152 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY. 



repeated, before the Academy of Berlin, all the 

 fundamental experiments; and "the result was a 

 full conviction on the part of Klaproth and the 

 Academy, that the Lavoisierian theory was the true 

 one 12 ." Upon the whole, the introduction of the 

 Lavoisierian theory in the scientific world, when 

 compared with the great revolution of opinion to 

 which it comes nearest in importance, the intro- 

 duction of the Newtonian theory, shows, by the 

 rapidity and temper with which it took place, a 

 great improvement, both in the means of arriving 

 at truth, and in the spirit with which they were 

 used. 



Some English writers 13 have expressed an opi- 

 nion that there was little that was original in the 

 new doctrines. But if they were so obvious, what 

 are we to say of eminent chemists, as Black and 

 Cavendish, who hesitated when they were presented, 

 or Kirwan and Priestley, who rejected them ? This 

 at least shows that it required some peculiar in- 

 sight to see the evidence of these truths. To say 

 that most of the materials of Lavoisier's theory 

 existed before him, is only to say that his great 

 merit was, that which must always be the great 

 merit of a new theory, his generalization. The 

 effect which the publication of his doctrines pro- 

 duced, shows us that he was the first person who, 



18 Thomson, vol. ii. p. 136. 



13 Brande, Hist. Diss. in Enc. Brit. p. 182. Lunn, 

 in Enc. Met. p. 596. 



