42 A CHEMICAL TRIAD. 



over and the sentence passed, invoked the mercy of the trium- 

 virate ! Alas ! they had none. He set forth Lavoisier's dis- 

 coveries, his many acts of benevolence, his charity, his other 

 excellent qualities : all in vain Lavoisier was to die. 



The philosopher did not murmur; meekly he submitted 

 himself to the impending fate. One request he made, and 

 only one ; any individual a shade less vile than Robespierre 

 would have granted it. 



c Let me live a few more days,' said he, ( to see the result 

 of some experiments now going on.' 



<Bah!' replied Coffinhall, the president of the judicial 

 conclave, who had been sitting on the mock trial ; ' the re- 

 public doesn't want philosophers. Away with him !' 



Thus mournfully ended the mortal career of Antoine 

 Laurent Lavoisier. 



I have already adverted to the revolution which this 

 great man accomplished in the science of chemistry. Two 

 great truths, made known by him, I have already related. 

 He made several other discoveries ; but Lavoisier is chiefly 

 known by the nomenclature which he devised, and which, 

 somewhat modified to suit advancing necessities, is still re- 

 tained by chemists. Before the time of Lavoisier, chemical 

 substances were known by arbitrary names. Thus, the che- 

 mist Glauber, having discovered a certain salt, called it after 

 his own name, i Glauber's salt' a name which conveys no 

 knowledge of its composition. According to the nomencla- 

 ture of Lavoisier, it is called e sulphate of soda,'* a compound 

 term, indicative of its being made up of sulphuric acid (oil of 

 vitriol) and soda. Again, before his time, a certain gas the 

 gas which maintains vitality when breathed was called by 

 one of several vague names. Lavoisier, finding this gas a 

 constituent of some acids all that were known to him and 

 imagining that it was the universal acidifying principle, called 



* Now more generally sodium sulphate, on the assumption that not sul- 

 phuric acid, but a function of sulphuric acid, unites with not soda, but sodium. 



