Occult Chemistry

Occult Chemistry

The Project Gutenberg eBook, Occult Chemistry, by Annie Besant and
Charles W. Leadbeater, Edited by A. P. Sinnett
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Title: Occult Chemistry Clairvoyant Observations on the Chemical
Elements
Author: Annie Besant and Charles W. Leadbeater
Editor: A. P. Sinnett
Release Date: June 14, 2005 [eBook #16058]
Language: English
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OCCULT CHEMISTRY
Clairvoyant Observations on the Chemical Elements
by
ANNIE BESANT, P.T.S.
and
CHARLES W. LEADBEATER

Revised Edition edited by A. P. SINNETT
LONDON THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING HOUSE 1, UPPER
WOBURN PLACE, W.C. 1.
1919

EDITOR'S PREFACE.

When undertaking to prepare a new edition of this book I received
permission from the authors to "throw it into the form in which you
think it would be most useful at the present time." It was left to my
discretion, "What to use and what to omit." I have not found it
necessary to avail myself to any considerable extent of this latter
permission. But as the contents of the book were originally arranged
the reader was ill-prepared to appreciate the importance of the later
research for want of introductory matter explaining how it began, and
how the early research led up to the later investigation. I have therefore
contributed an entirely new preliminary chapter which will, I hope,
help the reader to realise the credibility of the results attained when the
molecular forms and constitution of the numerous bodies examined
were definitely observed. I have not attempted to revise the records of
the later research in which I had no personal share, so from the
beginning of

Chapter III
to the end the book in its present form is simply a reprint of the original
edition except for the correction of a few trifling misprints.
I have thus endeavoured to bring into clear prominence at the outset the
scientific value of the light the book sheds on the constitution of matter.
The world owes a debt to scientific men of the ordinary type that
cannot be over-estimated, but though they have hitherto preferred to
progress gradually, from point to point, disliking leaps in the dark, the
leap now made is only in the dark for those who will not realise that the
progress to be accomplished by means of instrumental research must
sooner or later be supplemented by subtler methods. Physical science
has reached the conception that the atoms of the bodies hitherto called
the chemical elements are each composed of minor atoms. Instrumental
research cannot determine by how many, in each case. Occult research
ascertained the actual number in some cases by direct observation and

then discovered the law governing the numbers in all cases, and the
relation of these numbers to atomic weights. The law thus unveiled is a
demonstration of the accuracy of the first direct observations, and this
principle once established the credibility of accounts now given as to
the arrangement of minor atoms in the molecules of the numerous
elements examined, seems to me advanced to a degree approximating
to proof.
It remains to be seen--not how far, but rather how soon the scientific
world at large will accept the conclusions of this volume as a definite
contribution to science, blending the science of the laboratory with that
variety that has hitherto been called occult.

CONTENTS.
I.--A PRELIMINARY SURVEY
II.--DETAILS OF THE EARLY RESEARCH
THE PLATONIC SOLIDS
III.--THE LATER RESEARCHES

OCCULT CHEMISTRY.

CHAPTER I.
A PRELIMINARY SURVEY.
The deep interest and importance of the research which this book
describes will best be appreciated if introduced by an account of the
circumstances out of which it arose. The first edition, consisting mainly
of articles reprinted from the Theosophist, dealt at once with the later
phases of the research in a way which, though intelligible to the occult
student, must have been rather bewildering to the ordinary reader.
These later phases, however, endow the earlier results with a
significance that in the beginning could only be vaguely conjectured. I
am the better entitled to perform the task that has been assigned to
me--that of preparing the present edition--by reason of the fact that it
was in my presence and at my instigation that the first efforts were
made to penetrate the mystery previously enshrouding the ultimate

molecule of matter.
I