Keely and His Discoveries: Aerial Navigation

by Mrs. Bloomfield H. Moore

But, as Frederick Major has said, “Science at present is too full of its own erroneous theories to accept or even notice theories outside of science, until practically proved, and probably not even then unless they can foist them upon the public as partially their own.” These words are not applicable to all men of science. There are some, among those most eminent, who, in the spirit of true science, are quite prepared for other roads to knowledge than those of our three hundred years old induction school. The late Professor W. K. Clifford, F.R.S., was one of those men who, in their earnest desire for “truth at any cost,” was ready to advance in every direction open to him. No “fear of a false step” held him back. He did not belong to the category of philosophical sceptics whom Dr. Stoney has so well classified as damping all advance, unless it can be carried on, from the beginning, under such conditions of perfection as are impossible in the early stages of every discovery and of almost every inquiry. Professor Stoney has well described Keely’s method of work in these remarks: “In the scientific method of investigating the validity of our beliefs, we take our existing beliefs as our starting point, or a careful selection of those which are fitted to enable us to advance. After the legitimate consequences of these have been worked out, the inquirer finds himself in a better position to return and test the validity of the bases on which he proceeded. After these revisions, and such corrections as he finds possible, he makes a step of a like kind farther forward: after which another revision and another advance. Thus real progress is accomplished. Probabilities acquire strength and accumulate; and in the end a state of mind is attained replete with knowledge of the realities within and around us. The sea of knowledge on which man makes his brief voyage is for the most part unfathomable. He cannot hope, except near shore, to measure the whole depth, and thus attain philosophical certainty. But the scientific student may diligently use such a sounding line as he possesses—that of probability—and with it explore wide expanses under which there are no rocks nor shoals within the utmost depth that he can plumb, and over which he may securely sail. Compare this with the situation of the philosophical sceptic, groping among rocks along the shore, and not venturing beyond the shallow margin which he can probe with his little pole.”

Professor Clifford struck out boldly in this unfathomable ocean of knowledge, when he admitted the infinite divisibility of the atom, which is one of the bases of Keely’s theories. And how exquisitely did his penetrating vision pierce the mists of materialism when he wrote:—“Every time that analysis strips from nature the gilding that we prized, she is forging thereat a new picture more glorious than before, to be suddenly revealed by the advent of a new sense whereby we see it—a new creation, at sight of which the sons of God shall have cause to shout for joy. What now shall I say of this new-grown perception of Law, which finds the infinite in a speck of dust, and the act of eternity in every second of time? Shall I say that it kills our sense of the beautiful, and takes all the romance out of nature? And, moreover, that it is nothing more than a combining and reorganizing of our old experiences; that it never can give us anything really new; that we must progress in the same monotonous way for ever. But wait a moment. What if this combining and organizing is to become first habitual, then organic and unconscious, so that the sense of law becomes a direct perception? Shall we not then be really seeing something new? Shall there not be a new revelation of a great and more perfect cosmos, a universe fresh-born, a new heaven and a new earth? Mors janua vitæ, by death to this world we enter upon a new life in the next. Doubtless there shall by-and-by be laws as far transcending those we now know as they do the simplest observation. The new incarnation may need a second passion; but, evermore, beyond it is the Easter glory.”

In these words there is the true ring of divinely inspired prophecy to those who know of the pure philosophy which Keely’s system unfolds; teaching the “wondrous ways of Him who is perfect in knowledge.” Professor Clifford was one of those whom Ernest Renan has classified as scouts in the great army, who divine beforehand that which becomes ere long patent to all. In their rapid and venturesome advance they catch sight before the others of the smiling plains and lofty peaks. The student of nature has been compared to a hound, wildly running after, and here and there chancing on game, universal exploration, a beating up of the game on all sides, that and that only is the sole possible method. And this is the spirit of those who pursue their researches in a scientific frame of mind: while those who enter the field in a sceptical mood, are indisposed to step out of the beaten track where they feel sure of their footing.

They have no ambitions to meet the fate of the trilobites in Professor Clifford’s amusing apologue. “Once upon a time—much longer than six thousand years ago—the Trilobites were the only people that had eyes; and they were only just beginning to have them. Some of the Trilobites, even, had as yet no signs of coming sight. So that the utmost they could know was that they were living in darkness, and that perhaps there was such a thing as light. But at last one of them got so far advanced that when he happened to come to the top of the water in the daytime he saw the sun. So he went down and told the others that in general the world was light, but there was one great light which caused it all. Then they killed him for disturbing the commonwealth; but they considered it impious to doubt that in general the world was light, and that there was one great light which caused it all. And they had great disputes about the manner in which they had come to know this. Afterwards, another of them got so far advanced that when he happened to come to the top of the water, in the night-time, he saw the stars. So he went down and told the others that in general the world was dark, but that, nevertheless, there were a great number of little lights in it. Then they killed him for maintaining false doctrines; but from that time there was a division amongst them, and all the Trilobites were split in two parties, some maintaining one thing and some the other, until such time as so many of them had learned to see that there could be no doubt about the matter that both of the savant Trilobites were right.”

Bacon has compared the mind of man to a prisoner in a cave with his back to the light, who sees only shadows of the events passing outside.

Dr. Stoney, in his paper on “Natural Science and Ontology,” frames a working hypothesis, which leads up to Keely’s theory, that “the laws of the universe are the laws of thought.” “This is a very different thing,” says Dr. Stoney, “from saying that they are the laws of human thought. The laws of human thought bear to them the same small proportion which the laws of the action of the wheels of a watch upon one another bear to the entire science of dynamics …. Natural science is thus, as it were, the study of an ever-changing shadow cast in a special and very indirect way by the mighty march of actual events.”

“The history of philosophy,” writes Ernest Renan, “should be the history of the thoughts of mankind. Hence we must look upon philology, or the study of ancient literatures, as a science having a distinct object, viz., the knowledge of the human intellect.”

The philologist and the chemist, because of the results of the researches of the one, and of the nature of the researches of the other, are the students who are best able to comprehend the discoveries of Keely. “It is the characteristic and the pride of modern science to attain its most lofty results only through the most scrupulous methods of experiment, and to arrive at the knowledge of the highest laws of nature, its hands resting on its apparatus. If the highest truths can, as it were, emanate from the alembic and the crucible, why should they not equally be the result of the study of the remains of the past, covered with the dust of ages? Shall the philologist who toils on words and syllables be less honoured than the student of chemistry labouring in his laboratory? It is impossible to guess beforehand what may result from philological researches, any more than one can know, in digging a mine, the wealth it may contain. We may be on our way to the discovery of a new world. Science always presents itself to man as an unknown country. The most important discoveries have been brought about in a roundabout way. Very few problems have been deliberately grappled with at the outset, ‘taken at the core.’ There is nothing more difficult to foretell than the importance with which posterity will invest this or that order of facts; the researches that will be abandoned, the researches that will be continued. In looking for one thing one may stumble upon another; in the pursuit of a mere vision, one may hit upon a magnificent reality.”

When a result has been attained, it is difficult to realize the trouble its attainment has cost, says Ernest Renan in “The Future of Science.”

Of this nature have been the researches of the present distinguished Professor of Chemistry in the Royal Institution; leading him into a discovery, the great importance of which the future alone can unfold.