234 BERZELIUS AND DR. ARNOTT. 



perature, in a thousand cases for one exception 

 and I have shown that the above examples 

 afford no real exceptions to the principle, but 

 confirm it that sulphate of soda and common 

 salt are far more soluble in water at 60 than 

 at 32 that lime and magnesia are perfectly 

 soluble in hot springs, which owe their solvent 

 power to intense subterranean heat. 



Berzelius supposes that the greater solubility 

 of lime and magnesia in cold than boiling water, 

 is owing to a portion of carbonic acid that is 

 almost always found combined with cold water ; 

 but which is driven off at a high temperature. 

 Whether this be regarded as a true explanation 

 of the fact or not, it is generally admitted by 

 chemists, that carbonic acid augments their 

 solubility in water. This however does not fully 

 resolve the problem, since the solubility of sul- 

 phate of soda increases with the temperature 

 from 32 to 70 F. and then diminishes slightly, 

 up to 212. 



Dr. Arnott admits, that the solution of a solid 

 in any gas or fluid menstruum is merely another 

 mode of melting it by heat that the menstruum 

 itself is fluid only because of the heat which it 

 contains. (Elements of Physics, vol. ii. p. 47.) 



This is a true statement as far as it goes ; 

 and it is highly probable, that if this philoso- 

 pher had renounced the inherent attractive pro- 

 perties of atoms, as Newton did on second 



