- troduced when the scales of measurement were changed.
We may, however, and do desire to find formulas expressing the relations of physical phenomena which shall contain no more arbitrary numbers than changes in the scales of measurement might require.
When a formula of this kind is discovered, it is no longer called an empirical formula, but a law of Nature; and is sooner or later made the basis of an hypothesis which is to explain it. These simple formulæ are not usually, if ever, exactly true, but they are none the less important for that; and the great triumph of the hypothesis comes when it explains not only the formula, but also the deviations from the formula. In the current language of the physicists, an hypothesis of this importance is called a theory, while the term hypothesis is restricted to suggestions which have little evidence in their favor. There is some justice in the contempt which clings to the word hypothesis. To think that we can strike out of our own minds a true preconception of how Nature acts, in a vain fancy. As Lord Bacon well says: "The subtlety of Nature far exceeds the subtlety of sense and intellect: so that these fine meditations, and speculations, and reasonings of men are a sort of insanity, only there is no one at hand to remark it." The successful theories are not pure guesses, but are guided by reasons.
The kinetical theory of gases is a good example of this. This theory is intended to explain certain simple formulæ, the chief of which is called the law of Boyle. It is, that if air or any other gas be placed in a cylinder with a piston, and if its volume be measured under the pressure of the
