DOES MATTER EXIST? 



WE believe in the existence of matter auto- 

 matically and instinctively, on the concordant 

 evidence of all our senses. But philosophers 

 and scientists have taught us for ages that our 

 senses are frequently false witnesses; the art of 

 the conjurer and of the showman prove this to us 

 every day. And, as a matter of fact, we would 

 be extremely puzzled to say what this matter is 

 in which we so firmly believe. It appears to us, 

 like Proteus, under a thousand different forms. 

 What .are the qualities which define it, which 

 form its true essence? A question frequently 

 debated but not easy to answer. 



For many impenetrability is the very essence 

 of matter. Classical teaching has asserted and 

 repeated again that two bodies cannot at the 

 same time occupy the same place in space, as if it 

 were an evident and experimentally-ascertained 

 fact, but nothing is less certain. Oxygen and 

 nitrogen are confounded in the air which we 



87 



