248 LAVOISIER. 



and full four months after his expression of surprise, 

 that he made the experiments which he many years 

 afterwards thought it not unbecoming to affirm, had 

 led him to the discovery about the same time with 

 Priestley. I will venture to assert that no one, however 

 little conversant with the rules of probability, or accus- 

 tomed to weigh testimony, can hesitate a moment in 

 drawing the conclusion, that M. Lavoisier never at any 

 time made this discovery; that he intruded himself 

 into the history of it, knowing that Priestley was its 

 sole author ; and that, in all likelihood, he covered over 

 to himself this unworthy proceeding, so lamentable 

 in the conduct of a truly great man, by the notion 

 that he differed with Priestley in his theory of the 

 gas the one conceiving it to be a peculiar air deprived 

 of phlogiston, and capable of taking it from inflammable 

 gases; the other holding it to be air which unites to 

 inflammable bodies, and precipitates its heat and light 

 in forming the union. But all must admit that the 

 air was a newly discovered substance, a gas wholly 

 different from all other gases formerly known ; and that 

 therefore, whatever might be the theory, the question of 

 fact regarded the bringing this new substance to light. 

 No self-deception, therefore, can vindicate M. Lavoisier 

 for either the statement in his Memoir, suppressing all 

 mention of Dr. Priestley's communication, or the still 

 more reprehensible statement in his ' Elements/ suppress- 

 ing the trifling confession of Priestley's priority. With 

 respect to Scheele the case is wholly different. What 

 Priestley had discovered in 1 774, he discovered the year 

 following, without being aware that he had been antici- 

 pated. His process, too, was wholly different from 

 Priestley's, whereas Lavoisier's was the very same. Of 



