Excerpt from Lucretius and the Atomic Theory There is a somewhat popular impression that speculation, or abstract thought, and imagination are incompatible. Perhaps they are rarely found together in remarkable exercise in the same individual; and this, while no proof of their incompatibility, is quite sufficient to satisfy a popular logic. I should be very sorry, indeed, to think that they are incompatible; for I do not know any greater help to the speculative power, or better corrective of vagueness in speculation, than imagination. The more you can individualise thought, the more clear it becomes, the less verbal, the more real; and all individualising, all embodiment of the abstract, is an imaginative effort, and often a very hard one. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.