349 Reviews. — Liebig^s Organic Chemistry. 



]y useful to each other, and, by mutual experiment and ex- 

 perience, the most happy results accrue. 

 Dr. Liebig remarks, in his preface, 



Since the time of the immortal author of the " Agricultural Chem- 

 istry," no chemist has occupied himself in studying the applications 

 of chemical principles to the growth of vegetables, and to organic 

 processes. 1 have endeavored to follow the path marked out by Sir 

 Humphrey Davy, who based his conclusions only on that which was 

 capable of inquiry and proof. This is the path of true philosophical 

 inquiry, which promises to lead us to truth, — the proper object of 

 our research. 



In order to facilitate a more perfect understanding of the 

 work, an introduction, consisting of a simple treatise on the 

 first principles of chemistry, is added by the American edi- 

 tor. This, we are informed, was also selected from a work 

 of Prof. Liebig. 



Chapter I. introduces the reader to the object of the work. 



The object of organic chemistry is to discover the chemical condi- 

 tions which are essential to the life and perfect development of ani- 

 mals and vegetables, and, generally, to investigate all those proces- 

 ses of organic nature which are due to the operation of chemical 

 laws. 



The continued existence of all living beings is dependent on the 

 reception by them of certain substances, which are applied to the 

 nutrition of their frame. An inquiry, therefore, into the conditions 

 on which the life and growth of living beings depend, involves the 

 study of those substances which serve them as nutriment, as well as 

 the investigation of the sources whence these substances are derived, 

 and the changes which they undergo in process of assimilation. 



The primary source whence man and animals derive the means of 

 their growth and support is the vegetable kingdom. 



Plants, on the other hand, find new nutritive material only in inor- 

 ganic substances. 



The purport of this work is to elucidate the chemical processes 

 engaged in the nutrition of vegetables. 



It will be devoted to the examination of the matters which supply 

 the nutriment of plants, and of the changes which these matters un- 

 dergo in the living organism. The chemical compounds which afibrd 

 to plants their principal constituents, viz. carbon and nitrogen, will 

 come under consideration, as well as the relations in which the vital 

 functions of vegetables stand to those of the animal economy and to 

 other phenomena of nature. 



To insure the growth of plants 



Requires the presence, first, of substances containing carbon and 

 nitrogen, and capable of yielding these elements to the growing or- 

 ganism ; secondly, of water and its elements ; and lastly, of a soil to 

 furnish the inorganic matters which are likewise essential to vegeta- 

 ble life. 



