POSITIVE IONS. 77 



of particles, that " Codlin is our friend, not Short " the 

 corpuscle, not the positive ion. For, though we shall refer 

 to the positive ion again and again, if we wish to know 

 something of the birth of matter, the decay of matter, the 

 nature of matter, of the nature of electricity and the rela- 

 tion of electricity to matter, of the nature of the sun and 

 the sun's rays, of the possible cause of gravitation, the 

 cause of clouds and rain, and the reasonable solution of 

 many another mystery if we wish to know something of 

 all this, the corpuscle is our most informing friend. 



In earnest of this, we may say that so far as we have 

 gone in this part of our work there is barely a paragraph 

 that will not be utilized in the study of the foregoing prob- 

 lems. Surely, then, we have in the corpuscle the fulcrum 

 for the lever of thought, the philosopher's desire, the one 

 thing to explain our explanations, for which alchemy so 

 earnestly sought in the dim, vague light of the middle 

 ages and called it the philosopher's stone, and for which, 

 chemistry, the daughter of alchemy, has so sorely felt the 

 need to make herself consistent in the periodic law. 



It is an interesting thought that, throughout the ages, 

 in this search for the one thing, the medieval scholar, la- 

 boriously poring over his great book in the light of his little 

 candle, and the modern savant in his laboratory, radiant 

 with electric illumination, have alike been literally bathed 

 in the light of the truth bombarded, hands and face and 

 eyes, by the one thing, with only that short space lacking, 

 between the retina and the innermost centre of the brain 

 where the power of deduction lies, to know. 



Verily, 



" Truth is within ourselves; it takes no rise 

 From outward things, whate'er you may believe. 



