Balance of Realities - Everything is constituted of particles
Everything is constituted of particles
Tags: vegetative soul, particles
The bodies of minerals, vegetables, animals and humankind are compendia of particles or dots. These particles come from other bodies, such as the earth, water, air and ether (the source of heat). Just as stone, namely mountain, is made from soil by the congealment of particles one by one, similarly, vegetables are initially like a single dot in a seed or in a stone; and those vegetables which do not have seeds, are nothing but a dot in the shoot of a branch which, when a cutting of it is planted in the soil, gradually becomes a tree. A cutting that has enough moisture and the capacity to grow a root initially does not absorb anything for some days. Then the vegetative soul, through the moderation of the season, together with the remaining vegetative soul of the cutting starts to grow. Tender shoots and roots sprout from it and the cutting, very slowly and gradually grows dot by dot and eventually becomes a huge tree.
Similarly, the bodies of animals and humankind are initially nothing but a dot and the speed of their growth and the limit of their minuteness are such that they cannot be seen by the naked eye. It is evident from the states of these things that the particle or the dot is not only the foundation of the body, but also of letters and numbers. If you grind gravel and observe it carefully, you will see small particles of soil. This shows that stone is made of soil, for the last state of annihilation of a thing is the initial state of its first survival (baqa’). The same is the case with vegetables. If we place wet wood on a burning fire, it does not catch fire, for it is mixed with water and water is the opposite of fire. However, if the fire is more powerful than its opposite, then first it will eliminate the water together with the opposite gases and air in the form of smoke. What remains has combustible characteristics and catches fire and is consumed. Now after the extinction of the fire, what is left is the earth, which the ordinary fire cannot burn. Similarly, the bodies of animals and humankind also, after being dissolved, rotted and dried are transformed into particles of earth. Thus, it becomes evident that bodies are compendia of particles.
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