section_path: History of the concept/Robert Boyle/Corpuscles of elements and compounds
section_name: Corpuscles of elements and compounds
paragraph_text: Corpuscles of elements and compounds
  
  Boyle used the concept of "corpuscles"—or "atomes", as he also called them—to explain how a limited number of elements could combine into a vast number of compounds:
  
  If we assigne to the Corpuscles, whereof each Element consists, a peculiar size and shape... such... Corpuscles may be mingled in such various Proportions, and... connected so many... wayes, that an almost incredible number of... Concretes may be compos’d of them.