82" Chemical PJulosbpfiij: 



which holds a high place in modern systems of 

 chifinistry. Some other distinguishing properties 

 of this air, and the relations which it sustains tcv 

 various bodies, were further investigated by Dr. 

 Rutherford, Professor Macbride, Mr. Lane^. 

 and others. 



Im-mediately succeeding to these brilliant disco- 

 veries, were those of Mr. Henry Cavendish, who^ 

 in 1766, with more success than any preceding in- 

 quirer, exantined the nature, and ascertained the 

 properties of iv flammable (or hydrogen) air; and a- 

 few years afterwards made the grand discovery of 

 the composition of water ^ which was destined soor^- 

 to become the corner-stone of a new theory. In 

 the mean time, Sir Torbern Bergman^, an illus- 

 trious Swede, was busily engaged in exploring the- 

 same department of philosophy. In the course of 

 his inquiries, he threw great light on the subject 

 of elective attra-ctions ; enlarged and explained 

 more satisfactorily the tables of affinities; gave 

 much new and valuable information, relating tO' 

 the constitution of ^'(^/a'Z/z/c and other mineral sub- 

 stances; made a considerable reform in the no- 

 menclature of the science, and accomplished 

 so large an amount of improvement, that he 

 may be justly styled one of the great fathers of 

 chemistry. Contemporary with Bergman was his 

 celebrated countryman Scheele, one of the most 

 extraordinary men and distinguished philosaphers 

 ©f the age in which he lived. He has been justly 

 called the Newton of chemistry. Without the aid 

 of education or of wealth, his genius burst forth, 

 and shone with astonishing lustre; insomuch that 

 at the age of forty-four, when he died — an age at 

 which most other great men have but begun to at- 

 tract public attention — he had finished a career of 

 discoveries which have no equal in the annals of 

 themistrv, Ik made new and ingenious anatyses of 



