SCIENCE AS A SYMBOL AND A LAW 25 



mechanical atom does not explain such electrical 

 phenomena, unless we arbitrarily associate with it other 

 supposititious electrical fluids or else give it complex 

 and variable electrical attributes; both of which defeat 

 the purpose of explaining all phenomena by means of 

 a single, invariable entity. Their explanation thus re- 

 quires us either to abandon the atomic theory or to 

 modify it radically; the latter has been done, and the 

 atom is now supposed to be a complex body composed 

 of an aggregation of invariable and indivisible par- 

 ticles, called electrons. 



As might be supposed, some specious advantages 

 have been obtained. The chemists have long sought in 

 vain for a chemical element whose atom might be con- 

 sidered the primordial substance, and from which the 

 atoms of the other elements were derived. This new 

 idea of the atom offers a solution, for the chemists may 

 now construct the atoms of all the elements out of dif- 

 ferent combinations of corpuscles. Also the early 

 investigators in electricity, as Franklin and Du Fay, 

 were led to postulate the existence of subtile electric 

 fluids to explain the fact that electrified matter some- 

 times showed a force of attraction and sometimes of 

 repulsion. Later, in the theories of Faraday and 

 Maxwell, the hypothesis of fluids was abandoned 

 and the ends of the atom of matter were endowed 

 respectively with the properties of electrical attrac- 

 tion and repulsion. Now it is possible to discard this 



