"There cannot exist any atoms or parts of matter that are of their own nature indivisible. For however small we suppose these parts to be, yet because they are necessarily extended, we are always able in thought to divide any one of them into two or more smaller parts, and may accordingly admit their divisibility. ...and although we should even suppose that God had reduced any particle of matter to a smallness so extreme that it did not admit of being further divided, it would nevertheless be improperly styled indivisible, for though God had rendered the particle so small that it was not in the power of any creature to divide it, he could not however deprive himself of the ability to do so... Wherefore, absolutely speaking, the smallest extended particle is always divisible..."
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René Descartes, A Discourse on Method (1637) Principles of Philosophy-II. Of the Principles of Material Things Tr. John Veitch (1916)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Atomic_theory
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