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Show Page 187 not a necessary quality of matter - it is perfectly possible to conceive of matter which is inert, lacking any force at all. Such matter would be, however, infinitely divisible and capable of only two modes of existence: at rest or moving uniformly "in straight lines." "Such a thing," he points out, "is unknown in the universe." All matter appears to be active, "self-moving," and if such a thing as inert matter exists, "it has not yet been discovered to be such by its inactivity." Now Orson feels sufficiently grounded to re-advance his earlier hypothesis, the reverse of Newton's law of motion, that "every particle...has a tendency to approach every other particle...with a force which varies inversely as the square of the distance." Thus, particles of "self-moving substance" must "will" not to act randomly, but systematically and "intelligently." Here, Orson argues that obedience to law, a fundamental pattern in nature, is evidence of intelligence. He calls in Sir John Herschel, the most famous scientist in England the son of astronomer William, who says, in his Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy: "To obey a law, to act in compliance with a rule, supposes an understanding and a will, a power of complying or not, in the being who obeys...." Thus far Orson goes with Herschel, but no farther...the scientist then commits the "error" of supposing matter to be passive anyway, carrying an impression of "spirit" from the Creator, that directs it along fixed patterns of motion. This Orson finds to be contradictory and hopelessly ambiguous: "But we ask, what is this 'spirit of the law?'" In other words, if particles are obedient to law, that in itself demonstrates an intellectual capacity. "We consider that the primary powers of all material substance must be intelligent...Substances without intelligence can have no powers, no forces...Unintelligent particles, then, is only |