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Cuvier’s History of the Natural Sciences

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Georges Cuvier

4. Early Eighteenth-Century Advances in Chemistry

6. Chemistry in the First Half of the Eighteenth Century

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Cerculus Æterni Motus. Frontispice from Becher’s Physica subterranea, profundam… (1733). Cliché Bibliothèque centrale, MNHN.

1Messieurs,

2During the previous sessions, I presented the various geology systems published in the first half of the eighteenth century. We saw that during that period, they were vague and based on arbitrary assumptions rather than on facts and observations. We will now address the history of chemistry in the same period as it is, after geology, the science encompassing the most important phenomena related to the greatest number of facts.

  • 1 Comparisons help to name things when their nature is unknown. Therefore, the use of a figurative t (...)

3Chemistry, as it exists today, provides knowledge of the mutual action of various substances reduced to their most elementary molecules and of the resulting changes. Therefore, any chemical phenomenon requires various substances; their parts lose their cohesion under the effect of heat or liquid. Once the different molecules are connected, they interact using their inherent forces, resulting in more or less perceptible changes in relationships, combination of simple bodies to others, or replacement of the initial combinations with different alliances. Different molecules seem to be inclined or selective in their changes. The driving force is therefore called elective affinity.1 This force is different from the power of attraction as it is only effective when material molecules are in contact. Its energy is subordinated to the nature of molecules while the force of attraction is only influenced by the variation of masses and distances. All chemical phenomena derive from elective affinities, either simple or double. This is very clear in our mind today but it was far from being the case at the beginning of the eighteenth century.

  • 2 [Middle Ages, see Volume 1, Lesson 21.]
  • 3 [Basil Valentine, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 9.]
  • 4 [Georg Ernst Stahl, see Volume 2, Lesson 9, note 90.]

4As we said earlier, the Ancients did not even assume the existence of a chemistry similar to ours even if they had the knowledge of some related facts. In the Middle Ages, when Arabs introduced chemistry to the West,2 it presented no theory and had no intention to give a mathematical or physical explanation of related phenomena. On the contrary, it used a mystical and figurative language only understood by insiders. At the end of the fourteenth century, some superior minds attempted to develop a global theory. The efforts of those semi-alchemists —to distinguish them from their predecessors— led to the five-principle doctrine already exposed in the publications of Basil Valentine.3 Preserved with the German miners, this doctrine was modified in the eighteenth century and later led to Stahl’s system,4 which dominated the following century. The author’s pupils quickly disseminated his new doctrine and a large portion of Europe adopted it because it provided a satisfactory explanation on many known facts. Only France, England, and the Netherlands rejected it. The Cartesian doctrine still prevailed in France and in Holland and there was no room for a system that was not based on the corpuscular theory.

  • 5 [Robert Boyle, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 32.]
  • 6 [John Mayow, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 68.]
  • 7 [Joseph Priestley, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 88.]
  • 8 [Henry Cavendish, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 77.]
  • 9 [Phlogiston theory, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 37.]

5More accurate ideas were developed in England: Boyle5 attacked the theory of the semi-alchemists as inadequate to explain numerous phenomena. He refuted it through his own pneumatic-chemical experiments. His pupil, Mayow,6 pursued his work, developing important applications for physiology. He established for instance the correct theory of respiration, proving that this function is analogous to combustion. If his experiments had continued intensely, they would have led to the current doctrine but Mayow could not finalize his system with the spread of Stahl’s. However, Boyle’s ideas on chemistry were not abandoned in England. Related works continued until the time of Priestley7 and Cavendish,8 forming a collateral series with the phlogiston theory.9

  • 10 [Johann Joachim Becher, see Volume 2, Lesson 9, note 89.]
  • 11 [Physica subterranea, profundam subterraneorum genesin, e principiis hucusque ignotis, ostendens, (...)

