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Page 12
[Illustration: PLATE IV.]
V. _The Bars._--These characterise a set of closely allied groups, termed
"inter-periodic." Fourteen bars (or seven crossed) radiate from a centre,
as in iron (1 on Plate IV), and the members of each group--iron, nickel,
cobalt; ruthenium, rhodium, palladium; osmium, iridium, platinum--differ
from each other by the weight of each bar, increasing in orderly
succession; the details will be given later. Manganese is often grouped
with iron, nickel, and cobalt (_see_ Crookes' lemniscates), but its
fourteen protruding bodies repeat the "lithium spike" (proto-element 5) and
are grouped round a central ovoid. This would appear to connect it with
lithium (2 on Plate IV) rather than with fluorine (3 in Plate IV), with
which it is often classed. The "lithium spike" re-appears in potassium and
rubidium. These details, again, will come out more clearly later.
VI. _The Star._--A flat star, with five interpenetrating tetrahedra in the
centre, is the characteristic of neon and its allies (4 on Plate IV)
leaving apart helium, which, as may be seen by referring to 3, Plate IV,
has an entirely different form.
There are thus six clearly defined forms, typical of classes, with
two--lithium and fluorine--of doubtful affinities. It is worthy of notice
that in diatomic elements _four_ funnels open on the faces of tetrahedra;
in triatomic, _six_ funnels on the faces of cubes; in tetratomic, _eight_
funnels on the faces of octahedra.
Thus we have a regular sequence of the platonic solids, and the question
suggests itself, will further evolution develop elements shaped to the
dodecahedron and the icosahedron?
* * * * *
II.
We now pass from the consideration of the outer forms of the chemical
elements to a study of their internal structure, the arrangement within the
element of more or less complicated groups--proto-elements--capable of
separate, independent existence; these, once more, may be dissociated into
yet simpler groups--hyper-meta-proto-elements--equally capable of separate,
independent existence, and resolvable into single ultimate physical atoms,
the irreducible substratum of the physical world (see _Theosophist_, 1908,
pp. 354-356).[18]
We shall have to study the general internal structure, and then the
breaking up of each element, and the admirable diagrams, patiently worked
out by Mr. Jinar�jad�sa, will make the study comparatively easy to carry
on.
The diagrams, of course, can only give a very general idea of the facts
they represent; they give groupings and show relations, but much effort of
the imagination is needed to transform the two-dimensional diagram into the
three-dimensional object. The wise student will try to visualize the figure
from the diagram. Thus the two triangles of hydrogen are not in one plane;
the circles are spheres, and the atoms within them, while preserving to
each other their relative positions, are in swift movement in
three-dimensional space. Where five atoms are seen, as in bromine and
iodine, they are generally arranged with the central atom above the four,
and their motion indicates lines which erect four plane triangles--meeting
at their apices--on a square base, forming a square-based four-sided
pyramid. Each dot represents a single ultimate atom. The enclosing lines
indicate the impression of form made on the observer, and the groupings of
the atoms; the groups will divide along these lines, when the element is
broken up, so that the lines have significance, but they do not exist as
stable walls or enclosing films, but rather mark limits, not lines, of
vibrations. It should be noted that it is not possible to show five of the
prisms in the five intersecting tetrahedra of prisms, and 30 atoms must,
therefore, be added in counting.
The diagrams are not drawn to scale, as such drawing would be impossible;
the dot representing the atom is enormously too large compared with the
enclosures, which are absurdly too small; a scale drawing would mean an
almost invisible dot on a sheet of many yards square.
The use of the words "positive" and "negative" needs to be guarded by the
following paragraphs from the article on "Chemistry" in the _Encyclop�dia
Britannica_. We use the words in their ordinary text-book meaning, and have
not, so far, detected any characteristics whereby an element can be
declared, at sight, to be either positive or negative:--
"When binary compounds, or compounds of two elements, are decomposed by an
electric current, the two elements make their appearance at opposite poles.
These elements which are disengaged at the negative pole are termed
electro-positive or positive or basylous elements, while those disengaged
at the positive pole are termed electro-negative or negative or chlorous
elements. But the difference between these two classes of elements is one
of degree only, and they gradually merge into each other; moreover the
electric relations of elements are not absolute, but vary according to the
state of combination in which they exist, so that it is just as impossible
to divide the elements into two classes according to this property as it is
to separate them into two distinct classes of metals and non-metals."
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