Occult Chemistry | Page 5

No attempt has been made to show this below E 2 except in the case of the hydrogen. The letters given are intended to help the reader to trace upwards any special body; thus d in the oxygen chemical atom on the gas level may be found again on E 4, E 3, and E 2. It must be remembered that the bodies shown diagrammatically in no way indicate relative size; as a body is raised from one substate to the one immediately above it, it is enormously magnified for the purpose of investigation, and the ultimate atom on E 1 is represented by the dot a on the gaseous level.
The first chemical atom selected for this examination was an atom of hydrogen (H). On looking carefully at it, it was seen to consist of six small bodies, contained in an egg-like form. It rotated with great rapidity on its own axis, vibrating at the same time, and the internal bodies performed similar gyrations. The whole atom spins and quivers, and has to be steadied before exact observation is possible. The six little bodies are arranged in two sets of three, forming two triangles that are not interchangeable, but are related to each other as object and image. (The lines in the diagram of it on the gaseous sub-plane are not lines of force, but show the two triangles; on a plane surface the interpenetration of the triangles cannot be clearly indicated.) Further, the six bodies are not all alike; they each contain three smaller bodies--each of these being an ultimate physical atom--but in two of them the three atoms are arranged in a line, while in the remaining four they are arranged in a triangle.
The wall of the limiting spheroid in which the bodies are enclosed being composed of the matter of the third, or gaseous, kind, drops away when the gaseous atom is raised to the next level, and the six bodies are set free. They at once re-arrange themselves in two triangles, each enclosed by a limiting sphere; the two marked b in the diagram unite with one of those marked _b'_ to form a body which shows a positive character, the remaining three forming a second body negative in type. These form the hydrogen particles of the lowest plane of ether, marked E 4--ether 4--on the diagram. On raising these further, they undergo another disintegration, losing their limiting walls; the positive body of E 4, on losing its wall, becomes two bodies, one consisting of the two particles, marked b, distinguishable by the linear arrangement of the contained ultimate atoms, enclosed in a wall, and the other being the third body enclosed in E 4 and now set free. The negative body of E 4 similarly, on losing its wall, becomes two bodies, one consisting of the two particles marked _b'_, and the second the remaining body, being set free. These free bodies do not remain on E 3 but pass immediately to E 2, leaving the positive and negative bodies, each containing two particles, as the representatives of hydrogen on E 3. On taking these bodies a step higher their wall disappears, and the internal bodies are set free, those containing the atoms arranged lineally being positive, and those with the triangular arrangement being negative. These two forms represent hydrogen on E 2, but similar bodies of this state of matter are found entering into other combinations, as may be seen by referring to f on E 2 of nitrogen (N). On raising these bodies yet one step further, the falling away of the walls sets the contained atoms free, and we reach the ultimate physical atom, the matter of E 1. The disintegration of this sets free particles of astral matter, so that we have reached in this the limit of physical matter. The Theosophical reader will notice with interest that we can thus observe seven distinct substates of physical matter, and no more.
The ultimate atom, which is the same in all the observed cases, is an exceedingly complex body, and only its main characteristics are given in the diagram. It is composed entirely of spirals, the spiral being in its turn composed of spirill?, and these again of minuter spirill?. A fairly accurate drawing is given in Babbitt's "Principles of Light and Colour," p. 102. The illustrations there given of atomic combinations are entirely wrong and misleading, but if the stove-pipe run through the centre of the single atom be removed, the picture may be taken as correct, and will give some idea of the complexity of this fundamental unit of the physical universe.
Turning to the force side of the atom and its combinations, we observe that force pours in the heart-shaped depression at the top of the atom, and issues from the