6Before describing Stahl’s system, we will recall the works of Becher,10 whose biography was presented last year. Becher contributed a lot to Stahl’s work and greatly served the cause of chemistry, even deserving the name of genius. He was the first to get rid of the enigmatic and obscure language of alchemists and simplified chemistry to general principles. In his Physica Subterranea, printed in 1664,11 he established that the five principles admitted up to his time were not simple but mixed beings and are therefore misnamed since the term principle refers to the last degree of simplification. Noticing that the combustion of sulfur produces sulfuric acid, he concluded that it consists of this acid and bitumen, a flammable material emitted by combustion. We can notice that it was already the spark of the phlogiston theory because if the word phlogiston were substituted for bitumen —the word used to designate the combustible substance— we would have exactly the Stahlian explanation.

7Becher’s work also includes another very important observation: the elements of mixed substances can only be known when they form other compounds. This notion already contains the base principle of all our analyses, the theory of elective affinities. However, along with such enlightenment are totally unfounded assertions, on which Becher mainly based his system. He establishes as a principle that all compounds consisted only of earth and water. He recognizes three earthy principles: 1) a heavy earth separated by fire from its compounds in the form of metallic lime; 2) a loamy earth, which provides color to substances and constitutes their combustibility principle, and 3) an earth that is the principle of metalleity. The latter is what the semi-alchemists called mercury.

8Becher refutes the name mercury as he claims that mercury and all metals are compounds. For the same reason, he rejects the name sulfur to designate the combustible matter. Stahl later observed that metals lost by combustion, or rather dephlogiston as he called it, their malleability and other characteristic qualities or properties, and assumed that the two principles only formed one. His system mainly differed from Becher’s in this respect.

9As I said, Becher considered all metals to be compounds and that the difference was due to the varying proportion of elements. Therefore, he was convinced that metals could be fabricated and he even believed that he made some from scratch. From the information left from his procedures, we can see that his production of metals was simply the reduction of metal oxides mixed with substances he used. Dwelling on Becher’s works would be useless. We have enough knowledge of the state of chemistry when Stahl took the lead.

  • 12 [Georg Ernst Stahl, see Volume 2, Lesson 9, note 90.]
  • 13 [Georg Wolfgang Wedel (born 12 November 1645, Golssen, Niederlausitz, Habsburg Monarchy; died 6 Se (...)
  • 14 [William Ernest (born 19 October 1662, Weimar, Germany; died 26 August 1728, Weimar, Germany), Duk (...)
  • 15 [Friedrich Wilhelm, Elector of Brandenburg, see Volume 2, Lesson 6, note 26.]
  • 16 [Friedrich Hoffman, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 100.]
  • 17 [Friedrich Wilhelm, see note 15, above.]

10Stahl (Georg Ernst) was born in 1660 in Anspach, Franconia.12 At an early age, he fervently studied physical sciences and at the age of fifteen he had a thorough knowledge of all their elements. After studying medicine in Jena under the scholar G. W. Wedel,13 he was appointed in 1687 physician at the court of the Duke of Saxe-Weimar.14 For the foundation of the University of Halle, the Elector of Brandenburg15 asked Friedrich Hoffman16 to choose the other lecturers. Hoffman called Stahl who quickly became famous. In 1716, he accepted the position of primary physician of Friedrich Wilhelm17 and died in Berlin in 1734.

  • 18 [Torbern Olaf Bergman, see Volume 2, Lesson 9, note 1.]
  • 19 [Henry Cavendish, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 77.]
  • 20 [Joseph Priestley, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 88.]
  • 21 [Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 78.]
  • 22 [Editions of these two publications by Georg Ernst Stahl, as described by Cuvier, cannot be found. (...)
  • 23 [Specimen Becherianum fundamentorum documentorum experimentorum subjunxit, Leipzig: Joh. Ludov. Gl (...)
  • 24 [Zufällige Gedancken und nutzliche Bedencken über den streit von den sogenannten Sulphure, und zwa (...)
  • 25 [Experimenta, observationes, animadversiones, CCC numero, chimicae et physicae, Berlin: Ambrosium (...)
  • 26 [Andreas Libau or Libavius, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 63.]
  • 27 [Jean Rey, see Volume 2, Lesson 11, note 11.]
  • 28 [Robert Boyle, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 32.]
  • 29 [John Mayow, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 68.]

