Occult chemistry : a series of clairvoyant observations on the chemical elements / by Annie Besant and Charles W. Leadbeater.

  • Besant, Annie, 1847-1933.
Date:
[1908]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Occult chemistry : a series of clairvoyant observations on the chemical elements / by Annie Besant and Charles W. Leadbeater. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    39/144 (page 17)
    elements grow denser in descending order; thus hydrogen is an invisible gas ; chlorine a denser gas visible by its color ; bromine is a liquid ; iodine is a solid—all, of course, when temperature and pressure are normal. By the lowering of temperature and the increase of pressure, an element which is normally gaseous becomes a liquid, and then a solid. Solid, liquid, gaseous, are three inter- changeable states of matter, and an element does not alter its constitution by changing its state. So far as a chemical ‘ atom ’ is concerned, it matters not whether it be drawn for investigation from a solid, a liquid, or a gas ; but the internal arrangements of the 4 atoms ’ become much more complicated as they become denser and denser, as is seen by the complex arrangements necessitated by the presence of the 3546 ultimate atoms contained in the chemical ‘ atom ’ of gold, as compared with the simple arrangement of the 1S ultimate atoms of hydrogen. According to the lemniscate arrangement, we should com- mence with hydrogen as the head of the first negative group, but as it differs wholly from those placed with it, it is better to take it by itself. Hydrogen is the lightest of the known elements, and is therefore taken as 1 in ordinary chemistry, and all atomic weights are multiples of this. We take it as 18, because it contains eighteen ultimate atoms, the smallest number we have found in a chemical element. So our 1 number weights ’ are obtained by dividing the total number of atoms in an element by 18 (see p. 349, January). Hydrogen (Plate V., 1). Hydrogen not only stands apart from its reputed group by not having the characteristic dumb-bell shape, well shown in sodium (Plate I opposite p. 349, January), but it also stands apart in being positive, serving as a base, not as a chlorous, or acid, radical, thus “ playing the part of a metal,” as in hydrogen chloride (hydrochloric acid), hydrogen sulphate (sulphuric acid), etc. It is most curious that hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen, the most widely spread gases, all differ fundamentally in form from the groups they reputedly head.* Hydrogen was the first chemical * Since writing the above, I have noticed, in the London Edinburgh and Dublin Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, conducted by Dr. John Joly and Mr. William Francis, in an article entitled “ Evolution and Devolution of the Elements,” the statement that it is probable that in “ the nebulous state of matter there are four substances, the first two being unknown upon earth, the third being hydrogen and the fourth .... helium. It also seems probable that 3