WHERE DID THE FIRST THEORY OF MATTER COME FROM?

We can trace the orgin of the theory of matter to the Ancient Greeks.In the 5th century BC,Empedocles, a Greek philosopher ,put forward the theory that all matter was made up of four elements-fire,air,water,and earth.The ratio of these elmentsto one another affected  the properties of matter.

                                               Empedocles also stated that nothing is ever created or destroyed-matter is just transformed from one form to another ,as the ratio of these elements to one another changes.Today ,we know that this is not so,yet Empedoclestheory is important because it was the first step to realizing that all matter is made up of different combinations of certain fundamental elments