As the words "ultimate physical atom" must frequently occur, it is
necessary to state what we mean by the phrase. Any gaseous chemical atom
may be dissociated into less complicated bodies; these, again, into still
less complicated; these, again, into yet still less complicated. These will
be dealt with presently. After the third dissociation but one more is
possible; the fourth dissociation gives the ultimate physical atom.[3] This
may vanish from the physical plane, but it can undergo no further
dissociation on it. In this ultimate state of physical matter two types of
atoms have been observed; they are alike in everything save the direction
of their whorls and of the force which pours through them. In the one case
force pours in from the "outside," from fourth-dimensional space,[4] and
passing through the atom, pours into the physical world. In the second, it
pours in from the physical world, and out through the atom into the
"outside" again,[4] _i.e._, vanishes from the physical world. The one is
like a spring, from which water bubbles out; the other is like a hole, into
which water disappears. We call the atoms from which force comes out
_positive_ or _male_; those through which it disappears, _negative_ or
_female_. All atoms, so far as observed, are of one or other of these two
forms. (Plate II.)

It will be seen that the atom is a sphere, slightly flattened, and there is
a depression at the point where the force flows in, causing a heart-like
form. Each atom is surrounded by a field, formed of the atoms of the four
higher planes, which surround and interpenetrate it.

The atom can scarcely be said to be a "thing," though it is the material
out of which all things physical are composed. It is formed by the flow of
the life-force[5] and vanishes with its ebb. When this force arises in
"space"[6]--the apparent void which must be filled with substance of some
kind, of inconceivable tenuity--atoms appear; if this be artificially