HISTORY OF COLD AND THK ABSOLUTE ZERO. 



By Prof. James Dewak, M. A., LL.D., D. Sc, F. R. S. 



It Wii.s Tj'ndair.s good fortune to appear before you at a moment 

 when a fruitful and comprehensive idea was vivifying the wliole 

 domain of scientitie thought. At the present time no such broad gen- 

 eralization presents itself for discussion, while, on the othiM- iiaiid, the 

 numl)er of specialized studies has enormously increased. Science is 

 advancing in so Inoad a front ])y th(^ eti'orts of so great an army of 

 workers that it would be idle to attemj)t, within the limits of an 

 address to the most indulgent of audienc<\s, anything like a survey 

 of chemistry alone. But 1 have thought it might ])e instructi\e, and 

 perhaps not iminteresting, to trace briefly in broad outline the devel- 

 opment of that l)ranch of study with which my own lal)ors have been 

 recently more intimatel}' connected — a study which I trust I am not 

 too partial in thinking is as full of philosophical interest as of expei'i- 

 mental difficulty. The nature of heat and cold must have engaged 

 thinking men fi'oni the ver}' earliest dawn of speculation ujwn the 

 external world; ])ut it will suffice for the present purpose if, dis- 

 regarding ancient philosophers and even medieval alchemists, we 

 take up the sul>ject Avhere it stood after the great revival of learn- 

 ing, and as it was regarded ])y the father of the inductive method, 

 That this wa's an especially attractive subject to Bacon is evident 

 from the fre<|uencv with which he recurs to it in his diti'erent 

 works, always with lamentation over the inadeciuacy of the means 

 at disposal for obtaining a considerable degree of cold. Thus, 

 in the chapter in the Natural History, "Sylva Sylvarum,''' entitled 

 '"'' Experiments in consort touching the production of cold," he says, 

 ''The production of cold is a thing very worthy of the iiKjuisition both 

 for the use and the disclosure of causes. For heat and cold are natui'c's 

 two hands whereby she chiefly worketh, and heat we have in readiness 

 in respect of the tire, but for cold we must sta}^ till it cometh or seek 



"Presidential address before British Association for the Advancement of. Science, 

 at Belfast nieetinfr, 1902, re])rinte(l, after revision by the author, from pamphlet copy 

 of the address. The introductory part of the address, relating to other topics, is 

 omitted. 



207 



