National opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1865-1874, 1873-02-21

Once OF twice year O paragraph
goes the round Of the daily papers
announcing that somebody has dis
covered perpetual motion and now
and then we hear that application has
been made to the Treasury Department
for the enormous reward which, it is
supposed, the Government has stand
ing for such q discovery. The idea
that such q reward is offered appears
to prevail in European countries as
we'll as in the United States, and it has
induced many a poor fellow to waste
his time and to belabor his wits in an
effort to realize his conception OF q
machine which shall move by its own
impulse for ever. No such prize has
ever been promised. The supposition
| is rs much a delusion as the belief that
the perpetual motion can ever be OBJ
tained by machine built with human
hands. An engine of such kind never
did exist, and none ever will exist. The
common conviction that perpetual mo-
tion was known to the ancients, and
that the secret was lost, has supplied
another incentive to dreamers who have
thought snch motion possible, but this
is founded upon fancy only; and it is
now proved beyond question that any
further attempts to attain this object
must, in the very necessity OF things,
result in complete failure.
So well convinced have even the most
liberal scientific men become of this
fact that they will hardly undertake to
give attention and consideration to any
novel theory that may be proposed or
to any new machine that may be con-
structed. The French Academy, in
deed, a century ago announced officially
that it would not even examine any
mechanical contrivance which professed
to embody perpetual motion, because
it knew positively that work cannot be
obtained from such machine without
corresponding and equivalent expendi-
ture.
If nm engine of such kind could be
constructed, it would move OF itself as
soon as the last rivet was placed it it,
and it would continue to move for ever.
1t would have to overcome friction,
the attraction of other bodies and the
resistance of the atmosphere, besides
the mere weight of its own parts, and
it would require to be made in such
manner that it would never wear out.
1t is admitted that if a body should be
plac, in motion in a perfect vacuum it
woul, move for ever, but under no
other conditions is such thing posi-
BILE.
1t is probable that the inventions of
the bell in the practicability of
perpetual motion number tens of thou
sands. Many of them have been
patented here and in Europe, but none
have obtained even ordinary cele-
brity. The fate of most Of them
has been to be forgotten. A few, how
ever, are remembered because they
moved for long while by outside in
fuence in such an ingenious manner
that a good many wise men were de-
ceived by the fraud and some others
have been preserved in print because
they were curious, interesting and par
ticularly absurd. One of the most pre-
posterous was invented q great many
years ago by q man named Norwood.
His theory was that as the weight of
the water in the larger vessel immense
ly exceeds that in the neck, it will pre-
ponderate and drive the liquid through
the spout into the vessel again. If the
larger body really would do this, GER
tainl, ,e should have eperpetual motion.
B.. tAe inventor was deplorably ignor-
ant of one of the fundamental laws of
ydrostatics--that water seeks only its |
own level. A child in this age would
know that the water in the neck will re-
main precisely at the height Of the liquid
in the greater vessel.