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Taylor and Francis, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street, E.C. ADVERTISEMENTS continued on 3rd page of Cover. XII. Remarks on Affinity. By M. DUMAS*. WHAT HAT is the force which causes simple substances to unite with other simple substances to form compounds-acids with bases to form salts, quicklime with water to form slaked lime, carbon to burn in air, iron to become covered with rust? This force we do not know. We are merely aware that it is only exerted when bodies are in apparent contact, that it becomes inappreciable when the distance of the bodies is appreciable, that, although the mass of bodies may come into play in the phenomena which it produces, their nature exerts the preponderating action. We designate it as affinity. I do not propose to retrace here the history of affinity since the first appearance of this word in the doctrines of chemistry, now more than two centuries ago. I have explained elsewhere the successive interpretations which have been given to it by Barchusen, who first used it, Boerhaave, who fixed the meaning, Geoffroy, who thought he had discovered the laws, and Berthollet, who did really formulate them for a great number of phenomena. I should even not have allowed myself to place before the Academy this fragment borrowed from the exposition of the last researches of French chemists, if, in order to show their import, I had not been led to place them in parallel with the principles established by Newton at the close of the long researches to which he devoted himself to account for the nature of chemical reactions. * Translated from the Comptes Rendus, September 21, 1868. Phil. Mag. S. 4. Vol. 37. No. 247. Feb. 1869. G |