In setting this up as a definite standard they will escape the inertia and conservatism that ordinarily characterize large groups, a condition which at the present time is retarding the British cooperative movement.

Bodies which may be moved by mechanical means only are subject to the power of inertia; and applied to bodies which may be acted on by motives, this power becomes the force of habit.

The horse goes on drawing his cart quite contentedly, without having to be urged on: the motion is the continued effect of those strokes of the whip, which urged him on at first: by the law of inertia they have become perpetuated as habit.

He does not admit that spirit can overcome the inertia of matter.

Whatever inertia may be, it is superable or destructible only by the force or motion of matter itself,matter being incapable of rest.

Q.But will not the inertia of a beam resist deflection, as well as the momentum increase deflection?

Long-continued impact on the side of a tube, producing a deflection of only one fifth of that which would be required to injure it by pressure, is found to be destructive of the riveting; but in large riveted structures, such as a ship or a railway bridge, the inertia of the mass will, by resisting the effect of impact, prevent any injurious action from this cause from taking place.

The outline of the cam should be a parabola, so that the valve may be set in motion precisely as a falling body would be; but it will, nevertheless, be necessary that the roller on which the cam presses should be forced upward by a spring rather than by a counterweight, as there will thus be less inertia or momentum in the mass that has to be moved.

In land and marine boilers, however, the safety valve is always kept down by weights; but in steam vessels a good deal of steam is lost in stormy weather by the opening of the valve, owing to the inertia of the weights when the ship sinks suddenly in the deep recess between the waves.

Q.To what is this loss of effect to be chiefly ascribed? A.Mainly to the inertia of the water, which, if the pump piston be drawn up very rapidly, cannot follow it with sufficient rapidity; so that there may be a vacant space between the piston and the water; and at the return stroke the momentum of the water in the pipe expends itself in giving a reverse motion to the column of water approaching the pump.

[Footnote 1: [Strenua nos exercet inertia: Navibus.]]

The first of these is the one become familiar under the name, law of inertia: Everything continues of itself in the state (of motion or rest) in which it is, and changes its state only as a result of some extraneous cause.

But the vivifying and deepening power of the Germanic spirit has here, more than in any other domain, destroyed the opposing force of inertia.

Creakingly the wain followed him, pausing and starting and pausing again with groans of inertia.

In this instrument, momentum and inertia are almost wholly avoided by the use of a needle weighing only one and a half grains, combined with a mirror reflecting a ray of light, which indicates deflections with great accuracy.

To one observer at least the most wonderful thing throughout that period of accumulating stress is the invincible inertia of the great mass of people, their quiet persistence in all that ignored the enormous presences, the promise of still more enormous things, that grew among them.

Myself, "these four and no more," were down in the book of fate for a struggle with inertia.

The limits of property in many respects are determined not according to the logic of expediency, but by the social inertia which often governs successive generations.

Socially they find expression in vandalism, hooliganism, major crime, in the break-up of the family; in alienation, inertia, boredom; in laxity, indiscipline; loss of faith, weakness or absence of purpose.

This law of inertia applies not only in the physical world, but also in the intellectual, moral and spiritual fields.

To deliver man from the control of his natural inertia he must be touched by some strong compelling power.

Ambition is one great force that enables most men to overcome this inertia.

Some people consider mental or moral inertia the chief force that sustains the corrupt political boss.

That sudden change from volition to inertia is, in itself, conviction to every right-seeing mind.

It will be evident that much greater accuracy of measurement of maximum pressures can be obtained by the minimum movement of the pointer, as both the inertia and the momentum are reduced to the minimum quantity.