Elements of chemistry : in a systematic order, containing all the modern discoveries ; illustrated with thirteen copperplates / by Mr Lavoisier, member of the academies and societies of Paris, London, Orleans, Bologna, Basil, Philadelphia, Haerlem, Manchester, &c. &c. ; translated from the French, by Robert Kerr, F.R. & A. SS. Edin. Member of the Royal College of Surgeons, and of the Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh.

  • Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent, 1743-1794.
Date:
Decem. 12, M.DCC.XCIX [1799]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Elements of chemistry : in a systematic order, containing all the modern discoveries ; illustrated with thirteen copperplates / by Mr Lavoisier, member of the academies and societies of Paris, London, Orleans, Bologna, Basil, Philadelphia, Haerlem, Manchester, &c. &c. ; translated from the French, by Robert Kerr, F.R. & A. SS. Edin. Member of the Royal College of Surgeons, and of the Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    all the fubftances into which we are able to reduce bodies by decompofition. Not that we are intitled to affirm, that thefe fubftances which we confider as fimple, may not themfelves be compounded of two, or even of a greater number of more fimple principles. But fince thefe principles cannot be feparated, or rather fince we have not hitherto difcovered the means of feparating them, they a£t, with regard to us as fimple fubftances, and we ought never to fuppofe them compounded until experiment and obfervation have proved them to be fo. The foregoing reflections upon the progrefs of chemical ideas naturally apply to the words by which thefe ideas are expreffed. Guided by the workwhich, in the year 1787, Meffrs de Morveau, Berthollet, de Fourcroy, and I compofed upon the Nomenclature of Chemiftry, I have endeavoured, as much as poffible, to denominate fimple bodies by fimple terms: and I was naturally led to name thefe firft. It will be recollected, that we were obliged to retain that name of any fubftance by which it had been long known in the world, and that in two cafes only we took the liberty of making alterations ; firft, in the cafe of thofe which were but newly difcovered, and had not yet obtained names, or at leaft which had been known but for a fhort time, and the names of which bad not yet received the fan&ion of the public j znd d