92 DR. GOODMAN ON LIGHT, HEAT, ETC. 



Potassium is thus found to develop a vast amount 

 of caloric, and to evince calorific phenomena of which 

 no other solid substance in nature is capable — and 

 therefore, it is more than probable that its extraordinary 

 chemical and electrical powers are derived from the quan- 

 tity of absolute caloric which it contains. So far as the 

 analogy of chemical and electrical phenomena is shown 

 by their being the most strongly marked in the same sub- 

 stance, so far equally is it manifested that chemical and 

 electrical phenomena are truly phenomena of heat, — since 

 heat is the existence which at all times so abundantly, and 

 beyond all other forces, predominates in this substance, in 

 which these phenomena are displayed in the highest degree. 



Lastly — If it is evidently manifested in my former paper 

 that chemical and electrical phenomena are one and the 

 same thing, because the substance producing the highest 

 chemical affinities develops also the highest electrical 

 phenomena ; so now it is equally shown that chemical and 

 electrical forces and caloric are one and the same thing, 

 because the substance manifesting the highest chemical 

 and electrical powers, develops also in all its phenomena, 

 both of a mechanical and chemical nature, the highest or 

 most intense quantity of heat. 



the opinion given at the meeting of the British Association in 1844, and 

 published in their report : — "That these existences are but the accidental 

 and varied forms (or modifications) of one universal fluid," whose essential 

 qualities in all instances are invariably identicaL 



