Out of nothing, nothing comes. This is really a wonderful axiom.
Men will grant it at once as an abstract proposition. But when they apply
it to real things, some seem to get confused, and entertain expectations
which if realized would set this axiom at naught. The same general truth
is expressed by the statement, Every effect must have a cause.
will be granted by pretty much everybody, until application to real things
is made.

Perhaps no one has trouble with the case where there is absolutely nothing at all.
From a space where there is no matter, whether solid, liquid or gaseous, no will
expect anything. But juggle matters a little. Put in A, put in B. Suppose it to be
known just what A will accomplish, and what B. And suppose, further, that we
have found, subsequent to our combination of A and B, that we can trace these
accomplishments of A and B. Call them a and b. Now, right here is where some
go astray. They seem willing to believe that in addition a new thing, c, might
somehow turn up. Well, if it should, then we will have a case of something
coming from nothing. We might, just as well, expect that sometimes 2 and 2
would produce 5. The additional unit here would be no more wonderful than c.

This is the trouble with the seekers after perpetual motion. They really
expect something from nothing; they expect an effect without a cause to
produce it. The take a machine ( A ) and a certain amount of energy ( B )
and expect that somehow the combination will give rise not merely to the
machine itself ( a ) and a total of energy ( b ) equivalent in amount to what
they put in ( B ). They expect not merely a and b; they will look for additional
energy c. If they get it, they will get something out of nothing; they will get an
effect without a cause behind it. It is just as ridiculous as expecting to get 17
separate ounces of metal by cutting up a pound of steel. Just as soon as one
grasps the idea that energy is a real thing, he is prepared to understand that
it cannot be increased by manipulating it. He is then ready to see that, if he
puts 2 foot-pounds into a machine, he cannot expect to get 2.5 foot-pounds
out. Indeed, he may apparently get less than 2, because some of the energy
will be transformed into heat and will be radiated off and thus may escape
observation.

However, men have been working at the impossible problem of getting
something out of nothing for hundreds of years. And, some are probably
still at it. No doubt, there are to-day, men in the United States who think
that a machine can somehow be made, which will run without energy being
constantly put into it. It is just as if they expected to cut the 8-inch square
into two separate parts, and get a 5 x 13 inch rectangle by putting these
parts together in a different way.

That the possibility of a perpetual motion machine has not been entirely
given up will be understood when it is learned that 575 applications for
patents for such apparatus were made to the British Patent Office in
the period 1855 to 1903. This is about ten patents a year.

In figure 1 we have an example cited by Mr. F. F. Charlesworth of the British
Patent Office. An endless band or chain is arranged to mesh with two sprocket
wheels. The band carries a series of cups, or rather dippers so attached that
the handles are continually perpendicular to the band. Heavy balls are fed one
by one to the open dippers on the descending side. When the dipper nears the
bottom, a projecting horn intercepts the ball and guides it away. It will be seen
that this machine will run as long as the balls are fed in at the top. In the form
shown, an elevating screw is used to bring the balls to the top and permit their
use over again. This endless screw is driven by mechanism connected with the
shaft of the upper sprocket wheel. The thing lost sight of here is the fact that it
will require as much energy to lift the ball to its initial position as it will develop
by falling. It was proposed, apparently for this same machine, to provide for the
return lift of the balls by conducting them along an incline to a hollow tower filled
with quicksilver or some other liquid. Once a ball had entered the base of the
tower, it would rise to the surface of the quicksilver because of the difference
in specific gravity. It could then be recovered by a lifting device, dropped into
an incline and fed into the machine again at the top. A very find scheme - the
only difficulty lay in getting the balls into the bottom of the quicksilver column.

Consider now Figure 2. We have here a similar arrangement to that shown in
Figure 1. However, the endless band is here of rubber and hollow. Instead of
dippers, there are hollow rubber projections or arms. On the following side of
each of the arms, conceiving the whole to turn with the hands of a watch are
air-sacks. To these weights are attached. When an arm is rising and the weight
is consequently underneath, there will be a distension of the sack. This entire
apparatus is immersed in water. It is expected that it will now begin to move
clockwise. The rising side is lighter than the descending one because the
distention of the air-sacks has decreased the specific gravity on the one side.
All air compartments communicate with the main tube. There is no change in
the tension of the air. As a weight at the top passes into the position where its
sack collapses, another sack will be distended at the bottom, and so the air
required will have the same volume. At any rate, this is the general scheme.
But why won’t it work? The reason lies in the progressively increasing pressure
of water as one passes downward beneath the surface. It is this that should raise
the distended side. But it is also this that resists the movement of air from the
top to distend an air-sack at the bottom. The distension of the air-sack at the
bottom is broadly the same problem as introducing a metal ball into the bottom
of the column of quicksilver.