11Stahl was said to be melancholic and prone to mysticism, characteristics reflected in the style of his publications, which lack clarity and accuracy. It is often difficult to understand his expressions or follow his reasoning. Despite these drawbacks, from which Becher did not suffer, he managed to significantly simplify Becher’s chemistry theory in a form later perfected by Bergman18 to a point that it seemed immutable until its obliteration by the works of Cavendish,19 Priestley,20 and particularly Lavoisier.21 Stahl’s first works on chemistry included his Zymotechnia fundamentalis and his Observationes physico-chimicae published in Frankfurt and Leipzig in 1697 and 1698.22 He hardly differed from Becher’s theory in both works. For instance, he still used the word bitumen for the principle he assumed to be emitted by combustion. It was only later that the recognized the term to be inadequate for a general meaning as it designates a specific substance, so he replaced it with phlogiston. In his Specimen Becherianum of 1702,23 he suggested to reduce Becher’s ideas to general propositions, to be demonstrated through reasoning and experience. In his treatise on sulfur published in 1718,24 he admitted phlogiston as the general principle but the complete theory was only exposed in his last work, published in Berlin in 1731 under the title Experimenta, observationes, animadversiones, ccc numero, chimicae et physicae.25 Stahl presents phlogiston as a universal element maybe originating from the sun or meteors, the calorific element of all bodies. Combustion is nothing other than the emission of this element, leaving the other bodies it was combined with. Even if Libavius,26 Jean Rey,27 followed by Boyle28 and Mayow,29 observed that the calcination of metals increased their weight, and therefore that no element was lost, Stahl’s theory was broadly adopted. It prevailed until 1780 and some chemists still supported it until the beginning of our century. Those men claiming to see oxygen in phlogiston were not true Stahlians because new discoveries forced them to modify their doctrines to a point that they had nothing much in common with the original theory.

12Stahl published two other works on chemistry several years before his Experimenta. The first one was a sort of textbook on docimasy and practical chemistry, without any discussion on theory; the second one was a treatise on salts. In the latter, Stahl recognized that salts are the combination of acids with earthy bases. He assumed that a radical acid existed and all others were only its modifications. According to him, this main acid was vitriol that he considered to be a simple substance, producing sulfur when combined with phlogiston.

13His various works show that he had no clear notion on chemical affinities. Alchemists did not have a better knowledge even if they recognized certain inclinations and antipathies. They explained that the effervescence sometimes witnessed from the contact of alkali and acid is due to antipathy and confrontation. Cartesian chemists interpreted the same facts using mechanical principles. Their opinion was that the pointed atoms of acids, displaced by subtle matter, created a friction when penetrating an alkaline substance, resulting in heat and bubbling.

14Stahl refuted both explanations but did not find the correct one: effervescence is the result of the emission of aerial carbonic acid, freed by the contact between the new acid and the alkali. When he observed that an acid takes from another acid one of the bodies of the compound, he simply stated that the former was stronger than the latter and did not make a generalization on mutual inclination between molecules of different natures.

  • 30 [Johann Juncker (born 23 December 1679, Londorf, Hessen; died 25 October 1759, Halle), a German ph (...)

15Johann Juncker,30 born in Giessen in 1679, who replaced Stahl after being his disciple, did not have a more accurate knowledge of chemical attraction. He explained phenomena using the Cartesian hypothesis, with the difference that he assumed the penetrating molecules to be displaced by atmospheric pressure rather than by subtle matter. This change does not constitute an improvement because chemical attraction occurs in the void and in the full.

  • 31 [Conspectus chemiae theoricopracticae in forma tabularum repraesentatus, in quibus physica, praese (...)
  • 32 [Conspectus chemiae theoretico-practicae: Vollstændige Abhandlung der Chemie nach ihrem Lehr-begri (...)

16Juncker particularly contributed to maintain the Stahlian doctrine by presenting it more methodically and clearly in his Conspectus chemiae theorico practicae, published in Halle in two volumes in 1730 and 1738.31 German and French translations were released in 1757.32

  • 33 [Isaac Newton, see Volume 2, Lesson 11, note 37.]
  • 34 [See Lesson 2, note 32, above.]
  • 35 [Opticks: or, a treatise of the reflexions, refractions, inflexions and colours of light, see Less (...)
  • 36 [Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 78.]
  • 37 [Étienne François Geoffroy, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 21.]

