The Relation of Science and Religion.pdf - Online Christian Library

94 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.some respect in contrast with each other.In taking a survey of the physical aspects ofthe world, we can not limit attention to themere mass, or to questions bearing on itsstructure. Observation must now be turnedon the perpetual change going on in form,arrangement, and distribution of materials.There is need for a science of all this, in accordancewith which the perpetual round ofchange may be reduced to order by referenceto causality and the laws of its operation.Thus we are introduced to our ordinary conceptionsconcerning positiwn, that is, the situationor place of objects, or of masses ofmaterial, or even of worlds, to each other;motion, or change of position, modifying oraltering the relations of objects; and force,that is the relative amount or proportion o.fenergy at work for the accomplishment of suchchanges as those already mentioned. In theseconnections we are introduced to recentlyformulated doctrines of energy, reached insearching for " the cause which alters or te~dsto alter a body's natural state of rest,'' as thisproblem was indicated in Newton's first law ofmotion. In the earlier stages of inquiry, attentionwas directed mainly on the active forces