Refer now to Figure 3. This represents what appears to have been
a French "solution". An air-tight bellows DFE is arranged on an axis
perpendicular to the paper. The total length of the bellows is about 40
inches. There is an aperture at E’, by means of which and a suitable tube
there is a communication between the interior of the bellows and a vessel
of mercury G. This vessel is fixed in position at about the level of the shaft
on which the bellows turns. B is a counterpoise, while C is a clasp which serves
to retain the bellows in position with a moderate amount of strength. Suppose
now the bellows to be forced open, say, to a third of its capacity. Quicksilver
will flow from G and after a time, so it is claimed, the weight within the bellows
will exert a turning effort sufficient to cause it to break away from the clasp.
The lower end of the tube E will continue in the mercury bath. The entire
movement will be arrested at the position shown in Figure 4, and another
clasp H will engage the bellows. The mercury rose before, because of the
height of the tube E being less than that of the usual barometric column.
The mercury now will run out from the bellows and the latter will collapse.
The counterpoise B then operates to bring the bellows back to its original
position. Arrived here, whatever mercury remains within, falls to about 27
inches height, where-upon mercury from the reservoir will rise to flow into
the bellows, because the length of the tube E is considerably less than 27
inches. This is essentially Dr. Papin’s account of this scheme. What is
wrong with the device?

Consider now Figure 5. Here we have a drum filled with water or other liquid
and arranged on trunnions. Upon one of the trunnions, a flywheel is mounted
and a suitable belt carries the power from the generator of perpetual motion.
By means of stuffing boxes two rods pass through the drum. These rods are
mutually perpendicular. Weights are arranged on the ends of these. It will be
understood that if we could always have the same amount of weight on the two
sides of a drum or wheel, but the weight on one side so managed as to be further
from the axis of rotation, the wheel or drum would turn. The excess of leverage
on one side would cause that side continually to descend. To manage this shifting
of the weights, the inventor provided the rods with cork spheres centrally arranged.
Evidently when the one-rod is vertical, its cork float will, if suitably dimensioned
with respect to the two weights, cause the upper weight to rise and so project from
the drum at a maximum distance. There will be no tendency for this position to be
lost until after this vertical rod has taken up a horizontal position. The condition
shown in the figure is where one rod is vertical and the other is horizontal. The
vertical rod and its weights will, apart from pervious movement, exert no turning
effort. But the horizontal one will, since on of its weights is father from the axis
than the other. Motion will be set up in the direction of the arrow. Of course the
rods must be so arranged as to prevent interference between their cork float.

A simple device is shown in Figure 6. An endless chain passes around two
wheels BB. A trio of idle wheels CCD deflects the chain from the vertical
on one side. The result here is that a greater length and consequently a
greater weight of chain are continually on the right-hand side. Presumably,
we have a clockwise movement here. The difficulty is that the deflected portion,
although heavier, does not exert the full effect of its weight. The gravitation
of the chain operates downwardly in an exactly vertical direction. But since
this gravitative action is compelled to act, say, on the topmost wheel, at an
angle, there is some loss. To make this perfectly clear, suppose a chain to
hang precisely vertical. At the point of tangency the gravitative pull will be
in the direction of the tangent and therefore most effective. Deflect the chain
in or out, and the gravitative pull will be at an angle to the tangent and so at
some loss. In point of fact the axles of the wheels BCB sustain a certain faction
of the weight of the chain.

