Matter. III.
The plain philosophical and scientific proofs by which we have established
the _actio in distans_, although sufficient, in our judgment, to convince
every unbiassed reader of the truth of the view we have maintained, may
nevertheless prove inadequate to remove the prejudice of those who regard
the time‐honored doctrine of action by material contact as axiomatic and
unassailable. It is true that they cannot upset our arguments; but they
oppose to us other arguments, which they confidently believe to be
unanswerable. It is therefore necessary for us to supplement our previous
demonstration by a careful analysis of the objections which can be made
against it, and to show the intrinsic unsoundness of the reasonings by
which they are supported. This is what we intend to do in the present
article.
_A first objection._—The first and chief argument advanced against the
possibility of _actio in distans_ without a material medium of
communication is thus developed in the _Popular Science Monthly_ for
November, 1873 (p. 94), by J. B. Stallo:
“How is the mutual action of atoms existing by themselves in complete
insulation, and wholly without contact, to be realized in thought? We are
here in presence of the old difficulties respecting the possibility of
_actio in distans_ which presented themselves to the minds of the
physicists in Newton’s time, and constituted one of the topics of the
famous discussion between Leibnitz and Clarke, in the course of which
Clarke made the remarkable admission that ‘if one body attracted another
without an intervening body, that would be not a miracle, but a
contradiction; for it would be to suppose that a body acts where it is
not’—otherwise expressed: Inasmuch as action is but a mode of being, the
assertion that a body can act where it is not would be tantamount to the
assertion that a body can be where it is not. This admission was entirely
in consonance with Newton’s own opinion; indeed, Clarke’s words are but a
paraphrase of the celebrated passage in one of Newton’s letters to
Bentley, cited by John Stuart Mill in his _System of Logic_, which runs as
follows: ‘It is inconceivable that inanimate brute matter should, without
the mediation of something else which is not material, operate upon and
affect other matter _without mutual contact_.... That gravity should be
innate, inherent, and essential to matter, so that one body may act on
another, at a distance, through a vacuum, without the mediation of
anything else by and through which their action and force be conveyed from
one to the other, is to me so great an absurdity that I believe no man,
who in philosophical matters has a competent faculty of thinking, can ever
fall into it.’ ”
Before we enter into the discussion of this objection we must remark that
it is scarcely fair to allege Newton’s view as contrary to _actio in
distans_. For he neither requires a material contact of matter with matter
nor a material medium of communication; he says, on the contrary, that the
inanimate brute matter needs _the mediation of something else which is not
material_; which amounts to saying that his inanimate brute matter must
have all around a non‐material sphere of power, without which it would
never reach any distant matter. This assertion, far from being a denial of
_actio in distans_, seems rather to be a remote endeavor towards its
explanation; and it may be surmised that, had Newton been as well
acquainted with the metaphysical doctrine about the essential constituents
of substance as he was with the mathematical formulas of mechanics, he
would have recognized in his “inanimate brute matter” the potential
constituent of material substance, and in his “something else which is not
material” the formal constituent of the same substance and the principle
of its operation. The only objectionable phrase we find in the passage now
under consideration is that in which he describes action and force as
_conveyed_ from matter to matter. But, as he explicitly maintains that
this convection requires no material medium, the phrase, whatever may be
its verbal inaccuracy, is not scientifically wrong, and cannot be brought
to bear against the _actio in distans_. We therefore dismiss this part of
the objection as preposterous, and shall at once turn our attention to
Clarke’s argument, which may be reduced to the syllogistic form thus:
“A body cannot act where it is not present either by itself or by its
power. But _actio in distans_ is an action which would be exerted where
the body is not present by itself, as is evident; and where the body is
not present by its power, as there is no medium of communication.
Therefore the _actio in distans_ is an impossibility.”
