Page:Science the handmaid of religion.djvu/17

Rh One more illustration, and we conclude.

V. That which we are told respecting the indestructibility of force, or the conservation of energy, has its theological equivalent in the doctrine of the immanence of Deity. Matter does not lose its energy, though the energy be transmuted over and over again; for the simple reason, that He who doubtless by some means made matter the vehicle of force, continues to matter the properties with which He originally endowed it. If gravitation be a universal property of matter, the energy which matter possesses by reason of the attractive force which we call the force of gravitation must continue to exist while the matter exists.

The physicist tells us that no light, no heat, no electricity, no motion is ever lost; because if motion be a property of bodies under certain conditions, then the light and heat and electricity, which are modes of motion, will continue so long as motive force be supplied. If a thing has once had existence, why should it cease to exist? If motion be once given, what can take it away? Water may be poured from one vessel to another; it may become steam, vapour, gas, but its elementary particles continue the same.

Thus, if science tells us that the force of the universe is never destroyed, it simply corroborates the assertion of the theologian, that it cannot be destroyed, so long as God chooses it to