17Juncker was in a position to revise the theory of his master as Newton33 presented several years back his enlightened ideas on chemical affinity. After discovering that gravity was the main cause of major astronomical phenomena, Newton also recognized that attraction might influence chemical combinations, or at least that there was a lot of similarity between the power that moved molecules and the force of planetary attraction. On the path towards truth, associating perspicacity, patience, and broad ideas, Newton could have quickly advanced the domain of chemistry. But as we reported, his observations were destroyed by fire,34 and in despair, he gave up any related research. The only parts we know about his discoveries come from fragments in his other works, particularly in his Opticks.35 In the latter, he stated that the degree of combustibility of transparent substances is related to their refractive power. Based on this observation, he claimed that diamond, as it was highly refractive, must be a combustible substance. Using a similar induction, he guessed the composition of water. Noticing that water had a higher refractive power than its density, and that therefore it sat between amber and glass, he concluded that water included combustible and non-combustible substances. We know today that water is composed of a combustible element, hydrogen, and a non-combustible but comburent element, oxygen. It is certain that if Newton had pursued his research, with the long career still ahead of him, he would have revolutionized chemistry as usefully as our compatriot Lavoisier.36 In any event, the theory of chemical affinities was not lost even if Newton did not expose it. Science does not perish for one man. A Frenchman named Geoffroy37 developed the theory during Newton’s lifetime.

  • 38 [Geoffroy’s tables of “affinities,” lists prepared by collating observations on the actions of sub (...)
  • 39 [Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 126.]

18Etienne Geoffroy, a member of the Academy of Sciences and a professor at the College we are now, was born in Paris in 1672 and died in 1731. His father, who amassed a great wealth in pharmacy and whose family had several aldermen, offered him a broad instruction. He was taught by the most competent masters in Paris and traveled throughout Europe to acquire some knowledge he could not have obtained otherwise. Chemistry was his subject of predilection. With much more accuracy than his predecessors, he observed the molecular connections as the basis of chemical phenomena. He identified and attempted to provide a relative measure of the different intensities of the powers at the source of molecular motion. Between 1718 and 1720, he published a table of chemical affinities.38 He avoided the use of the term attraction, probably not to displease the Academy and its strong detachment from anything related to Newton’s opinions. This caution did not seem to have saved the substantive issue: in 1732, when Fontenelle39 gave Geoffroy’s eulogy, he showed some restraint towards his old colleague and qualified his affinity doctrine as a singular system.

  • 40 [Jean Baptiste Seìnac (born 1693, Lombez, France; died 1770), a French physician and chemist, best (...)

19He added that some considered these affinities to be disguised attractions, even more dangerous because the men who presented them were men of talent. The Academy obstinately showed an antipathy towards the theory of molecular attractions for fear of occult qualities. In fact, shortly after Geoffroy’s death, this theory was entirely adopted by Sénac in his work Nouveau cours de chimie, suivant les principes de Newton et de Stahl.40

  • 41 [The Marshal of Saxony is Maurice, Count of Saxony, better known as Maurice de Saxe (born 28 Octob (...)
  • 42 [Battle of Fontenoy (11 May 1745), a major engagement of the War of the Austrian Succession, fough (...)
  • 43 [Louis XV, see Lesson 1, note 40, above.]

20Sénac was more famous as a physician than as a chemist. He was born in 1693 in the diocese of Lombez. Protestant at birth, he converted to Catholicism and even became a professed Jesuit. He left the order shortly after to study medicine. He healed the Marshal of Saxony41 in 1746 from his injuries at the battle of Fontenoy,42 an achievement that made him universally famous. Six years later, he became the primary physician of the King of France,43 until his death in 1770.

  • 44 [Herman Boerhaave, see Volume 2, Lesson 1, note 78.]

21His chemistry treatise I mentioned above was written when he was young. He did not publish it himself. One of his pupils did, and even so almost fraudulently as indicated by the absence of the name of the author. The title indicates that the Stahlian ideas had reached France. They were adopted earlier in Germany even if some distinguished chemists did not adopt them while not refuting them, like Boerhaave,44 Stahl’s contemporary and his rival in physiology.