The objection, though extremely plausible, is based on a false
assumption—that is, on the supposition that there can be distance from the
active power of one element to the matter of another. The truth is that,
however far matter may be distant from matter, no active power can ever be
distant from it. For no distance in space is conceivable without two
formal ubications. Now, a material element has undoubtedly a formal
ubication in space by reason of its matter, which is the centre of its
sphere of activity, but not by reason of its active power. Distances, in
fact, are always measured from a point to a point, and never from a point
to an active power, nor from an active power to a point. The matter of a
primitive element marks out a point in space, and from this point we take
the direction of its exertions; but the power of an element, as
contradistinguished from its matter, is not a point in space, nor does it
mark a point in space, nor is it conceivable as a term of distance. And
therefore to suppose that there may be a distance from the active power of
an element to the point where another element is ubicated, is to make a
false supposition. The active power transcends the predicament _ubi_, and
has no place within which we can confine it; it is not circumscribed like
matter, and is not transmissible, as the objection supposes, from place to
place through any material medium; it is ready, on the contrary, to act
directly and immediately upon any matter existing in its indefinite(1)
sphere, while its own matter is circumscriptively ubicated in that single
point(2) which is the centre of the same sphere. Prof. Faraday explicitly
affirmed that “each atom extends, so to say, throughout the whole of the
solar system, yet always retains its own centre of force”;(3) which, in
metaphysical language, means that while _the matter_ of a primitive
element occupies a single point, _the form_ constitutes around it an
indefinite sphere of power. And for this reason it was Faraday’s opinion
that the words _actio in distans_ should not be employed in science. For
although the matter of one body is distant from the matter of another, yet
the power that acts is not distant; and therefore, although there is no
contact of matter with matter, there is a _contactus virtutis_, or a
contact of power with matter, which alone is required for the production
of the effect.
We are far from supposing that the adversaries of the _actio in distans_
will be silenced by the preceding answer; as it is very probable that the
answer itself will be to many of them a source of new difficulties. Still,
many things are true which are difficult to be understood; and it would be
against reason to deny truths sufficiently inferred from facts, only on
account of the difficulty which we experience in giving a popular
explanation of them. Those who, to avoid such a difficulty, deny action at
a distance, expose themselves to other difficulties which are much more
real, as admitting of no possible solution; and if they reject actions at
a distance because their explanation appears to be difficult, they are
also bound to reject even more decidedly all actions by material contact;
for these indeed admit of no explanation whatever, as we have already
shown.(4)
To understand and explain how material elements can act at any distance is
difficult, for this one radical reason: that our intellectual work is
never purely intellectual, but is always accompanied by the working of
that other very useful, but sometimes mischievous, power which we call
imagination; and because, when we are trying to understand something that
transcends imagination, and of which no sensible image can be formed, our
intellect finds itself under the necessity of working without the
assistance of suitable sensible representations. Our imagination, however,
cannot remain inactive, and therefore it strives continually to supply the
intellect with new images; but as these, unhappily, are not calculated to
afford any exact representation of intellectual things, the intellect,
instead of receiving help from the imagination, is rather embarrassed and
led astray by it. On the other hand, the words which we are generally
obliged to use in speaking of intellectual objects are more or less
immediately drawn from sensible things, and have still a certain
connection with sensible images. With such words, our explanations must,
of course, be metaphorical in some degree, and represent the intelligible
through the sensible, even when the latter is incompatible with the
former. This is one of the reasons why, in some cases, men fail to express
intelligibly and in an unobjectionable manner their most intellectual
thoughts. True it is that the metaphysicians, by the definite form of
their terminology, have greatly diminished this last difficulty; but, as
their language is little known outside of the philosophical world, our use
of it will scarcely help the common reader to understand what it conveys.
On the contrary, the greater the exactness of our expressions, the more
strange and absurd our style will appear to him who knows of no other
language than that of his senses, his imagination, and popular prejudice.