Consider Figure 7. Three rotatable shafts are arranged horizontally so
that a vertical section would show the shaft sections at the vertices of
a right-angled triangle, as disclosed in the figure. Suppose now that an
endless chain be arranged to envelop these rollers. It might be thought
that, since the hypotenuse is longer than the vertical side, a uniform
chain would set up a clockwise movement. The explanation just given,
however, prepares us to understand that this will not be the case. In fact
the disadvantage under which the gravitative pull of the hypotenuse is
delivered is just compensated by its excess of weight. Such an arrangement
will be a well-balanced, immovable one. But suppose that the metal chain
be replaced by a band to which sponges are attached, the whole being
enveloped by a string of evenly distributed weights. Suppose, in addition,
that the horizontal portion of the apparatus be immersed in water. We now
have a device conceived by Sir William Congreve, probably about 1827.
Sir William was a member of the British Parliament and the inventor
of the celebrated Congreve rockets. This machine was expected to turn
counterclockwise. The modus operandi was conceived to be as follows:
On the vertical side a sponge as it entered the water would be uncompressed
by the string of weights and therefore free to adsorb water by capillary
attraction. As a sponge emerged from the water at the lower end of the
hypotenuse, the line of weights would operate to compress it thus and
thus keep it comparatively dry. Because of the differences in weight
on the dry and wet sides, the whole system would move.

Perhaps the most celebrated efforts in the directions of perpetual
motion have been made in connection with the continued distribution
and redistribution of weights within or about a wheel movably mounted
upon an axle or trunnions. The purpose is to have the same number of
weights upon the down-going and up-going sides, but to have the average
distance from the axis of rotation greater upon the down-going side. It is
conceived that, on the principle of a difference in leverage exerted by the
two groups of weights, we should get a never-ceasing motion, if this relation
could be perpetually maintained. One of the most distinguished of those who
gave attention to this matter was the second Marquis of Worcester who
flourished about the middle of the seventeenth century. This gentleman
wrote in his "Century of Inventions" of a device whose purpose was "to
provide and make that all Y^e weights of Y^e deƒcending syde of a wheele
shal be perpetually further from Y^e center, then thoƒe of Y^e mounting syde,
and yett equall in number and heft on Y^e one side as Y^e other. A moƒt
incredible thing if not scene, butt tried before Y^e late King of happy
and glorious memorye in Y^e Tower by my directions, two Extraordinary
Embaƒƒadors accompanying his Ma^tie and Y^e D. of Richmond, D Hamilton,
and moƒt part of Y^e Court attending him."

He goes on to relate that the wheel, or drum, was 14 feet in diameter and
was provided with 40 weights of 50 pounds each. When this wheel was put
in motion, it was claimed, so it seems, that as the weights successively passed
the vertical diameter above they hung a foot further from the center, and that
as they passed this diameter on the lower side they would hang a foot nearer.
It would seem that the precise method by which this result was accomplished
is not certainly known. However, it is thought to be substantially as indicated
in Figure 8. It will be seen that the distribution to right and left is about equal,
so that so far as mere weight is concerned, we have a balance. But there is a
preponderance of leverage on one side. The view represents the position at a
certain definite instant. And we may grant that this instant displays conditions
in a fairly typical manner. It would seem then that the Marquis was perhaps
justified when he said, "Bee pleafed to judge y^e confequence."

Half a century or thereabouts later, a celebrated apparatus was
constructed more than once by Jean Ernest Elie-Bessler Orphyrreus upon
what are conceived to have been substantially the foregoing principles.
It is related that Orphyrreus, as he is generally called, made one machine
about 1715, but broke it up because of the tax imposed upon it by the
government of Hessel Cassel. A second apparatus was made and exhibited
to the Landgrave. It is said that this machine, which outwardly appeared
to be a drum 12 feet in diameter and 14 inches between faces mounted
upon an iron axle, upon being started with a started with a smart impulse
"in either direction" would rotate faster and faster until the periphery
was moving at 16 feet per second. It was claimed, so it would seem,
that the wheel having been set in motion in the chamber of the Landgrave
and kept there under seal, was still going after the lapse of two months.
The machine was stopped, so it is said, to prevent undue wear. However,
the inventor kept his secret very close. The Landgrave, having made him
a fine present, was shown the interior. But he had to promise not to tell
what he had seen nor to make use of his knowledge. In fact, Orffyreus
demanded a payment of about $100,000 for his secret. Prof. ‘s Gavesand
of Leyden was employed by the Landgrave to investigate the machine,
in so far as one might be able to do so without opening up the interior.
In a letter to Sir Isaac Newton in connection with this matter, he describes
it as made of "several cross pieces of wood framed together, the whole
of which is covered over with canvas, to prevent the inside from being seen.
Through the center of this wheel or drum runs an axle of about six inches
of diameter, terminated at both ends by iron axes of about three-quarters
of an inch in diameter upon which the machine turns. I have examined these
axes and am firmly persuaded that nothing from without the wheel in the
least contributes to its motion. When I turned it but gently, it always stood
still as soon as I took away my hand; but when I gave it any tolerable degree
of velocity, I was always obliged to stop it again by force; for when I let it go,
it acquired in two or three turns its greatest velocity, after which it revolved
for twenty-five or twenty-six times in a minute. This motion it preserved some
time ago for two months, in an apartment of the castle; the door and windows
of which were locked and sealed."

