GREEK SCIENCE IN EARLY ATTIC PERIOD 



of that philosophy, gold and oxygen and mercury and 

 diamonds are one substance, and, if you please, one 

 quality. But such refinements of analysis as this are 

 for the transcendental philosopher, and not for the 

 scientist. Whatever the allurement of such reasoning, 

 we must for the purpose of science let words have a 

 specific meaning, nor must we let a mere word -jugglery 

 blind us to the evidence of facts. That was the rock 

 on which Greek science foundered ; it is the rock which 

 the modern helmsman sometimes finds it difficult to 

 avoid. And if we mistake not, this case of the atom of 

 Democritus is precisely a case in point. Because De- 

 mocritus said that his atoms did not differ in quality, 

 the modern philosopher has seen in his theory the es- 

 sentials of monism ; has discovered in it not merely a 

 forecast of the chemistry of the nineteenth century, 

 but a forecast of the hypothetical chemistry of the 

 future. And, on the other hand, because Anaxagoras 

 predicted a different quality for his primordial ele- 

 ments, the philosopher of our day has discredited the 

 primordial element of Anaxagoras. 



Yet if our analysis does not lead us astray, the 

 theory of Democritus was not truly monistic; his in- 

 destructible atoms, differing from one another in size 

 and shape, utterly incapable of being changed from 

 the form which they had maintained from the be- 

 ginning, were in reality as truly and primordially dif- 

 ferent as are the primordial elements of Anaxagoras. 

 In other words, the atom of Democritus is nothing less 

 than the primordial seed of Anaxagoras, a little more 

 tangibly visualized and given a distinctive name. 

 Anaxagoras explicitly conceived his elements as in- 



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