These general remarks apply most particularly to _actio in distans_. It is
objected that a cause cannot act where it is not, and where its power is
not conveyed through a material medium. Now, this proposition is to be
ranked among those which nothing but popular prejudice, incompleteness of
conception, and imperfection of language cause to be received as
axiomatic. We have pointed out that no material medium exists through
which power can be conveyed; but as the objection is presented in popular
terms and appeals to imagination, whilst our answer has no such advantage,
it is very probable that the objection will keep its ground as long as men
will be led by imagination more than by intellect. To avoid this danger,
Faraday preferred to say that “the atom [primitive element] of matter is
everywhere present,” and therefore can act everywhere. But by this answer
the learned professor, while trying to avoid Scylla, struck against
Charybdis. For, if the element of matter is everywhere present, then
Westminster Abbey, for instance, is everywhere present; which cannot be
true in the ordinary sense of the words. In fact, we are accustomed to say
that a body is present, not in that place where its action is felt, but in
that from which the direction of the action proceeds, and since such a
direction proceeds from the centres of power, to these centres alone we
refer when we point out the place occupied by a body. Prof. Faraday, on
the contrary, refers to the active powers when he says that matter is
everywhere present; for he considers the elements as consisting of power
alone.(5) But this way of speaking is irreconcilable with the notions we
have of determinate places, distances, etc., and creates a chaotic
confusion in all our ideas of material things. He speaks more correctly in
the passage which we have already mentioned, where he states that “each
atom [element] extends, _so to say_, throughout the whole of the solar
system, yet always retaining its own centre of force.” Here the words “so
to say” tell us clearly that the author, having found no proper terms to
express himself, makes use of a metaphor, and attributes _extension_ to
the material elements in a sense which is not yet adopted in common use.
He clearly wishes to say that “each element extends _virtually_ throughout
space, though it _materially_ occupies only the central point from which
its action is directed.”
This latter answer is very good. But people are not likely to realize its
full meaning; for in speaking of material substance men frequently
confound that which belongs to it by reason of its matter with that which
belongs to it by reason of its substantial form. It is evident, however,
that if the substance had no matter, it would not mark out a point in
space; it is, therefore, only on account of its matter that a substance is
formally ubicated.
As to the substantial form (which is the principle of activity), although
it is said to have a kind of ubication on account of the matter to which
it is terminated, nevertheless, of itself, it has no capability of formal
ubication, as we have already shown. Hence the extent to which the active
power of an element can be applied is not to be measured by the ubication
of its matter; and although no cause can act where it is not virtually by
its power, yet a cause can act where it is not present by its matter.
The direct answer to the argument proposed would, therefore, be as
follows:
“A body cannot act where it is not present either by itself or by its
power.” _Granted._
“But _actio in distans_ is an action which would be exerted where the body
is not present by itself, as is evident.” _Granted._ “And where the body
is not present by its power.” _False._
To the reason adduced, that “there is no medium of communication,” we
simply reply that such a medium is not required, as the active power
constitutes an indefinite sphere, and is already present after its own
manner (that is, virtually) wherever it is to be exerted; and therefore it
has no need of being transmitted through a medium.
This is the radical solution of the difficulty proposed. But the notion of
an indefinite sphere of activity, on which this solution is grounded, is,
in the eyes of our opponents, only a whimsical invention, inconsistent, as
they think, with the received principles of philosophy. We must therefore
vindicate our preceding answer against their other objections.
_A second objection._—A sphere of power, they say, is a mere absurdity.
For how can the active power be there, where its matter is not? The matter
is the first subject of its form; and therefore the form must be in the
matter, and not outside of it. But in a primitive substance the active
power is entitatively the same thing with the substantial form;
accordingly, the active power of a primitive substance must be entirely in
its matter, and not outside of it. And the same conclusion is to be
applied to the powers of all material compounds; for in all cases the form
must be supported by the matter. How is it, then, possible to admit a
sphere of power outside of its matter, and so distant from its matter as
is the sun from the planets?
