326 LAVOISIER. 



panied his ' Elements.' She survived him many years, 

 and late in life was married to Count Kumford, whom 

 she also outlived. 



From the accurate detail into which I have entered 

 of Lavoisier's history, no difficulty remains in forming 

 an estimate of his merits as a great teacher of science. 

 He possessed the happiest powers of generalizing, and 

 of applying them to the facts which others had dis- 

 covered, often making important additions to those 

 facts ; always, where any link was wanting to connect 

 them, either together or with his conclusions, supply- 

 ing that link by judiciously-contrived experiments of 

 his own. He may most justly be said to have made 

 some of the most important discoveries in modern 

 times, and to have left the science of chemistry with 

 its bounds extended very far beyond those within 

 which he had found it confined when his researches 

 began. 



It is, however, fit that we make the important dis- 

 tinction between the two classes of his theories : those 

 which being founded upon a rigorous induction, and not 



Eushed beyond the legitimate conclusions from certain 

 tcts, stand as truths to this day, and in all probability 

 will ever retain their place ; and those which, carried 

 incautiously or daringly beyond the proper bounds of 

 him who is only naturae minister et interpres* have 

 already been overthrown never, indeed, having re- 

 posed upon solid foundations. 



1. Of the first class is his important doctrine of cal- 

 cination justly termed by him, oxidation, by which 

 he overthrew the leading doctrine of Stahl, and showed 

 that metals do not part with anything in passing from 

 the reguline state, but, on the contrary, absorb and fix 

 a gas proved by other philosophers to be oxygen 

 s.^ ^This^his capital discovery, stands, and in all pro- 

 bility will ever stand, the test of every inquiry. 



* Bacon. 



