THE NATURE OF MATTER 51 



break it up into hundreds of thousands of molecules of plasm. 

 The merciless analysis then dissolves each molecule into 

 some hundreds of atoms, that had clung together in a 

 structure which still defies the investigation of the chemist. 

 And the physicist now tells us that each atom is a still more 

 complex system of far smaller points, which he calls electrons. 

 To conceive it in the terms which are at present most 

 accepted, the electron is an apparently permanent strain- 

 centre in an ocean of ether. More than a thousand of these 

 strain-centres have aggregated somehow, adjusted their 

 respective motions as planets do round a central sun, and 

 formed a comparatively stable system. Within its limits, of 

 the proportionate size of flies in a theatre, they spin in their 

 complicated orbits. Yet 200,000,000 of these systems, end 

 to end, would not measure an inch. There are trillions of 

 them in a table-spoon full of water. Some hundreds of 

 these systems, of varying size, have joined together to form 

 a molecule of protoplasm, the smallest particle of living 

 matter that we can take without destroying its nature. And 

 some hundreds of thousands, if not a few million, of these 

 large systems (the molecules) are subtly connected to form 

 the tiny Procytella. It is a structure so intricate as to fill 

 the most powerful mathematician with despair. 



We must bear this structure in mind when we say that 

 "ordinary matter" is incapable of discharging vital functions 

 unless it is directed or controlled by some immaterial agency. 

 We are not dealing with " ordinary matter " at all. We are 

 dealing with a substance of the most astounding subtlety 

 and complexity. Nor are the intricacy of structure and the 