This objection, which we have often heard from men who should have known
better, is wholly grounded on a false conception of the relation between
the matter and the form of a primitive being. It is false, in fact, that
the matter _supports_ the substantial form, and it is false that the
substantial form exists in the matter as in a subject. The accidental act
requires a _subject_ already existing; but the substantial act requires
only a potential term to which it has to give the first existence. This is
evident; because if the substantial act ought to be supported by a real
subject, this real subject would be an actual substance before receiving
the same substantial act; which is a contradiction in terms. And therefore
the form is not _supported_ by the matter, but only _terminated_ to it;
and the matter is not the _subject_ of the form, though it is so called by
many, but is only the substantial _term_, to which the substantial form
gives existence. “Properly speaking,” says S. Thomas, “that which is
potential in regard to some accidental actuality is called _subject_. For
the subject gives actuality to the accident, as the accident has no
actuality except through its subject; and for this reason we say that
accidents are in a subject, whereas _we do not say that the substantial
form is in a subject_. ‘Matter,’ therefore, and ‘subject,’ differ in this:
that ‘subject’ means something which does not receive its actuality by the
accession of anything else, but exists by itself and possesses a complete
actuality (as, for example, a white man does not receive his being from
his whiteness). ‘Matter,’ on the contrary, means something which receives
its actuality from that which is given to it; because matter has, of
itself, only an incomplete being, or rather no being at all, as the
Commentator says. Hence, to speak properly, the form gives existence to
the matter; whereas the accident gives no existence to the subject, as it
is the subject that gives existence to the accident. Yet ‘matter’ is
sometimes confounded with ‘subject,’ and _vice versa_.”(6)
From this doctrine it is manifest that the matter is not the subject of
the substantial form, and consequently that the form, or the principle of
activity, is in no need of being supported by its matter. It is rather the
matter itself that needs to be supported—that is, kept in existence—by its
form; as it has no being except from it. The matter is potency, and the
form is act; now, all act is nobler than its corresponding potency. It is
not, therefore, the potency that determines the conditions of existence of
its act, but the act itself determines the conditions of existence of its
potency. And thus it is not the matter that determines the range of its
form, but it is the form that determines the being of its own matter, in
the same manner as the form of a body determines its centre of gravity.
These considerations, which will hereafter receive a greater development,
suffice to show that the range of the elementary power is not determined
or circumscribed by its material term. And thus the objection is
substantially destroyed.
Those who make this objection suppose that the activity of a material
element is entitatively enclosed, embedded, and merged in the matter as in
a physical recipient by which it must be circumscribed. This supposition
is a gross philosophical blunder. The matter of a primitive element is not
a physical recipient of the substantial form; for it is nothing physically
before it is actuated. The substantial form gives to the matter its first
being; and therefore it cannot be related to it as the enclosed to the
encloser or the supported to the supporter, but only as the determiner to
the determinable. This is an obvious metaphysical truth that cannot be
questioned. Moreover, the form can determine the existence of a material
point in space without being itself confined to that point. This is very
clearly inferred from the fact already established, viz., that a material
point acts all around itself in accordance with the Newtonian law; for
this fact compels the conception of a material element as a virtual
sphere, of which the matter is the central point, while its virtual
sphericity must be traced to the special character of the form. Now,
although the centre of a sphere borrows all its centric reality from the
sphericity of which it is the intrinsic term, yet the sphericity itself
cannot be confined within its own centre; which shows that, although the
matter of an element borrows all its reality from the substantial form of
which it is the essential term, yet the substantial form itself, on
account of its known spherical character, must virtually extend all around
its matter, and constitute, so to say, an atmosphere of power expanding as
far, at least, from the central point as is necessary for the production
of the phenomena of universal gravitation.
Nor can this be a sufficient ground for inferring, as the objection does,
that in such a case the form would be distant from its matter as much as
the sun is from the planets. The form, as such, cannot be considered as a
term of the relation of distance; for, as we have already remarked, there
is no distance without two formal ubications. Now, the form, as such, has
no formal ubication, but is reduced to the predicament _ubi_ only by the
ubication of its own matter. Hence it is impossible rationally to conceive
a distance between the matter and its form, however great may be the
sphere of activity of the material element. When the substantial form is
regarded as a principle of accidental actions, we may indeed consider it,
if not as composed of, at least as equivalent to, a continuous series of
concentric spherical forms overlying one another throughout the whole
range of activity; and we may thus conceive every one of them as
_virtually_ distant from the material centre, its virtual distance being
measured by its radius. But, strictly speaking, the radius measures the
distance between the agent and the patient, not between the agent and its
own power; and, on the other hand, as the imagined series of concentric
sphericities continues uninterruptedly up to the very centre of the
sphere, we can easily perceive that the substantial form, even as a
principle of action, is immediately and intrinsically terminated to its
own matter.
_A third objection._—What conception can we form of an _indefinite_
sphere? For a sphere without a spherical surface is inconceivable. But an
indefinite sphere is a sphere without a spherical surface; for if there
were a surface, there would be a limit; and if there were a limit, the
sphere would not extend indefinitely. It is therefore impossible to
conceive an indefinite sphere of activity.