  • 45 [Charles Drelincourt (born 1 February 1633, Paris; died 31 May 1697, Leiden), a French physician w (...)
  • 46 [Jan Swammerdam (see Volume 2, Lesson 16, note 50), author of Biblia naturae; sive Historia insect (...)
  • 47 [Seìbastien Vaillant (see Volume 2, Lesson 18, note 31), author of Botanicon Parisiense ou deìnomb (...)

22Herman Boerhaave was born in 1668 in Voorhout, Holland. He was a professor at the University of Leiden after Drelincourt’s death,45 his longtime master. He simultaneously held the chairs of anatomy, botany, and physiology. His reputation as lecturer attracted pupils from all over Europe. He was also very famous in medicine and his wealth tremendously increased, not regrettably as he put it to the most laudable use: he was helping scholars, with both his money and reputation, and printed at his own expense any useful works that their authors were not able to publish. We owe him the printing of Swammerdam’s Bible of Nature,46 Vaillant’s Botanicon Parisiense,47 and other important works.

23He also contributed with his own publications. Today we will focus only on those on chemistry.

  • 48 [Elementa chemiae, quae anniversario labore docuit, in publicis, privatisque, scholis, Hermannus B (...)
  • 49 [Institutiones et experimenta chemiae, Paris: [s. n.], 1724, 2 vols, [2] + 290; [14] + 375 p.]
  • 50 [Albrecht von Haller, see Volume 2, Lesson 1, note 16.]
  • 51 [Gerard van Swieten (born 7 May 1700, Leiden; died 18 June 1772, Vienna), a Dutch-Austrian physici (...)

24Boerhaave’s Elements of Chemistry48 was only printed in 1732, after the publication of all of Stahl’s works. However, his students collected his ideas and published them in 1724.49 Some of his lectures at the university only became known in this way. Nothing was lost as his audience included very distinguished men like Haller,50 Van Swieten,51 etc. He also did not need an outside penman to assert his ideas: his treatise on chemistry was written with clarity and elegance, in a remarkable contrast with Stahl’s obscurity. However, if the form of his writing prevailed, his content was inferior. Stahl had a stronger perception of the subject of chemistry. Boerhaave defined chemistry as the art of operation of certain mutations on substances in order to produce specific effects. This definition does not express a special class of phenomena; it is still physics. He was not more accurate when describing salts, rocks, and metals. Like mineralogists, he focused on their external qualities. He sorted out that chemical phenomena were due to the changing position of material parts but he did not express the cause.

  • 52 [Otto Tachenius (born 1610, Herford, Westphalia; died 1680, Venice), a German, pharmacist, physici (...)
  • 53 [Franciscus Sylvius, born Franz de le Boë, better known as Sylvius de le Boë, see Volume 2, Lesson (...)

25While focusing on chemistry in his works, Boerhaave did not lose sight of physiology and searched for arguments to disprove the chemical-physiological theories introduced in Holland by Tachenius,52 Sylvius de le Boë,53 and other physicians from the same school. These authors stated that many vital phenomena were based on the effervescence produced from mixing liquids assumed to have acidic and alkaline proprieties. Boerhaave proved with experiments that when coming out of the body, most liquids like blood, lymph, milk, or pancreatic juice are neither acidic nor alkaline. Boerhaave’s research did not only include animal fluids. He also studied plant saps and can be considered as the founder of organic chemistry, neglected or only superficially addressed until then. Boerhaave does not specifically mention phlogiston in any of his works but refers to it when addressing the elements of fire (pabula ignis). He rejects the idea of the flame to be the combustible. He notes in general that it is often difficult to recognize if there is a real production or only deduction in chemical products. He rejects, rightly so, the explanation of the semi-alchemists on effervescence and finds absurd to attribute antipathies and passions to inert substances. However, his explanation, attributed to motion, which is not a cause but an effect, is not more satisfactory. Further down, he addresses dissolution by menstruum and notices the reciprocal action between the solvent and the dissolved substance, consistently with our current ideas. He insists on rejecting the agreement by alchemists of a universal menstruum.

  • 54 [Johann Friedrich Böttger (born 4 February 1682, Schleiz, Germany; died 13 March 1719, Dresden), a (...)
  • 55 It is said that the family of Baron [Darcy of] Chiche [a title in the Peerage of England], famous (...)

