemisphere would be without light--in contradiction to Epicurus, who says the sun is only as large as it appears to be.