This objection is easily answered. A sphere without a spherical _form_ is
indeed inconceivable; but it is not necessary that the spherical form
should be a _limiting_ surface, as the objection assumes. We may imagine
an indefinite sphere of matter; that is, a body having a density
continually decreasing in the inverse ratio of the squared distances from
a central point. Its sphericity would consist in the spherical decrease of
its density; which means that the body would be a sphere, not on account
of an exterior spherical limit, but on account of its interior
constitution. Now, what we say of an indefinite sphere of matter applies,
by strict analogy, to an indefinite sphere of power. Only, in passing from
the former to the latter, the word _density_ should be replaced by
_intensity_; for intensity is to power what density is to matter. And thus
an indefinite sphere of power may have its spherical character within
itself without borrowing it from a limiting surface. We may, therefore,
consider this third objection as solved.
Let us add that in our sphere of power not only all the conditions are
fulfilled which the law of gravitation requires, but, what is still more
satisfactory, all the conditions also which befit the metaphysical
constitution of a primitive substance. We have a centre (_matter_), the
existence of which essentially depends on the existence of a principle of
activity (_form_) constituting a virtual sphere. Take away the substantial
form, and the matter will cease to have existence. Take away the virtual
sphericity, and the centre will be no more. But let the spherical form be
created; the centre will immediately be called into existence as the
essential and intrinsic term of sphericity, it being impossible for a real
sphericity not to give existence to a real centre. And although this
spherical form possesses an intensity of power decreasing in proportion as
the sphere expands, still it has everywhere the same property of giving
existence to its centre, since it has everywhere an intrinsic spherical
character essentially connected with a central point as its indispensable
term. Whence we see that the substantial form, though virtually extending
into an indefinite sphere, is everywhere terminated to its own matter.
Thus the Newtonian law and the _actio in distans_, far from being opposed
to the known metaphysical law of the constitution of things, serve rather
to make it more evident by affording us the means of representing to
ourselves in an intelligible and almost tangible manner the ontologic
relation of matter and form in the primitive substance.
_A fourth objection._—A power which virtually extends throughout an
indefinite sphere must possess an infinite intensity. But no material
element possesses a power of infinite intensity. Therefore no element
extends its power throughout an indefinite sphere. The major of this
syllogism is proved thus: In an indefinite sphere we can conceive an
infinite multitude of concentric spherical surfaces, to every one of which
the active power of the element can be applied for the production of a
finite effect. But the finite taken an infinite number of times gives
infinity. Therefore the total action of an element in its sphere will be
infinite; which requires a power of infinite intensity.
The answer to this objection is not difficult. From the fact that the
active powers virtually extend through an indefinite sphere and act
everywhere in accordance with the Newtonian law, it is impossible to prove
that material elements possess a power of infinite intensity. We concede,
of course, that in an indefinite sphere “an infinite multitude of
concentric spherical surfaces can be conceived, to every one of which the
active power of the element can be applied for the production of a finite
effect.” We also concede that “the finite taken an infinite number of
times gives infinity.” But when it is argued that therefore “the total
action of an element in its sphere will be infinite,” we must distinguish.
The total action will be infinite in this sense: that it would reach an
infinite multitude of terms, if they existed in its sphere, and produce in
each of them a determinate effect, according to their distance—this we
concede. The total action will be infinite—that is, the total effort of
the element will be infinitely intense; this we deny. The schoolmen would
briefly answer that the action will be infinite _terminative_, but not
_intensive_. This distinction, which entirely upsets the objection, needs
a few words of explanation.
In the action of one element upon another the power of the agent, while
exerted on the patient, is not prevented from exerting itself at the very
same time upon any other element existing in its sphere of activity. This
is a well‐known physical law. Hence the same element can emit a thousand
actions simultaneously, without possessing a thousand powers or a
thousandfold power, by the simultaneous application of its single power to
a thousand different terms. The actions of an agent are therefore
indefinitely multiplied by the mere multiplication of the terms, with no
multiplication of the active power; and accordingly an active power of
finite intensity may have an infinite applicability. This is true of all
created powers. Our intellect, for instance, is substantially finite, and
yet it can investigate and understand any number of intelligible objects.