It seems that no one who had the $100,000 ever agreed to pay it over upon
the condition that the apparatus should be "found to be really a perpetual
motion. "Whether Sir Isaac Newton replied to Prof. ‘s Gravesand or not,
I do not know.

A device probably similar to that just described is illustrated in Figure 9.
There is a rotatable wheel upon whose circumference arms are hinged at
equal intervals. Weights are attached at the outer ends. Stops are so arranged
that the movement of an arm on its hinge is limited to an angle one side of which
is a prolongation of a radius. All the arms are arranged to swing from a radial
direction in a circular direction contrary to the hands of a clock. By attending
to the figure, it will readily be seen that on the right the weights A, B and C are
advantageously situated to produce a clockwise motion, even though somewhat
resisted. Because of a preponderant advantage which it might seem reasonable
to suppose continually to attach to the weights on the right, we might look for
perpetual motion.

What may be regarded as a variation from this device is exhibited in Figure 10.
Here the arms consist each of a number of links hinged together. A trough D C
is arranged to permit the weights, which are here loose balls, to roll from one
side to the other. This trough is fixed in position. By these means, the weights
of the upper left-hand quadrant are entirely removed or brought in close to
the vertical diameter. When a weight rises to the point D it rolls off by way
of a trough to an arm previously crumpled up but now outstretched.

The greatest thing overlooked in such devices is the question of velocity.
A ball which falls from top to bottom will acquire, apart from friction, just
so much momentum. This is due to the vertical distance passed over, and
will not vary however tortuous the real path may be. The reason that it is
due to the vertical distance is because that is the direction in which gravitation
acts. Similar considerations apply to the upward movement. It is the vertical
distance that counts because that is the direction in which gravitation has to
be overcome. Of course, this is precisely the same from top to bottom as from
bottom to top.

I may be permitted to call attention to a device somewhat similar to those just
described. (See Figure 11.) The figures to the right and left of the vertical diameter
are the same in number. As it is obvious that a number of 9’s preponderates over
an equal number of 6’s, the wheel must, of course, turn clockwise. Study this device
well; it is as good as any of the others.

The devices described so far all aimed at gaining a balance of power from the effect
of gravity. Other inventors have sought to utilize the properties of a magnet for the
same purpose.

The oldest devices of this kind (Figure 13) offered in 1570 by the Jesuit priest,
Johannes Theisner, had a lodestone on a pillar, supposedly drawing iron balls
up an incline. When they reached the top they were to drop into a curved tube
which would let them out at the bottom of the incline through a trap door. The
other three types are all based on what seems to have been the most popular
notion of perpetual motion schemes, namely, on overbalancing one side of a
wheel to make it rotate. Stephan’s plan (Figure 14), dating back to 1799, was
to have four cylindrical magnets siding in holes bored radically into a square
wooden block which was mounted so as to rotate between two pivoted magnets
of opposite polarity. All these sliding magnets had their north poles pointing
away from the center; hence they would be attached by the pivoted magnet
with the South Pole at its free end, but repelled by the other. Then the corners
of the wooden block were suppose to tilt the magnets so as to carry the
movement beyond the dead points.

Instead of using such a wooden block, the writer in his high-school days
proposed (Figure 15) a brass drum rotating close to a horseshoe magnet,
with two rods running radially through the drum at right angles to each other.
Each of these rods was to carry heavy knobs at its outer ends and a soft iron
armature inside the drum. Then the magnet was to attract the armatures
so as to draw out one knob after the other, leaving gravity to return them.
Somewhat allied is the more recent proposal of Korting and Hope (Figure 12)
that a magnet be used to attract one after another of a series of soft iron pieces
connected at their ends by brass links to form a ring and supporting by rods which
can slide in and out on the spokes of a wheel. Of course none of these devices ever
worked and some of our readers may be interested in figuring out why.