APPENDIX D - ON THE CLUSTERING OF GRAVITATIONAL MATTER IN ANY PART OF THE UNIVERSE

Summary

Gravitational matter, according to our ideas of universal gravitation, would be all matter. Now is there any matter which is not subject to the law of gravitation? I think I may say with absolute decision that there is. We are all convinced, with our President, that ether is matter, but we are forced to say that we must not expect to find in ether the ordinary properties of molar matter which are generally known to us by action resulting from force between atoms and matter, ether and ether, and atoms of matter and ether. Here I am illogical when I say between matter and ether, as if ether were not matter. It is to avoid an illogical phraseology that I use the title “gravitational matter.” Many years ago I gave strong reason to feel certain that ether was outside the law of gravitation. We need not absolutely exclude, as an idea, the possibility of there being a portion of space occupied by ether beyond which there is absolute vacuum—no ether and no matter. We admit that that is something that one could think of; but I do not believe any living scientific man considers it in the slightest degree probable that there is a boundary around our universe beyond which there is no ether and no matter. Well, if ether extends through all space, then it is certain that ether cannot be subject to the law of mutual gravitation between its parts, because if it were subject to mutual attraction between its parts its equilibrium would be unstable, unless it were infinitely incompressible.