THE FOURTH DIMENSION SIMPLY EXPLAINED

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lines from the original square, four lines in the final square, and four lines traced by the movements of the four points of the original square, or twelve lines in all, meeting at eight points; four points from the original square and four points from the final square.

Let us assemble the above facts for convenience in comparing them and add to the table the corresponding properties of an imaginary fourth dimensional figure, these being determined as follows: As the line, the first dimension, is formed from a moving point, so a square, a typical second dimension figure, is formed from a moving line, making a figure bounded by four lines, and as a cube having a third dimension is similarly formed by a plane moving into
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Number of dimensions in figure Point Line Square Cube Corresponding figure of four dimensions 0 1 2 3 4

Number of points in figure 1 2 4 8 16

Number of lines bounding figure 0 0 4 12 32

Number of planes Number of cubes bounding figure bounding figure 0 0 0 6 24 0 0 0 0 8

the third dimension, making a figure bounded by six planes, does it not follow that a corresponding fourth dimensional figure is formed by the movement of a cube into the fourth direction and will be bounded by cubes? If this is the case and the line derives from the point two points, and the square derives from the line four lines and four points; and if the cube derives from the square eight points, twelve lines and six planes, does it not follow that the moving figure gives to the corresponding fourth dimensional figure the following qualities? The cube at rest has eight points in space, at the end of its movement it has eight new points in space, its movement into the fourth dimension has created the fourth dimensional figure; therefore, the figure should have sixteen points. The cube has at rest twelve lines or edges and has at the end of its movement twelve additional lines, and each of its eight points has traced a new line, making thirty-two lines or edges in all for a corresponding fourth dimensional figure. Similarly, as the cube has six planes at the beginning and has six new planes at the ending of its movement, and as its twelve lines will in moving
Page 114 trace twelve new planes, there will be twenty-four planes in the fourth dimensional figure. Now, as a cube is generated from a moving square, when the cube moves to generate a figure of the fourth dimension, the new figure will have a cube at the beginning of the movement and another cube at the end, and in addition each of the six squares bounding the original cube will by their movement trace a new cube, thus adding six new cubes to the two already mentioned, or eight cubes in all to bound the new fourth-dimensional figure.

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