A History of Greek Philosophy / THE ATOMISTS / LEUCIPPUS AND DEMOCRITUS

Page 4

As regards the atoms he conceived that when they differed in weight this must be in respect of a difference in their essential size. In this he was no doubt combating the notion that the atoms say of lead or gold were in their substance, taking equal quantities, of greater weight than atoms of water or air. The difference of weight in objects depended on the proportion which the atoms in them bore to the amount of empty space which was interlaced with them. On the other hand, a piece of iron was lighter yet harder than a piece of lead of equal size, because of the special way in which the atoms in it were linked together. There were fewer atoms in it, but they were, in consequence of their structure and arrangement, more tightly strung.

In all this Democritus was with great resolution working out what we may call a strictly mechanical theory of the universe. Even the soul or life-principle in living creatures was simply a structure of the finest and roundest (and therefore most nimble) atoms, with which he compared the extremely attenuated dust particles visible in their never-ending dance in a beam of light passed into a darkened room. This structure of exceeding tenuity and nimbleness was the source of the motion characteristic of living creatures, and provided that elastic counteracting force to the inward-pressing nimble air, whereby were produced the phenomena of respiration. Every object, in fact, whether living or not, kept its form and distinctive existence by its possession in degree of a kind of soul or spirit of resistance in its structure, adequate to counteract the pressure of external forces upon its particles.

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