26While Boerhaave belonged to a period not too far from ours, the need to fight against the alchemical theories at the time is not surprising. Fifty-some books were published at the beginning of the eighteenth century claiming the possibility of metal transmutation. Some were candid expressions of men of good faith but many were the works of charlatans. Such charlatanry was not harmless; some alchemists lost their life after making to sovereigns some promises they could not keep. One of those poor devils was beheaded in 1605; another one was hanged in 1609. Others were imprisoned for a long time, including Baron Böttger,54 who, bored in captivity, did so many experiments to achieve transmutation that he discovered the composition of porcelain. This invention was a source of great wealth for Saxony.55

  • 56 [Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 126.]

27One could say that Fontenelle56 and the Academy of Sciences were the ones who contributed the most to destroy the illusion of metal transformation. They rendered a service to both dupes and charlatans as the latter were often forced to expiate with their life their uncertain promises.

28Messieurs, we have reached the end of the general theories related to Stahl’s. The works of the English school, at our next meeting, will complete the history of chemistry in the first half of the eighteenth century.

Anmerkungen

1 Comparisons help to name things when their nature is unknown. Therefore, the use of a figurative term for a science is a sign that progress is still required. Chemistry is no exception despite its immense advances since the end of the preceding century. [M. de St.-Agy]

2 [Middle Ages, see Volume 1, Lesson 21.]

3 [Basil Valentine, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 9.]

4 [Georg Ernst Stahl, see Volume 2, Lesson 9, note 90.]

5 [Robert Boyle, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 32.]

6 [John Mayow, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 68.]

7 [Joseph Priestley, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 88.]

8 [Henry Cavendish, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 77.]

9 [Phlogiston theory, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 37.]

10 [Johann Joachim Becher, see Volume 2, Lesson 9, note 89.]

11 [Physica subterranea, profundam subterraneorum genesin, e principiis hucusque ignotis, ostendens, opus sine pari, primum hactenus et princeps, Frankfurt: Hermannum aÌ Sande, 1664, [14] + 504 + [22] + 161 + [9] p.]

12 [Georg Ernst Stahl, see Volume 2, Lesson 9, note 90.]

13 [Georg Wolfgang Wedel (born 12 November 1645, Golssen, Niederlausitz, Habsburg Monarchy; died 6 September 1721, Jena, Saxe-Weimar), a German professor of surgery, botany, theoretical and practical medicine, and chemistry, well known for his published work on alchemy and pharmaceutical chemistry.]

14 [William Ernest (born 19 October 1662, Weimar, Germany; died 26 August 1728, Weimar, Germany), Duke of Saxe-Weimar from 1683-1728.]

15 [Friedrich Wilhelm, Elector of Brandenburg, see Volume 2, Lesson 6, note 26.]

16 [Friedrich Hoffman, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 100.]

17 [Friedrich Wilhelm, see note 15, above.]

18 [Torbern Olaf Bergman, see Volume 2, Lesson 9, note 1.]

19 [Henry Cavendish, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 77.]

20 [Joseph Priestley, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 88.]

21 [Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 78.]

22 [Editions of these two publications by Georg Ernst Stahl, as described by Cuvier, cannot be found. The 1697 edition of Zymotechnia Fundamentalis, seu fermentationis theoria generalis, qua nobilissimae hujus artis, et partis chymiae, utilissimae atque subtilissimae, causae et effectus in genere, ex ipsis mechanico-physicis principiis, summo studio eruuntur, simulque experimentum novum sulphur verum arte producendi, et alia utilia experimenta atque observata, inseruntur, was published at Halle (Typis & sumptibus Christoph. Salfeldii, [8] + 400 p., in-8°), although a subsequent edition was printed in Frankfurt in 1734. Stahl’s Observationes selectiores physico-chemico-medicae curiosae apparently first appeared in 1715, printed at Halle, Impensis Orphanotropheum, 130 p.]

23 [Specimen Becherianum fundamentorum documentorum experimentorum subjunxit, Leipzig: Joh. Ludov. Gleditschium, 1702, 304 p.]

24 [Zufällige Gedancken und nutzliche Bedencken über den streit von den sogenannten Sulphure, und zwar sowol dem gemeinen verbrennlichen, oder flüchtigen, als unverbrennlichen, oder fixen, Halle: In Verlegung des Wäysenhauses, 1718, [6] + 373 p.]

