Copy 1, Volume 1

A system of theoretical and practical chemistry / By Fredrick Accum.

  • Friedrich Accum
Date:
1803
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A system of theoretical and practical chemistry / By Fredrick Accum. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    have an evil spirit confined in the pommel of his sword. In- deed, many of the adherents of alchemy endeavoured to enforce the belief of charms and spells; Paracelsus, the most impe- tuous man, who, in ostentation and lies surpassed all his pre- decessor alchemists, promised immortality in this world to his followers, but his premature death, which happened in’ 1541, exposed his vanity, and blasted all their hopes, It would surpass our limits, were we to give a circumstantial detail of the state of the chemical arts at that period. It will be readily conjectured, that owing to the great numbers of experi- ments which were performed amongst the alchemists, many va- Juable discoveries must have been made unintentionally. The alchemists actually collected a rich store of important chemical facts, and if they did not succeed in drawing gold from their furnaces, they produced those materials on which the true science of chemistry was afterwards erected: for as yet the science of chemistry did not exist. At the end of the seventeenth century chemistry began to as- sume a scientific form. ‘The scattered chemical facts which the alchemist had discovered were collected, arranged, and reduced to principles. The first chemical writer that excites our notice is Becher, This man collected all the facts which were noticed before him, and pointed out many important objects to which the researches of chemists ought to be directed. The publication of his Physica Subterranea, in 1669, forms a very important era in the history of chemistry. At that period chemistry escaped for ever from the trammels of alchemy, and became the rudiments of the science which we find at present. Becher distinguished himself so highly by his chemical knowledge as to cause the names of all former theorists to be forgotten, after having laid the foundation to the famous system of phlogiston, He died in the year 1682. Soon after his death arose one of his pupils, whose name was Stahl, He simplified and improved the doctrine of his master so much that he made it entirely his own; and accordingly it
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