340 Analysis of Scientific Books. 



articles from old dispensatories, such as althea, chamomile, 

 Sfc." After this statement, he would be an unreasonable critic 

 who should censure Dr. Ure for having re-printed from the old 

 work several indifferently-written articles, since those which he 

 has himself composed, as denoted by asterisks, would con- 

 stitute nearly three volumes of the ordinary octavo form. 



The memoirs which have been published in the Philosophical 

 Transaciions, and in this journal, by Dr. Ure, would satisfy the 

 world, that, during his long career in public teaching, he 

 has not been a passive spectator of chemical events, but that 

 he has devoted a large proportion of his time to experimental 

 research, without which discipline, indeed, the demonstrations 

 of a Professor, however showy, will possess neither xmity of 

 design, nor authoritative force. He would become merely the 

 retailer of another's wares, of whose value, genuineness, and 

 mode of production, he was incompetent to judge. The dic- 

 tionary affords abundant evidence that its author does not be- 

 long to this class of teachers. 



The promise held out in the title-page seems to be honestly 

 fulfilled; for he has, on several important occasions, mwsi^afed 

 aiieiv the principles of chemical science ; and has, in conse- 

 quence, rectified many errors which had gained currency in our 

 compilations. His general views of chemical theory appear to 

 be, for the most part, much sounder than those which have 

 been re-echoed, with unvarying monotony, in what have been 

 called chemical systems. He has, in particular, bestowed 

 much pains in arranging the valuable facts belonging to the 

 English school of chemistry, which, originating with the fault- 

 less memoirs of Cavendish, Hatchett, and Howard, on the 

 Baconian plan of research, has finally, under Dalton, Wol- 

 laston, and Sir H. Davy, risen to undisputed pre-eminence 

 among the schools of Europe. The numerous facts incon- 

 sistent with the Lavoisierian creed are carefully detailed, and 

 the just inferences drawn from them, both with regard to the 

 theory of acidification and combustion. 



The general article Acid, in the dictionary, presents, in the 

 first place, Lavoisier's notion of the origin of acidity, with Ber- 

 thoUet's judicious remarks on it. Dr. Ure then exhibits Sir 

 H. Davy's more just and comprehensive views of acid con- 

 stitution ; and concludes with Dr. Murray's hypothetical mo- 

 dification of these views, which he successfully controverts. 



" The more recent investigations of chemists on fluoric, hydriodic, and 

 hydrocyanic acids have brought powerful analogies in support of the 

 cliloridic theory, by shewing that hydrogen alone can convert certain un- 

 decompounded bases into acids well characterized, without the aid of 

 oxygen. Dr. Murray indeed has endeavoured to revive and new-model the 

 early opinion of Sir H. Davy, concerning the necessity of the presence of 

 water, or its elements, to the constitution of acids. He conceives that many 

 acids are ternary compounds of a radical with oxygen and hydrogen ; but 

 that the two latter ingredients do not necessarily exist in them in the state 



