MEMOIR OF THE LATE DR. HENRY. 131 
their efficacy is weakened instead of being con- 
firmed by needless iteration. It is enough if a 
writer, on asubject full of these proofs, presents 
them first apart from each other, and then in 
combination, in clear, plain and unaffected lan- 
guage, to the understanding of the reader, and 
contents himself with a general but forcible 
impulse towards the conclusions respecting their 
causation, which have forced themselves upon 
his own mind. A work of this kind, executed 
as it ought to be, would be a foundation for a 
just reputation to its author, and for a more 
durable one than can be raised by any abstract 
of the state of technical chemistry, which how- 
ever well executed at the time, must soon be 
rendered obsolete by the rapid march of dis- 
covery, while the great and leading principles 
of chemical philosophy will stand unimpeached 
and unchanged landmarks to guide those, who 
are in search of truth. There would too, I think, 
be great utility in such a work, because in- 
dependently of all such tendency as that to 
which I have alluded, it would place the reader 
on a station from whence he might enjoy a 
distinct view of the surrounding world, of that 
world with which he is brought closely into 
contact, and with which he is every hour con- 
versant, but whose most beautiful arrangements 
