THE ALUMNI JOURNAL. 



255 



Like many other great discoveries in 

 science, the artificial formation of natural 

 products began, as in the case of alcohol 

 and urea, with observations arising from 

 experiments not primarily directed to 

 this end. It was not until the theory of 

 chemical structure had risen to a rank of 

 a scientific guide that the move compli- 

 cated syntheses were rendered possible 

 by more exact methods. We justly 

 credit structural chemistry with these 

 triumphant achievements. In arriving 

 at such results any defects in the theory 

 of structure are put out of consideration 

 because — and this point must never be 

 lost sight of— all doubt as to the possibil- 

 ity of this or that atomic grouping being 

 stable is set aside at the outset by the 

 actual occurrence of the compound in the 

 nature. The investigator starts with the 

 best of all assurances. From the time of 

 Wohler and Hennell the course in dis- 

 covery in this field has gone steadily on. 

 The announcement of a new synthesis 

 has ceased to produce that excitement 

 which it did in the early days when the 

 so-called "organic" compounds were re- 

 garded as products of a special vital 

 force. The interest among the uninitiated 

 now rises in proportion to the technical 

 value of the compound. The present list 

 of 1 80 odd synthetical products comprises, 

 among the latest discoveries, gentisin, 

 the coloring matter of the gentian root 

 {Gcntiana luted), which has been pre- 

 pared by Kostanecki and Tambor, and 

 caffeine, synthesized by Emil Fischer and 

 L,orenz Ach, starting from dimethylurea 

 and malonic acid. 



I have allowed myself no time for those 

 prophetic flights of the imagination which 

 writers on this subject generally indulge 

 in. When we know more about the 

 structure of highly complex molecules, 

 such as starch and albumin, we shall 

 probably be able to synthesize these 

 compounds. It seems to me more im- 



portant just at present to come to an 

 understanding as to what is meant by an 

 organic synthesis. There seems to be an 

 impression among many chemists that a 

 synthesis is only effected when a com- 

 pound is built upon simpler molecules. 

 If the simpler molecules can be formed 

 directly from their elements, then the 

 synthesis is considered complete. Thus 

 urea is a complete synthetical product, 

 because we can make hydrogen cyanide 

 from its elements; from this we can pre- 

 pare a cyanate, and finally urea. In 

 dictionaries and text-books we find syn- 

 thetical processes generally separated 

 from modes of formation, and the latter 

 in their turn kept distinct from methods 

 of preparation. The distinction between 

 formation and preparation is obviously a 

 good one, because the latter has a practi- 

 cal significance tor the investigator. But 

 the experience gained in drawing up the 

 tables of synthesized compounds, to 

 which I have referred, has resulted in the 

 conclusion that the terms "synthesis" 

 and "mode of formation" have been 

 either unnecessarily confused or kept dis- 

 tinct without sufficient reason, and that 

 it is impossible now to draw a hard-and- 

 fast line between them. Some recent 

 writers, such for example, as Dr. Karl 

 Elbs, in his admirable work on this sub- 

 ject ("Die synthetischen Darstellungs- 

 methoden der Kohlenstoffverbindungen," 

 Leipzig, 1889),- have expanded the mean- 

 ing of the word synthesis so as to com- 

 promise generally the building up of or- 

 ganic molecules by the combination of 

 carbon with carbon, without reference to 

 the circumstance whether the compound 

 occurs as a natural product or not. But 

 although this definition is sufficiently 

 wide to cover the whole field of the pro- 

 duction of carbon compounds from less 

 complex molecules, it is in some respects 

 too restricted, because it excludes such 

 well-known cases as the formation of 



