Matter and spirit among the Europeans

Death is the entry into the greatest light. (Hugo)

Matter and Spirit among the Europeans

The philosophy of Aristotle held the highest station among the Europeans (al-Ifranj), and the philosopher Ibn Rushd al-Andalusī was its great champion, expounding that philosophy and disseminating it among the Europeans; and it had a mighty dominion over their souls until Galileo discovered, in the year 1609 (1), the rotation of the earth and laid down the new system in astronomy. At that a revolution occurred in ideas, and it disposed them to receive modern principles in philosophy. In the course of this intellectual movement the philosopher Bacon (2) appeared and raised up a modern scientific edifice whose foundation is observation and experiment; by this the pillars of Aristotle's philosophy were shaken and its shadow began to contract little by little, and whatever of his philosophy was not coupled with a shining demonstration passed away, while what was sound remained, in accordance with the law of progress and growth. Modern philosophy, like the ancient, reckons matter to be compounded of indivisible particles (al-jawāhir al-fardah) at the utmost limit of smallness, called “atoms.” The elements in modern philosophy exceed seventy in number, after having been four among the ancients. The cosmos, as natural scientists generally hold, is compounded of matter that admits of being weighed and of a force that moves that matter, which does not admit of being weighed; and this force, in its several shapes — electricity, light, heat — consists of motions in the indivisible particles, transmitted by means of a subtle imponderable fluid in which the particles swim, called ether (athīr). Each one of these three things is independent in its properties of the other two, since there is no apparent relation between what admits of being weighed and what does not. The determinate quantity of matter in the world, on their view, undergoes no change by increase or decrease, and on this foundation Lavoisier built his well-known rule, that nothing is created and nothing is annihilated. He explained it thus: if you burn a piece of paper it turns into a black substance differing in its properties from the substance of the paper, because the sheet has dissolved into its original constituents — carbon (Carbone), hydrogen (Hydrogène), oxygen (Oxygène) and the rest — so that its composition is altered. Its carbon, for instance, has in part united with the oxygen of the air and so turned into carbonic acid (Acide Carbonique), which belongs to the order of gas; its hydrogen too has united and turned into water in the form of vapour; and a portion of the carbon remained without uniting with the oxygen, and that is the black substance. Thus in the example the shape of the sheet was altered by its dissolution, yet the original indivisible particles of which the sheet was compounded are still present in their entirety, even though their shape has changed. And after they had come to know the transmutation of compounds one into another, they discovered this same truth in force as well, and made plain that forces are transmuted one into another: motion is transmuted into heat, and this into light, and thence it turns into electricity. The natural scientists observed that certain substances share their properties between matter and ether, and that they make the air a conductor of electricity, penetrate solid bodies, and admit the influence of the magnet — matters strange to the rules of the natural sciences. Thereupon they set about searching out this obscure secret, and their thinking arrived at certain theories which met with criticism and rebuttal. Then Dr. Gustave Le Bon (1), the celebrated French researcher, arose and made plain that the old rule — that matter does not perish, and that it is inert, so that nothing issues from it but the force it has acquired beforehand — is not on the side of correctness, and that observation resting upon experiment indicates that matter is a prodigious source of the force called “the force latent in the atoms” (al-qūwah al-kāminah fī al-dharrāt), and that this force is capable of diffusing of itself; and that most of the forces of the cosmos, and electricity and the heat of the sun above all, come from that force latent in the atoms, which is diffused in the dissolution of matter. Force and matter are two forms of one thing: matter is one of the forms of the force latent in the atoms, and it is the more stable; while heat, light, electricity and what is of that kind are a second form of that force, but less stable. So the separation of the atoms one from another — or, in other words, the depriving of matter of its materiality — is nothing but the conversion of its stable form into its unstable forms, which are called electricity, or light, or heat, or the like. And since light and electricity and most of the known forces are generated from the conversion of matter, it holds good that whenever a body radiates it loses a part of its mass by that radiation alone, so that if it were able to radiate the whole of its force it would pass away entirely into the ether.

Radium (1), the swiftest of substances in dissolution, sends forth its atoms at a speed approaching the speed of light (200,000) kilometres in every second. Half a gramme of it, after (1500) years, is converted completely; and after (10,000) years there remains of it only one part in a hundred. So if this great diffusion continues, even after millions of years, it turns into an unknown force. Force, then, although its secret has not appeared, is not separate from matter but latent within it, and there is no duality between the two, as some of the learned supposed in former times. (This comes close to the views of the theologians (mutakallimūn).)

