^l^ Mr. T. S. Hmit on the Theory of Chemical Changes, 



^ilfhfch metamorphosis sustains a less important part. By union 

 we rise to indefinitely higher species ; but in division a limit is 

 met with, in the production of species which seem incapable of 

 -further division, and these, being regarded as primary or original 

 %pecies, ai*e called chemical elements. These two processes con- 

 tinually alternate with each other, and a species produced by the 

 first may yield by division species unlike its parents. From 

 this succession results double decomposition or equivalent substi- 

 iution^which always involves a union followed by division, although 

 under the ordinary conditions the process cannot be arrested at 

 the intermediate stage. 



The prevalence of certain modes of division in related species, 

 has given rise to the different hypotheses of copulates and radi- 

 cals, which have been made the ground of systems of classifica- 

 tion ; but these hypotheses are based on the notion of dualism, 

 which has no other foundation than the observed order of gene- 

 ration, and can have no place in the theory of the science. A 

 body may divide into two or more new species, yet it is evident 

 'that these did not pre-exist in it, from the fact that a different 

 ^division may yield other species whose pre-existence is incompa- 

 tible with the last ; nor can the pre-existence of any species but 

 those which we have called primary, be admitted as possible. 

 ^Apart from these considerations, it is to be remarked that our 

 Science has to do only with phsenomena, and no hypothesis as to 

 the noumenon or substance of a species under examination, 

 based upon its phsenomena, or those of its derived species, can 

 ever be a subject of science, for it transcends all sensible know- 

 ledge. ' "i> .:-'.h Ks •ifOUiVIiJjKf 



For these reasons, 'it i^ conceived that the notion of pre-existi^ 

 elements or groups of elements, should find no place in the the- 

 ory of chemistry. Of the relation which subsists between the 

 higher species, and those derived from them, we can only assert 



ithe possibility, and under proper conditions, the certainty of 

 producing the one from the other. Ultimate chemical analyses, 

 and the formulas deduced from them, serve to show what changes 

 are possible in any body, or to what new species it may give rise 

 by its changes. 



Chemical union is interpenetration, as Kant has taught, and 



< not juxtaposition, as conceived by the atomistic chemists. When 

 bodies unite, their bulks, like their specific characters, are lost 

 in that of the new species. Gases and vapours unite in the pro- 

 portion of one volume of each, or in some other simple ratio, and 

 the resulting species in the gaseous state occupies one volume, 

 so that the specific gravity of the new species is the sum of those 



\.of its factors. Tlie converse of this is tme in division, and the 



-united volumes of the resulting species are some simple multiple 



