, 182 Biography of Berzelius. 
ways acid when it contains oxygen in a proportion greater than is 
necessary to form water; that by an excess of hydrogen, resinous, 
oleaginous, or alcoholic substances were formed; and lastly, that 
when oxygen and hydrogen were present in the same proportions 
as in water, these substances were neither acid nor resinous, but 
re. 
ented themselves with remarking, that they contained a 
greater quantity of hydrogen than was necessary to form water 
with the oxygen present, and that it was united with nitrogen in 
the form of ammonia. ' . 
Gay-Lussac and Thenard had burnt the organic substances by 
means of chlorate of potash, in a special form of apparatus; Ber- 
zelius borrowed from them the use of chlorate of potash, but his 
mode of combustion was incomparably more advantageous. He 
novelty of the subject presented many difficulties. But al- 
though afterwards the methods of analysis were greatly sif™- 
plified and improved, still the analytical results obtained by him 
in his investigation of organic substances have proved to be re 
ganic bo ies. his observation led to the view which rega@ 
organic bodies as oxyds, whose radicals, however, are compound, 
while in the inorganic bodies they are simple. This view at first 
attracted little notice among chemists, and was not till long after 
wards recognized as correct by many, after the number of fantas 
ic ideas of the composition of organic bodies had created 
earnest desire for a rational and consistent theory 