This amounts to saying that, if there is no limit to possible intellectual
conceptions, there is no limit to the number of intelligible terms; but
from this fact it would be absurd to infer that a created intellect has a
power of infinite intensity. In like manner, the motive power of a
material element is substantially finite, and yet it can be applied to the
production of a number of movements which has no limit but the number of
the terms capable of receiving the motion. The infinity of the total
action is therefore grounded on an assumed infinity of terms, not on an
infinite intensity of the power.
Nor can this be a matter of surprise. For, as the motive power is not
transmitted from the agent to the patient, it remains whole and entire in
the agent, however much it may be exerted in all directions. It is not
absorbed, or exhausted, or weakened by its exertions, and, while acting on
any number of terms, is yet ready to act on any number of other terms as
intensely as it would on each of them separately. If ten new planets were
now created, the sun would need no increase of power to attract them all;
its actual power would suffice to govern their course without the least
interference with the gravitation of the other existing planets. And the
reason of this is that the power of all material elements is naturally
determined to act, and therefore needs no other condition for its exertion
than the presence of the movable terms within the reach of its activity.
The number of such terms is therefore at every instant the measure of the
number of the real actions.
We have said that the active power is not weakened by its exertions. In
fact, a cause is never weakened by the mere production of its connatural
effects, but only because, while producing its effects, it is subjected to
the action of other agents which tends to alter and break up its natural
constitution. Now, to be altered and impaired may be the lot of those
causes whose causality arises from the conspiration of many active
principles, as is the case with all the physical compounds. But primitive
causes, such as the first elements of matter, are altogether unalterable
and incorruptible with respect to their substantial being, and can never
be impaired. When we burn a piece of paper, the paper with its composition
is destroyed, but we know that its first components remain unaltered, and
preserve still the same active powers which they possessed when they were
all united in the piece of paper.
This incontrovertible fact maybe confirmed _à priori_ by reflecting that
the active principle, or the substantial form, of a primitive element, is
not exposed to the influence of any natural agent capable of impairing it.
Everything that is impaired is impaired by its contrary. Now, the active
principle has no contrary. The only thing which might be imagined to be
contrary to a motive power would be a motive power of an opposite nature,
such as the repulsive against the attractive. Motive powers, however, do
not act on one another, but on their matter only, as matter alone is
passive. On the other hand, even if one power could act on another, its
motive action would only produce an accidental determination to local
movement, which determination surely would not alter in the least the
substance of a primitive being. Hence, although two opposite actions, when
terminated to the same subject, can neutralize each other, yet two
opposite motive powers can never exercise any influence on each other by
their natural actions; and therefore, in spite of their finite entity,
they are never impaired or weakened, and are applicable to the production
of an unlimited number of actions.
_A fifth objection._—An action of infinite intensity cannot but proceed
from a power of infinite intensity. But, according to the Newtonian law,
two elements, when their distance has become infinitely small, act on one
another with an intensity infinitely great. Therefore, if the Newtonian
law hold good even to the very centre of the element, the elementary power
possesses infinite intensity.
To this we reply that the mathematical expression of the intensity of the
action, in the case of infinitesimal distances, does not become infinite,
except when the action is supposed to last for a finite unit of time. But
the action continued for a finite unit of time is not the _actual_ action
of an element; it is the integral of all the actions exerted in the
infinite series of infinitesimal instants which makes up the finite unit
of time. To judge of the true intensity of the actual exertion, it is
necessary to exclude from the calculation the whole of the past or future
actions, and to take into account the only action which corresponds to the
infinitesimal present. In other terms, the actual action is expressed, not
by an integral, but by a differential. In fact, the elements act when they
are, not when they have been, or when they will be; they act in their
present, not in their future or in their past; and the present, the _now_,
is only an instant, which, though connecting the past with the future, has
in itself neither past nor future, and therefore has a rigorously
infinitesimal duration. It is this instant, and not the finite unit of
time, that measures the actual effort of the elements. Accordingly, the
action as actually proceeding from the elements, when at infinitesimal
distance, is infinitely less than the integral calculated for a finite
unit of time; which shows that the argument proposed has no foundation.
