Kirwanian Society. 155 



referable to the same cause. It was also considered improbable 

 that the continuance of the arborization should be dependent on 

 the decomposition of water; 



Several arguments and experiments were then adduced to 

 show that these phaenomena depend upon laws of chemical af- 

 finity which have been hitherto overlooked. The affinity of one 

 body for another will be modified, and even altered in a singular 

 manner, by the contiguity of a third. This law of affinity was 

 isuj)ported by a copious collection of experiments. Arborizations 

 in several of their varieties and circumstances were investigated, 

 and referred for explanation to the general inferences from the 

 preceding facts. The result of a great number of experiment', 

 proved that the order of the changes produced on the affinities 

 of bodies bv the proximity of a third, exactly corresponds with 

 the order in wliich metals precipitate each other in the metallic 

 state from their solutions. 



Jan. 11. The reading was continued. Some considerations 

 were adduced to show that affinity is a force existing between 

 everv species of matter ; and even between those that apparently 

 exert no action on each other. The principle before stated, 

 namely, that the attraction of one body for another will be pecu- 

 liarly modified by the contiguity of a third, was referred to ; and 

 it was shown that this change is reciprocal, the third body suf- 

 fering a change of another nature by the contiguity of the first. 

 Considerations were then offered, from which it was deemed ne- 

 cessarv to admit a division of bodies into two grand classes ac- 

 cording to their species of affinity. The foregoing principles 

 with some others of less consequence were supposed capable of 

 explaining not only the internal action of the galvanic series, hxLt 

 also the effects produced by galvanism on other bodies. It was 

 stated, tiiat for reasons elsewhere assigned* the author conceived 

 galvanic phsnomenatobe unconnected with electricity any further 

 than that the latter is a concomitant power ; and it was supposed 

 that every fact can be better explained without the agency of that 

 power. 



The variou? phaenomena of decomposition were then referred for 

 explanation to the new principles, and some were adduced which 

 have never been hitherto satisfactorily accounted for^ and which 

 were considered reconcilaVjle to these views. Some new facts re- 

 lating to the internal action of the galvanic series were also no- 

 ticed, which militate with modern theories, but do not oppose that 

 now proposed. The power of the series in producing electricity, 



• III ail essay presented by t!ie Author to the itoyal Irisli Academy on 

 the theories of galvanism, and thoir influence on the doctrines of che- 

 mistry, &c.-, whicli was lionourcd by that karncd body with the prize. 



effects 