The Views of the Europeans on Life

The most important views of the Europeans on life are three great views. The first is that life is a force from among the forces beyond nature, and a gift of the everlasting First Cause (al-ʻillah al-ūlā). Upon this view are a body of their greatest men of learning, who avow the existence of the First Cause, among them the philosopher Pasteur (2). This philosopher says: “The knowledge of God and reverence for Him reach my intellect just as we reach the physical truths.”

Pasteur was asked how his scientific discoveries were to be reconciled with the teachings of religion, and he answered, saying: My studies, instead of shaking my belief, have made me in my faith like the Breton peasant (a French proverb by which the point is made).

Among them is Newton (1), the celebrated natural scientist, who refuted the views of the materialists in four great letters and sent them to Dr. Bentley). He says: “This orderliness in the sun, the moon, the planets and the comets cannot have any maker but a being powerful over all things. And they deny the generation of the living from the non-living; for the living, on their view, is generated only from the living.

Among them is Pascal, who says in his book Thoughts (Pensées): This whole visible world is but a faint trace, scarcely to be seen, in the ample bosom of nature.

And it is an infinite sphere whose centre is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere; our conceiving goes astray at that idea, and that is the greatest sign indicating God's power over all things (2).

Among them is Malebranche (1) the Frenchman, for he divided beings into four kinds, the highest kind being God, who encompasses all things.

Among them is Harvey, the discoverer of the circulation of the blood in the body, who said: I have never dissected an animal without seeing in it something new, and new proofs of divine providence.

Among them is Professor Joly, who inferred, from the marvels of his observations in the world of insects, the existence of a high, divine force.

Among them is Huxley, who acknowledges in his book Darwiniana that it is impossible to overturn divinity on the doctrine of evolution.

And he says in another article of his that whoever denies the existence of God as Spinoza conceived Him is a fool; and he acknowledges in the end the acting force (al-qūwah al-fāʻilah).

The second of them is what (Hermann Eberhard Richter) (2) holds.

That the void which we see is filled with germs, the living forms, as with the indivisible particles of which inert matter is composed; both are in continual renewal and non-existence does not take hold of them. Life, on this view, arises from the cell (khalīyah).

— Notes —

[17] (1) — Galileo « Galilsé », among the greatest of the Italian astronomers. He was born in the city of Pisa « Pise » and died blind (1564–1642). In Venice « Venise », in the year 1609, he invented the first magnifier by means of which it became possible to know the states of the moon. It is he who discovered the manner of the earth's revolution about the sun, as others of the stars (and the worlds) revolve about it, taking their enjoyment of its light. In the year 1632 he composed a bulky volume in which he deposited all the secrets he had discovered; and it is an excellent volume, for the composing of which every philosopher and man of learning has thanked him.

[17] (2) François Bacon « Français Bacon » is a great English philosopher who lived in the time of King James I « Jacques 1er ». He was born in London « Londres », and he rescued philosophy from collapse by writing a volume which he named « Novum Arganum ». He was born and died in the years — 1561 — 1626 —.

[19] (1) He is the celebrated philosopher and researcher, author of Jawāmiʻ al-kalim and Sirr taṭawwur al-umam.

[20] (1) Radium (Radium) is a metallic kind discovered by Bīmūn Curie and his wife, Madame Curie (Bémant et Mme. Curie); they found it in Bīshrāns (Béchurance). Radium, which was discovered in the year 1894, has many uses for increasing the illumination of electricity, and for photographic instruments, etc.

[20] (2) Louis Pasteur (Louis Pasteur), a French astronomer, born in the town of Dole (Dole). He is known for his numerous services to humanity and for his great inventions for the treating of the sick. He was born and died — 1822 — 1912 —

[21] (1) Newton (Newton) is a philosopher of English origin, born in Woolsthorpe (Woolsthorpe) — 1642 — (1727)

[21] (2) Blaise Pascal (Blaise Pascal) is a great French philosopher and astronomer, born in Clermont (Clerment). He was skilled in the science of calculation and so arrived at the invention of a writing machine set apart for calculation. Then one day an accident befell him at the bridge of Neuilly (Pont de Neuilly) which called him to leave philosophy and inventions aside and to withdraw into devotion; and for that reason the benefit which was being gathered from Lambīz Pascal became, with every regret, but little! ..

[22] And he became a pious monk who would not let himself forget devotion even for the twinkling of an eye. He died before completing a religious book which he had begun to set down, under the title (Meditations) (Pensées). He was born and died in the years — 1623 — 1662 —. And Pascal has a maxim upon man which he states thus: “Man is but a reed, one of the ordinary reeds, save that he is a thinking reed.”

[22] (1) Malebranche was born in the year 1638 A.D. and died in the year 1715

[22] (2) Hermann Eberhard Richter (Hermann Rickter), surnamed (Jean Paul)