This answer serves also to complete our solution of the preceding
objection. It was there objected that the active power of an element can
be applied to the production of an infinite multitude of _finite_ effects;
to which we answered that a finite power was competent to do this by being
applied simultaneously to an infinite multitude of terms. But now we add
that none of those effects acquire a _finite_ intensity, except by the
continuation of the action during a finite unit of time, and therefore
that the true effect produced in every instant of time is infinitesimal.
Hence the infinite multitude of such effects, as related to the instant of
their actual production, is an infinite multitude of infinitesimals, and
the total effort of a primitive element in every instant of time is
therefore finite, not infinite.
_A sixth objection._—If we admit that a material element has an indefinite
sphere of power, we must also admit that the element has a kind of
immensity. For the active power must evidently be present entitatively in
all the parts of space where it is ready to act. Accordingly, as by the
hypothesis it is ready to act everywhere, its sphere being unlimited, it
must be present everywhere and extend without limit. In other words, the
elementary power would share with God the attribute of immensity—which is
impossible.
This objection, which, in spite of its apparent strength, contains only an
appeal to imagination instead of intellect, might be answered from S.
Thomas in two different ways. The first answer is suggested by the
following passage: “The phrase, _A thing is everywhere and in all times_,
can be understood in two manners: First, as meaning that the thing
possesses in its entity the reason of its extending to every place and to
every time; and in this manner it is proper of God to be everywhere and
for ever. Secondly, as meaning that the thing has nothing in itself by
which it be determined to a certain place or time.”(7) According to this
doctrine, a thing can be conceived to be everywhere, either by a positive
intrinsic determination to fill all space, or by the absence of any
determination implying a special relation to place. We might therefore
admit that the elementary power is everywhere in this second manner; for
although the matter of an element marks out a point in space, we have seen
that its power, as such, has no determination by which it can be confined
to a limited space. And yet nothing would oblige us to concede that the
active power of an element, by its manner of being everywhere, “shares in
God’s immensity”; for it is evident that an absence of determination has
nothing common with a positive determination, and is not a share of it.
The second answer is suggested by a passage in which the holy doctor
inquires “whether to be everywhere be an attribute of God alone,” and in
which he proposes to himself the objection that “universals are
everywhere; so also the first matter, as existing in all bodies, is
everywhere; and therefore something is everywhere besides God.” To which
he very briefly replies: “Universals and the first matter are indeed
everywhere, but they have not everywhere the same being.”(8) This answer
can be applied to the active power of primitive elements with as much
reason, to say the least, as it is to the first matter. The active power
may therefore be admitted to be everywhere, not indeed like God, who is
everywhere _formally_, and “has everywhere the same being,” but in a quite
different manner—that is, by extending everywhere _virtually_, and by
possessing everywhere a different degree of virtual being. We know, in
fact, that this is the case, as the exertions of such a power become
weaker and weaker in proportion as the object acted on is more and more
distant from the centre of activity.
Yet a third answer, which may prove to be the best, can be drawn from the
direct comparison of the pretended immensity of the elementary power with
the real immensity of the divine substance. God’s immensity is an infinite
attribute, which contains in itself the formal reason of the existence of
space, and therefore eminently contains in itself all possible ubications.
By his immensity God is essentially everywhere with his whole substance,
and is as infinite and entire in any one point of space as he is in the
whole of the universe and outside of it. On the other hand, what is the
pretended immensity of the elementary power? It is unnecessary to remark
that an indefinite sphere of power does not give existence to space, as it
presupposes it; but it is important to notice that, however great may be
the expansion of that virtual sphere, the essence and the substance of the
element are absolutely confined to that single point, where its form is
terminated to its matter. Both matter and form are included in the essence
of an element; hence there only can the element be with its essence and
substance where its matter and its form are together. But they are not
together, except in a single point. Therefore the element, however great
may be the virtual expansion of its sphere of power, is essentially and
substantially present only in a single point.
