On Mr Faraday s Experimental Researches. 319 



ing only acid and alkaline matter/' which Mr Faraday's ex- 

 tended trials have confirmed. 



What can be more clear than this, -that my brother did not 

 consider water as essential to the formation of a voltaic combi-. 

 nation ? \Vhat can be more clear that he was acquainted with 

 the fact, that certain substances, non-conductors when solid, be- 

 come conductors when rendered fluid by heat; and that he be- 

 lieved that the property was common to other salts ? 



But Mr Faraday states that my brother, in this passage, " is 

 spcakino- of the production of electricity in the pile, and not of 

 its effects when evolved ; " nor (Mr Faraday adds) do his words 

 at all imply that any correction of his former distinct statements 

 relative to decomposition was required. ' 



This criticism does not appear to me just. Mr Faraday is 

 well aware that my brother considered chemical action and 

 decomposition as essential to the action of voltaic combinations. 

 How could the fused litharge and chlorate of potassa have 

 acted, unless they underwent decomposition .? It might as well 

 be supposed that they acted without conducting. Is, therefore, 

 Mr Faraday justified in wishing it to be understood that my 

 brother considered the fused sahne bodies as not undergoing de- 

 composition .? Surely it is not proper to judge of an author by 

 detached sentences; his general views ought to be taken into ac- 

 count ; and particular passages should be read and interpreted, 

 if required, according to those views, not the contrary, as Mr 

 Faraday has done, sacrificing the general views to particular pas- 

 sages, nowise to the advantage of the author ; which I am the 

 more surprised at, as Mr Faraday cannot plead ignorance of these 

 views, beheving him thoroughly conversant with the writings 

 in which they are contained ; and knowing how intimately he 

 was acquainted with them from their living source. Now, con- 

 sidering my brother's general doctrines on voltaic action, and on 

 electro^chemical decomposition, I see no shadow of reason for 

 the conclusions which Mr Faraday has arrived at, or the asser- 

 tions he has made. The first proof Uiat my brother had of de- 

 composition of the fixed alkalies, was in operating on them in a 

 fused state by voltaic electricity. He witnessed the separation 

 of their metallic bases at one extremity of the battery ; and de- 

 tected the evolution of oxygen at the other. At that time it 



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