A history of chemistry from earliest times to the present day : being also an introduction to the study of the science / by Ernst von Meyer ; translated with the author's sanction by George M'Gowan.

Date:
1891
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A history of chemistry from earliest times to the present day : being also an introduction to the study of the science / by Ernst von Meyer ; translated with the author's sanction by George M'Gowan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    truth had been well proved, being overlooked for so long to such an extent; and, further,when these did come to be finally appreciated, of the merit of their discovery being minimised so far as regarded the discoverer himself, and wrongly ascribed in great part to another. It was only long after his death that Eichter's services were recognised to their full extent.^ Starting from the observation that the neutrahty is not disturbed by the mutual decomposition of two neutral salts, he created the doctrine of equivalents; he was the originator of Stbchio- metry, ^ the art of chemical measurement, which has to deal with the laws according to which substances unite to form chemical compounds. Josephe Louis Proust.—The work of this investigator, who, independently of Eichter, also partially proved the validity of the law of chemical proportions, fell later in point of time than the most important of Eichter's researches. Born at Angers in 1755, Proust went through EoueUe's course of study, and then applied his knowledge of pharmacy and chemistry at first as manager of the apothecary's shop attached to the Salpetri^re Hospital in Paris, and later as a teacher in different Spanish universities. It was in Madrid, where he settled after 1791, that he carried out his most celebrated investigations. The war deprived Inm both of his post and of his splendidly equipped laboratory m 1808, and it was only towards the end of his life that his necessities were reheved by a pension, while he was at the 1 Cf especially C. Lbwig's memoir, Jeremias Benjamin Jlichter,der Ent- decker der cJicmischen Proportioncn (Breslau, 1874) [Jeremias Benjamm Star he Discoverer of Chemical Proportions (Breslan, 1874)]. Accordmg to SrRicMer-s work was particularly emphasised by Gehlen. Schwei^er and Berzelius. The discovery of the law of neutralisation waa ascribed by SLlfus to Wenzel, in consequence of a misunderstanding on the part of the former- and it was left to hI Hess of St. Petersburg to point out this error, fliii-tv-three years after Richter's death. . E^cSimself says that he was unable to devise a better name for this t^.nZZvd''StMlctric, from <rro.xero., signifying something which can- MnrC divided, and .erp.lu, which denotes the finding out of relative proportions.