25 [Experimenta, observationes, animadversiones, CCC numero, chimicae et physicae, Berlin: Ambrosium Haude, 1731, 282 p.]

26 [Andreas Libau or Libavius, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 63.]

27 [Jean Rey, see Volume 2, Lesson 11, note 11.]

28 [Robert Boyle, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 32.]

29 [John Mayow, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 68.]

30 [Johann Juncker (born 23 December 1679, Londorf, Hessen; died 25 October 1759, Halle), a German physician, one of the most ardent defenders of the Halle physician Georg Ernst Stahl.]

31 [Conspectus chemiae theoricopracticae in forma tabularum repraesentatus, in quibus physica, praesertim subterranea et corporum naturalium principia, Halle: Impensis Orphanotropheum, 1730-1738, [8] + 1086 + [50] p.; [10] + 598 + [29] p.]

32 [Conspectus chemiae theoretico-practicae: Vollstændige Abhandlung der Chemie nach ihrem Lehr-begrif und der Ausübung, darin die Naturlehre, besonders von den Mineralien, der natürlichen Coerper ersten Bestandtheile, verhalten gegen einander, Eigenschaften, Kraefte und Gebrauch, zur wohlgegründeten und nützlichen Anwendung in der Apotheckerkunst, andern Künsten und Handwercken, der Hauswirthschaft und gemeinem Leben, vornehmlich nach Bechers und Stahls Grundlehren ausgeführt, und mit eben dieser, wie auch anderer berühmten chemicorum Erfahrungen bestaetiget werden, Halle: In Verlegung des Waysenhauses, 1749-1753, 3 vols, in-4°; Éleìmens de chymie, suivant les principes de Becker & de Stahl, traduits du Latin sur la IIe eìdition de M. Juncker, avec des notes, par M. Demachy, Paris: chez Simeìon-Prosper Hardy, 1757, 6 vols.]

33 [Isaac Newton, see Volume 2, Lesson 11, note 37.]

34 [See Lesson 2, note 32, above.]

35 [Opticks: or, a treatise of the reflexions, refractions, inflexions and colours of light, see Lesson 2, note 38, above.]

36 [Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier, see Volume 2, Lesson 10, note 78.]

37 [Étienne François Geoffroy, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 21.]

38 [Geoffroy’s tables of “affinities,” lists prepared by collating observations on the actions of substances one upon another, showing the varying degrees of affinity exhibited by analogous bodies for different reagents.]

39 [Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 126.]

40 [Jean Baptiste Seìnac (born 1693, Lombez, France; died 1770), a French physician and chemist, best remembered for important studies of the heart in an era when cardiological medicine was rudimentary. He is the author of Nouveau cours de chimie, suivant les principes de Newton et de Stahl, avec un discours historique sur l’origine & les progrez de la chymie, Paris: Jacques Vincent, 1723, lxvii + [3] + 796 p. (in 2 vols).]

41 [The Marshal of Saxony is Maurice, Count of Saxony, better known as Maurice de Saxe (born 28 October 1696, Goslar, Lower Saxony, Germany; died 20 November 1750, Château de Chambord) was a Franco-Saxon soldier in French service who became a Marshal and later also Marshal General of France.]

42 [Battle of Fontenoy (11 May 1745), a major engagement of the War of the Austrian Succession, fought between the forces of the Pragmatic Allies, comprising mainly Dutch, British, and Hanoverian troops, and a French army under Maurice de Saxe (see note 41, above), commander of King Louis XV’s forces in the Low Countries. The battle was one of the most important in the war and, although badly injured, Saxe was credited with its success.]

43 [Louis XV, see Lesson 1, note 40, above.]

44 [Herman Boerhaave, see Volume 2, Lesson 1, note 78.]

45 [Charles Drelincourt (born 1 February 1633, Paris; died 31 May 1697, Leiden), a French physician who held the chair of Medicine at Leiden University from 1668 until his death.]

