Dr. Hare on the Chemical Nomenclature of Berzelius. 253 
most part, are more worthy of being considered as salts than the 
latter ; nor whereupon the amphide compounds resulting in the 
one case, are to be considered as acids or bases, according to their 
relation to the voltaic poles, more than are the haloid compounds 
resulting in the other. 
Your nomenclature and your classification, are founded on the 
words acid, salt, and base, and yet you have not given any con- 
sistent definition of the ideas to be attached to either. These 
words have been shown to be employed by you in different 
senses, whether as respects composition or properties. 
On this subject you will find the following comments in my 
letter to Prof. Silliman above quoted. 
‘“‘ An attempt to reconcile the definitions of acidity given by 
Prof. Berzelius, with the sense in which he uses the word acid, 
will, in my apprehension, increase the perplexity. It is alleged 
in his Traite, page 1, Vol. II, ‘that the name of acid is given to 
silica and other feeble acids, because they are susceptible of com- 
bining with the ovides of electro-positive metals, that is to say 
with salifiable bases, and thus to produce salts, which is precisely 
the principal character of acids.’ Again, Vol. I, page 308, 
speaking of the halogene elements, he declares that ‘ their combi- 
nations with hydrogen, are not only acids, but belong to a series 
the most puissant that we can employ in chemistry ; and in this 
respect they rank as equals with the strongest of the acids, into 
which oxygen enters as a constituent principle.’ And again, 
Vol. II, page 162, when treating of hydracids formed with the 
halogene class, he alleges, ‘ The former are very powerful acids, 
truly acids, and perfectly like the oracids ; but they do not com- 
bine with salifiable bases; on the contrary, they decompose them 
and produce haloid salts.’ 
“In this paragraph, the acids in question are represented as 
pre-eminently endowed with the attributes of acidity, while at 
the same time they are alleged to be destitute of his ‘ princi- 
pal character of acids, the property of combining with salifiable 
“In page 41 of the same volume, treating of the acid consist- 
ing of two volumes of oxygen and one of nitrogen, considered 
by chemists generally as a distinct acid, Berzelius uses the 
following language. ‘If I have not coincided in their view, it 
is because, judging by what we know at present, the acid in 
Vol. xxix, No. 2.—July-Sept. 1845. 33 
