244 
conclusive enough without touching the gieat question as to 
substantial existence. It is mainly a physical and not a 
metaphysical argument against the atomic idea. Accord g 
to that hypothesis, matter is believed to consist in its inner 
nature ” of infinitesimal particles called atoms, which are 
themselves incapable of change, but which in their movemen s 
and combinations give the varied qualities to material objects 
which we observe them to possess. These atoms are regarded 
as not really touching one another, but moving each within a 
“space” surrounding it,— all being more or less distant fiom 
one another, according to the degree of molecular density m 
the matter which they compose. It is on a mistake m 
reference to this “space” that Mr. Faraday founds his argu- 
ment. He says that, according to the atomic theory, space 
must be the only continuous part m matter, for the paiticles 
are considered as separated by “space ’’ from each other. 
Now, “ space ” in the absence of matter is just the opposite o 
continuity. Instead of being continuous at all, it is that 
which, in its essential emptiness, constitutes all breaks m 
continuity; so far, at least, as matter is concerned. Arguing 
as if space were matter, and tlie only continuous thing 111 
material objects, he takes as one example a piece of shellac, 
which is an insulator for electric agitation, and says that, 
according to the atomic theory, the “ space between the 
particles of shellac must be an insulator. But, as Mr. Grove 
expresses it of heat, the thing space is unknown. Empty 
space is simply the absence of all substance— the idea ex- 
pressed by the phrase is equivalent to that expressed by the 
word nothing. And this mere nothing, or absence of all 
substance, cannot, in the sense in which shellac is an insulator, 
be either an insulator or a conductor. The manifest truth m 
the case, whether we take one theory of matter or another, is 
that the particles of shellac are not m a state to move on tne 
approach of the electric wave. They have somehow such a 
nature that they are like rocks in the agitated tide of electri- 
fied matter. It is this that constitutes shellac an insulator. 
This view of the case is, we humbly think, beyond all question, 
on the understanding that electricity is only a particular kind ot 
motion in the molecules of conducting matter. Faraday, havm p 
laid down the mistake which we have thus indicated as his 
foundation, proceeds to take “platinum or potassium; and 
as these are conductors, he says that, according to^e atomic 
theory “ space ” in them must be a conductor ! But there is 
no such “ must he” in the case. The particles of platinum 
are moveable in the electric current, and so they readily move 
on the approach of that peculiar agitation. The space, hypo- 
