in Physics, the minute part of a body, an assemblage of which constitutes all natural bodies.

In the new philosophy, particle is often used in the same sense with atom in the ancient Epicurean philosophy, and corpuscle in the later. Some writers, however, distinguish them; making particle an assemblage or composition of two or more primitive and physically indivisible corpuscles or atoms; and corpuscle, or little body, an assemblage or mass of several particles or secondary corpuscles. The distinction, however, is of little moment; and, as to most purposes of physics, particle may be understood as synonymous with corpuscle. Particles are then the elements of bodies: it is the various arrangement and texture of these, with the difference of the cohesion, &c. that constitute the various kinds of bodies, hard, soft, liquid, dry, heavy, light, &c. The smallest particles or corpuscles cohere, with the strongest attractions, and always compose larger particles of weaker cohesion; and many of these cohering compose larger particles, whose vigour is still weaker; and so on for divers successions, till the progression end in the largest particles, on which the operations in chemistry, and the colours of natural bodies, depend, and which, by cohering, compose bodies of sensible bulks.

The cohesion of the particles of matter, according to the Epicureans, was effected by hooked atoms; the Aristotelians thought it managed by rest, that is, by nothing at all. But Sir Isaac Newton shows it is by means of a certain power whereby the particles mutually attract or tend toward each other, which is still perhaps giving a fact without a cause. By this attraction of the particles he shows that most of the phenomena of the lesser bodies are effected, as those of the heavenly bodies are by the attraction of gravity. See ATTRACTION and COHESION.

a term in Theology, used in the Latin church for the crumbs or little pieces of consecrated bread, called in the Greek church μαρτυρικόν. The Greeks have a particular ceremony, called τὸ παρεῖν τῶν παρείων, wherein certain crumbs of bread, not consecrated, are offered up in honour of the Virgin, St John Baptist, and several other saints. They also give them the name of ἀποστολή, ὁλοκλήρωσις. Gabriel archbishop of Philadelphia wrote a little treatise express ἀποστολή, wherein he endeavours to show the antiquity of this ceremony, in that it is mentioned in the liturgies of St Chrysostom and Basil. There has been much controversy on this head between the reformed and catholic divines. Aubertin and Blendel explain a passage in the theory of Germanus patriarch of Constantinople, where he mentions the ceremony of the particles as in use in his time, in favour of the former; Messieurs de Port Royal contest the explanation; but M. Simon, in his notes on Gabriel of Philadelphia, endeavours to show that the passage itself is an interpolation, not being found in the ancient copies of Germanus. Particle manus, and consequently that the dispute is very ill grounded.

Organic Particles, are those small moving bodies which are imperceptible without the help of glasses; for besides those animals which are perceptible to the sight, some naturalists reckon this exceedingly small species as a separate class, if not of animals properly so called, at least of moving bodies, which are found in the semen of animals, and which cannot be seen without the help of the microscope. In consequence of these observations, different systems of generation have been proposed concerning the spermatic worms of the male and the eggs of the female. In the second volume of Buffon's Natural History, several experiments are related, tending to show that those moving bodies which we discover by the help of glasses in the male semen are not real animals, but organic, lively, active, and indestructible molecules, which possess the property of becoming a new organized body similar to that from which they were extracted. Buffon found such bodies in the female as well as in the male semen; and he supposes that the moving bodies which he observed with the microscope in infusions of the germs of plants are likewise vegetable organic molecules. Needham, Wrisberg, Spalanzani, and several other writers on the animal economy, have pursued the same track with M. de Buffon.

Some suppose that these organic molecules in the semen answer no purpose but to excite the venereal desire: but such an opinion cannot be well founded; for eunuchs, who have no seminal liquor, are nevertheless subject to venereal desire. With respect to the beautiful experiments which have been made with the microscope on organic molecules, M. Bonnet, that learned and excellent observer of nature, remarks that they seem to carry us to the farthest verge of the sensible creation, did not reason teach us that the smallest visible globule of seminal liquor is the commencement of another universe, which, from its infinite smallness, is beyond the reach of our best microscopes.—Animalcules, properly so called, must not be confounded with the wonderful organic particles of Buffon. See Animalcule.

Grammar, a denomination for all those small words that tie or unite others, or that express the modes or manners of words. See Grammar.