HISTORY OF THE ATOMIC THEORY. 189 



The most important sentences bearing on the subject of 

 Richter's volumes have been selected, including everything 

 which seems to indicate any knowledge of the subject. His 

 prolixity is excessive, every little idea is long dwelt upon, 

 and as an example of the small fear he had of too much 

 enlarging his book, it may be stated that he actually writes 

 a system of algebra in one of the volumes, because a little 

 algebra is wanted for the full understanding of his demon- 

 strations. It may be that there are sentences hidden among 

 other portions of the book less directly bearing on his subject 

 which would indicate great knowledge, for although I have 

 spent many days among his six volumes, I have certainly 

 omitted some parts which seemed to me out of the range of 

 stoechiometry. But his doctrines are not to be got in frag- 

 mentary sentences, so that the loss of any such sentences 

 cannot, in the least, affect the result. 



Richter's St(echiometry, Vol. I., Page 121. 



Definition 1. 



** Stoechiometry (stoechyometria) is the science of measuring 

 the quantitative proportions, or the proportions of the masses 

 in which chemical elements stand in regard to each other. 

 The mere knowledge of these relations might be called 

 * quantitative stoechiology.' 



Principle 1. P. 123. 



" Every infinitely small particle of the mass of an element 

 has an infinitely small part of the chemical attractive force or 

 aflBnity. 



Experience 5. 



" In order to make a neutral compound out of two elements, 

 it is needful, as each of the elements is of the same constitu- 

 tion at one time as at another, to take the same quantity for 

 the first part formed as for the second part. For example, if 



