the generation of movement in the form of manifested changes is not an atomic property; it is the primordial effect of the Supernatural Cause, which, in order to produce all the phenomena of cosmos, acts directly upon living matter alone.

CHAPTER IV.

IMPONDERABLE MATTER: HYPOTHESIS OF PROGENEETHER OF THE PHYSICISTS.

§ 30. Real existence of progene-§ 31. Nature of progene-§ 32. Distribution of progene-§ 33 Forms of progenic motion-§ 34. Progenic potence—§ 35. Progenic phenomena-§ 36. Recapitulation of the concept of progene.

§ 30. REAL EXISTENCE OF PROGENE.

We give the name progene to the imponderable fluid or metafluid which physicists call ether. The change of denomination is made on account of greater etymological propriety in the use of the word progene (first engendered), because the progenic potence which moves ponderable particles to form organic matter is the first change engendered in nature, and because with this new name we avoid on the one hand the false concepts attributed by physicists to imponderable ether, and on the other, the equivocal ideas of the old name which not only represents ponderable bodies of definite composition in Chemistry, but also is commonly applied to immaterial things.

Some authors have denied the existence of imponderable matter, presuming that they could found a physiological theory of all the changes of nature by

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admitting ponderable matter alone. For this purpose they were obliged either to endow matter with inconceivable properties, or to give a real and exclusive existence to the abstract idea of force. Those who admit in cosmos only ponderable or atomic matter, fall into a scientific idolatry in which the forces are considered as causal instead of being merely mechanical resultant, but we have already dethroned all the false gods of the scientific Olympia which were born of the absurd ontological idea of admission of properties as absolute conditions of matter and of forces as real existences combined with some passive substratum. In confirmation of what has been said in opposition to such ontological ideas we will demonstrate in Part II. that it is an error to consider the abstract idea of gravitation as the fundamental cause of phenomena ; we will see that this force is the resultant of the interaction of progene with corpuscular matter and not a causal force.

We must now remove the irreflexive doubts which exist respecting the admission of progene because this has not the sanction of the sense of touch which gives more apparent certainty for the admission of objects. It is in truth a false assertion of irreflexive minds that the complete contents of the notion of matter are obtained directly by means of the perceptions of the senses, or what is the same, that we do not know anything as to matter apart from extrinsic ideas, or ideas directly presented by sensation; it is thus imagined by many writers that all science of matter is directly acquired by immediate experience, adding to this that the same writers consider such knowledge as the sole one, indisputable in its evidence, and deny certainty

in the true proof of the ideas which are not immediately presented to the senses. But although the phenomenal changes, that is, those manifested to the senses, are what reveal to us material activity, they do not compose the whole of such activity, because this is found also in a potential, virtual, or latent state, as is proved by the actions of expenditure or forces of position which oblige us to recognize the existence of a potential or non-manifested energy. Again, we have already said (in the psychological data) that sensation is only the immediate idea formed by the mind in its capacity of feeling, by propagating through the nerves the interaction between matter and the senses, and that the theory of knowledge also authorizes us to admit and recognize some things in nature though they are beyond the direct reach of our senses. Thus, for instance, there are tenuous gases which escape our direct observation; they can be neither touched nor seen, yet they are recognized by their effects in chemical interaction with other bodies; and the changes which then take place, and not the bodies themselves, are those which are evident to the senses. Thus, also, there are infra-red and ultra-violet rays of light, better said of progene, which cannot be perceived by the eye; there are vibrations from sonorous instruments which, being either defective or excessive, cannot be perceived by the ear; etc., etc.

Though sensation is the immediate effect of the capacity of our mind to refer our knowledge of matter to the senses, and though it provokes mental reaction it may be a deceitful illusion produced by want of reflexion. Sensations are the data for reflection, and the witnesses for our reason in order to assent to

scientific judgments and to derive from these the conclusions which form the physiological theory, that is, all the abstract knowledge of nature together.

We have repeatedly said that physiological knowledge comprehends not only phenomena, but also the potential changes which reason can discover after their transference into manifested changes; and that physiological problems cannot be resolved by the exclusive use of the senses but by reason. The theory of nature is of a rational solution, therefore it is speculative and not a fact of irreflexive observation; the difference between physical and metaphysical theories is that in the latter the fundamental data are those of intrinsic intuition or proper consciousness (abstraction being made of experimental incitants), which is contrary to that occurring in the physiological or physical, whose base is only a mental reference to the incitants experienced, abstraction being made of the states of consciousness which provoked them. We will conclude with this statement, that material as well as immaterial knowledge is always reflexive or rational, and not in any manner irreflexive or sensual.

Those who are opposed to the idea of the existence of imponderable matter make use of the argument that it is not an object of sensation. This is not true, but even if it were it would not be a sufficient argument to deny its existence, according to the summary idea which we have given relative to the acquisition of material knowledge. But is there any one so obstinate that, from a spirit of contradiction to all that is rational, he dares to deny that he sees light? Do not all feel also the rays of light when they estimate their heat? An ellipsis of language has conduced to an error of re