Page:Various Forces of Matter.djvu/37

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
CENTRE OF GRAVITY.
25

Again, if you are really so inclined (and I do hope all of you are), you will find a great deal of philosophy in this [holding up a cork and a pointed thin stick about a foot long]. Do not

Fig. 10

refer to your toy-books, and say you have seen that before. Answer me rather, if I ask you, have you understood it before? It is an experiment which appeared very wonderful to me when I was a boy; I used to take a piece of cork (and I remember, I thought at first that it was very important that it should be cut out in the shape of a man, but by degrees I got rid of that idea), and the problem was to balance it