CHAPTER V. 

 THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE LAW. 



In the foregoing pages we have been confronted with a 

 series of extraordinary facts concerning the atoms of the ele- 

 ments of matter and it now behooves us to seek earnestly 

 for tho cause of it all. 



The remarkable approximation to regularity in the atomic 

 weights, as observed in Prout's Law, the Triads of Do- 

 boreinor, the Octaves of Newlands, and, finally, the summa- 

 tion cf the mystery in the Periodic Law makes a most 

 impressive demonstration of a scheme of arrangement 

 among the atoms. No such scheme could be the result of 

 mere chance on the basis of the theory of probability. This 

 scheme of arrangement must mean something, and this 

 something must bo fundamentally important. 



The main characteristic of the whole scheme is relation- 

 ship. The elements are unquestionably not fragmentary, 

 unrelated facts in nature. They are related to one another 

 in a very real sense ; and it is an expression of this relation- 

 ship that we must seek in the meaning of the law. We 

 may begin either by assuming that the atoms are simple, 

 undecomposable, separately created, ultimate things, or 

 that- they are not. There is no tertium quid. If the atoms 

 are in fact ultima tes, then you will seek in vain for any ex- 

 planation of the foregoing mystery. There positively is no 

 conceivable explanation. 



If, on the contrary, you assume that they are made up of 



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