204 CHEMICAL ATTRACTION. 



dicated of electricity, unless we admit, that, in 

 its latent or combined state, it is identical with 

 the omnipresent igneous fluid. It is impossible 

 to imagine any thing more at variance with 

 common sense and the universal experience of 

 mankind, than the supposition that caloric is 

 the offspring of electricity-r-or that a universal 

 agent should be the effect of any other power 

 which is not universal. It would be quite as 

 rational to maintain that the ocean, from which 

 all the waters of the earth are derived, is pro- 

 duced by the perpetual influx of rivers from the 

 dry land. 



2. Another objection to the electro-chemical 

 theory arises from the fact, that bodies which 

 are assumed to be in the same electric state, 

 unite chemically. 



For example, oxygen combines with chlorine, 

 fluorine, iodine, and bromine, making chloric, 

 fluoric, iodic, and bromic acids ; while sulphur, 

 phosphorus, carbon, hydrogen, and the metals, 

 which are considered to be in an opposite state 

 of electricity from the above elements, combine 

 chemically with each other as well as with 

 oxygen, chlorine, &c. Besides, it is not true 

 that oxygen, chlorine, iodine, and bromine, are 

 uniformly in the same electric state ; for it is 

 very well known that when chloric acid is de- 

 composed, its elements are conveyed to different 

 poles of the battery that when sulphurous and 



