CONCLUSION 169 



Can anyone then ascribe the likeness of gems so rich and 

 multitudinous to chance ? Chance could not have given 

 us twenty atoms so constituted and so similar. Posses- 

 sion by chance of forces and characteristics so extra- 

 ordinary in their nature, so perfectly similar and so 

 exactly measured, so exquisitely adapted and so richly 

 adaptable, is an absolutely impossible suggestion. Every 

 particle, and all the particles, with one voice sounding 

 everywhere through immensity, inexpressible in beauty, 

 clearness, and force, protest against the madness that 

 would bring it forward. 



The atoms of matter, whether of one or many kinds, 

 have not been formed by mere division. In such a case 

 the matter divided must have been naturally divisible 

 into such atoms of their size and weight and nature, 

 it must have been composed of aggregates of them ; and 

 then the question reverts to the same position as before, 

 for they must all have existed from eternity in the same 

 condition as now, though under a different general 

 arrangement. They are not formed by mere aggregation. 

 That would imply the existence from eternity of atoms of 

 a smaller size, but of the same nature and constitution, 

 and therefore having the atomic form, and all the 

 possibilities of their present condition. It would imply 

 that those atoms of smaller size happened to be of such 

 measures and figures as to be capable of being formed by 

 mind into units the exact counterparts of each other. It 

 would imply that they possessed the same characteristics 

 as the aggregates now possess, and that they had in them 

 the power of acting as the aggregates now act. It would 

 necessitate their having the characteristic of a strong 

 force of cohesion. The existence of this force between 

 two independent particles was a contingency. It was 

 pure chance that there should be an attraction between 



