A CONNECTING MEDIUM
and other or foreign lumps of matter; and we
use the first portion as a measure of the extent
of the second, The human body is our standard
of size. We proceed also to subdivide our idea
of matter—according to the varieties of resist-
ance with which it appeals to our muscular
sense—into four different states, or “elements,”
as the ancients called them—iz., the solid, the
liquid, the gaseous, and the ethereal. The
registance experienced when we encounter one
or other of these forms of material existence
varies from something very impressive—the
solid ; through something nearly impalpable—
the gaseous ; up to something entirely imagina-
tive, fanciful, or inferential—viz., the ether.
The ether does not in any way affect our sense
of touch (i.¢., of force); it does not resist motion
in the slightest degree. Not only can our bodies
move through it, but much larger bodies, planets
and comets, can rush through it at what we are
Pleased to call a prodigious speed (being far
gteater than that of an athlete) without showing
the least. sign of friction. I myself, indeed, have
designed and carried out a series of delicate
experiments to see whether a whirling mass of
iron could to the smallest extent grip the ether
and carry it round, with so much as a thousandth
part of its own velocity. These shall be de-
scribed further on, but meanwhile the result
arrived at is distinct. The answer is, no; I
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