From this every one will see that there is no danger of confounding the
virtual ubiquity of created power with God’s immensity. Divine immensity
has been ingeniously, though somewhat strangely, defined by a philosopher
to be “a sphere of which the centre is everywhere.” The power of an
element, on the contrary, is “a sphere of which the centre is ubicated in
a single point.” If this does not preclude the notion that the element
“shares in God’s immensity,” we fail to see why every creature should not
share also in God’s eternity, by its existence in each successive moment
of time. The objection is therefore insignificant. As to the virtual
sphere itself, we must bear in mind that its power loses continually in
intensity as the virtual expansion is increased, till millions of millions
of elements are required to produce the least appreciable effect. Hence
the virtuality of elementary powers tends continually towards zero as its
limit, although it never reaches it. And as a decreasing series, though
implying an infinity of terms, may have a finite value, as mathematicians
know, so the virtuality of the elementary powers, although extending after
its own manner beyond any finite limit, represents only a finite property
of a finite being.
From what we have said in these pages the intelligent reader will realize,
we hope, that the much‐maligned _actio in distans_, as explained by us
according to Faraday’s conception, can bear any amount of philosophical
scrutiny. The principles which have formed the basis of our preceding
answers are the three following:
1st. Motive powers have no other formal ubication than that from which
their exertions proceed;
2d. Motive powers are never distant from any matter;
3d. Motive powers are not merged or embedded in the matter to which they
belong, but constitute a virtual sphere around it.
That _actio in distans_ not only is possible, but is the only action
possible with the material agents, has been proved in our preceding
article. The embarrassment we experience in its explanation arises, not
from our reason, but from our habit of relying too much on our
imagination. “Imagination,” says S. Thomas, “cannot rise above space and
time.” We depict to ourselves intellectual relations as local relations.
The idea that a material point situated on the earth can exert its power
on the polar star suggests to us the thought that the active power of that
element must share the ubication of the polar star, and be locally present
to it. Yet the true relation of the power to the star is not a local
relation, and the exertion of the power is not terminated to the _place_
where the star is, but to the _star_ itself as to its proper subject; and
therefore the relation is a relation of act to potency, not a relation of
local presence.
There is nothing local in the principle of activity, except the central
point from which its action is directed; and there is nothing local in its
action, except the direction from that central point to the subject to
which the action is terminated. True it is that we speak of _a sphere_ of
power, which seems to imply local relations. But such a sphere is not
locally determined by the power, which has no ubication, but by the matter
to which that power is to be applied. For the necessity of admitting a
sphere of power arises from the fact that all the matter placed at equal
distance from the centre of activity is equally acted on. It is only from
matter to matter that distance can be conceived; and thus it is only from
matter to matter, and not from matter to power, that the radius of a
sphere can be traced. Abstract geometry deals with imaginary points, but
physical geometry requires real points of matter.
Power is above geometry, and therefore it transcends space; hence the
difficulty of understanding its nature and of explaining the mode of its
operation. Nevertheless, power and matter are made for one another, and
must have a mutual co‐ordination, since they necessarily conspire into
unity of essence. Hence whatever can be predicated _potentially_ of the
matter can be _virtually_ predicated of the power; and, as the matter of
an element, though actuated in a single point of space, is everywhere
_potentially_—viz., can be moved to any distant place—so also the
principle of activity, though formally terminated to a single point, is
everywhere _virtually_—that is, it can impart motion to matter at any
distance. Thus _actio in distans_ might directly be inferred, as a
necessary result, from the ontological correlation of the essential
principles of matter. But we have no need of _à priori_ arguments, as, in
questions of fact, the best arguments are those which arise from the
analysis of the facts themselves. These arguments we have already given;
and, so long as they are not refuted, we maintain that nothing but _actio
in distans_ offers a philosophical explanation of natural facts.
To Be Continued.
Hope.
Youthful hope around thee lingers;
Soon its transient lines will fly:
Time and Death with frosty fingers
Touch its blossoms, and they die.
Yet rejoice while hope is keeping
Watch upon her emerald throne.
Ere thy cheek is pale with weeping,
Ere thy dreams of love have flown.
The Veil Withdrawn.
Translated, By Permission, From The French Of Madame Craven, Author Of “A
Sister’s Story,” “Fleurange,” Etc.