46 [Jan Swammerdam (see Volume 2, Lesson 16, note 50), author of Biblia naturae; sive Historia insectorum in classes certas redacta: nec non exemplis, et anatomico variorum animalculorum examine, aeneisque tabulis illustrata, published posthumously in 1737 and 1738 (Leiden: Isaak Severinus, Boudewyn & Pieter Vander Aa, 2 vols, in-folio, [62] + 85 + [2] + 86-362 + [367]-550 + [2] p.; [4] + 551-910 + [36] + 124 (explanation of the plates) p., with engraved title vignettes and 53 folding engraved pls.; translated into English in 1758 as The Book of Nature, or the History of insects, London: C. G. Seyffert, 2 parts in 1, [6] + xx + [6] + 236; 153 + lxiii + [12] p., in-folio, 53 engraved pls), considered by many authorities to be the finest collection of microscopic observations ever produced by one person.]

47 [Seìbastien Vaillant (see Volume 2, Lesson 18, note 31), author of Botanicon Parisiense ou deìnombrement par ordre alphabeìtique des plantes qui se trouvent aux environs de Paris compris dans la carte de la preìvôteì& de l’eìlection de la dite ville par le sieur Danet Gendre anneìe 1722... Avec plusieurs descriptions des plantes, leurs synonymes, le tems de fleurir & de grainer. Et une critique des auteurs de botanique par Feu Monsieur Sebastien Vaillant,... enrichi de plus de trois cents figures, dessineìes par le Sieur Claude Aubriet, Leiden: Jean & Herman Verbeek; Amsterdam: Balthazar Lakeman, 1727, [29] + xii + map + 206 + [10] p., 33 pls.]

48 [Elementa chemiae, quae anniversario labore docuit, in publicis, privatisque, scholis, Hermannus Boerhaave, Leiden: Isaak Severinus, 1732, 2 vols, 605 p.; [2] + 538 + [46] p.]

49 [Institutiones et experimenta chemiae, Paris: [s. n.], 1724, 2 vols, [2] + 290; [14] + 375 p.]

50 [Albrecht von Haller, see Volume 2, Lesson 1, note 16.]

51 [Gerard van Swieten (born 7 May 1700, Leiden; died 18 June 1772, Vienna), a Dutch-Austrian physician and pupil of Herman Boerhaave (see Volume 2, Lesson 1, note 78). He played an important role in the fight against superstition during the enlightenment, particularly in the case of vampires reported from villages in Serbia in the years between 1718 and 1732.]

52 [Otto Tachenius (born 1610, Herford, Westphalia; died 1680, Venice), a German, pharmacist, physician, and alchemist who discovered silicic acid, the acid content in oils and fats, and explained the cleaning effect of soaps. He is the author of Hippocrates chemicus, per ignem et aquam methodo inaudita novissimi salis viperini antiquissima fundamenta ostendens (Venice: Combi & La Nouij, 1697, 460 + [4] p.), a defense of his “viperine salt” —which he described as a universal remedy and sold as his primary means of support— including a long discussion of the nature and use of alkalis in medicine.]

53 [Franciscus Sylvius, born Franz de le Boë, better known as Sylvius de le Boë, see Volume 2, Lesson 13, note 90.]

54 [Johann Friedrich Böttger (born 4 February 1682, Schleiz, Germany; died 13 March 1719, Dresden), a German alchemist, generally credited with being the first European to discover the secret of the creation of porcelain in 1708, but it has also been claimed that English manufacturers or Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus (German physicist, physician, and philosopher, born 10 April 1651, Kieslingswalde, now Sławnikowice in western Poland; died 11 October 1708, Dresden) produced porcelain first. Certainly, the Meissen factory, established in 1710, was the first to produce porcelain in Europe in large quantities and since the recipe was kept a trade secret by Böttger for his company, experiments continued elsewhere throughout Europe.]

55 It is said that the family of Baron [Darcy of] Chiche [a title in the Peerage of England], famous in Paris among all hunting enthusiasts, owes its immense wealth to the privilege of selling the first results of Böttger’s great discovery (see note 54, above). [M. de St.-Agy]

56 [Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, see Volume 2, Lesson 12, note 126.]

Abbildungsverzeichnis

Bildunterschrift Cerculus Æterni Motus. Frontispice from Becher’s Physica subterranea, profundam… (1733). Cliché Bibliothèque centrale, MNHN.
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