TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 35 



I do not know tliat the industry of M. de la Bastio's mind was excited by 

 Bacon's mention of glass more strong for falls and for fire among things hitherto 

 only desired and not had ; but the conception of such an enumeration seems to 

 me worthy of its author. Much fruitless and discouraging labour might be saved, 

 a stimulus might be given to experimental inquiry, and chemical research might 

 become more systematic and thus more productive, if Bacon's example were 

 followed by the leaders of Chemistry at the present day. 



The Council of tlie Pharmaceutical Conference, whose meeting has just pre- 

 ceded our own, has published a list of subjects for research which they commend 

 to the attention of Chemists. Where one of these subjects has been undertaken 

 by any Chemist his name is appended to it. Might not the representatives of 

 Scientific Chemistry issue a similar list ? 



Perliaps two or three of the distinguished English Chemists who are members 

 of this Association might be willing to serve on a Committee, which should put 

 itself into communication with the leaders of Chemical inquiry abroad, and 

 should make and obtain and publish suggestions of subjects for research. Such a 

 list so got together would, I think, find a welcome place in all scientific journals, 

 and would thus be widely known and easily accessible to every student. 



That which chiefly makes the organization of Chemical inquiry desirable is the 

 boundless extent of the field upon which we have entered. Not every fact, how- 

 ever laboriously attained and rigorously proved, is an important fact in Chemistry 

 any more than in other branches of knowledge. Our aim is to discover the laws 

 which govern the transformations of matter ; and we are occupied in amassing a 

 vast collection of receipts for the preparation of different substances, and facts as 

 to their composition and properties, which may be of no more service to the 

 generalizations of the science, whenever our Newton arises, than were, I conceive, 

 the bulk of the stars to the conception of gi-avitation. 



It may, howevei', be urged that the growth of Chemical theory keeps pace with 

 the accumulation of chemical facts. It is so, if the elaboration of constitutional 

 formulcie is leading us up to such a theory. But at present, however usefid and 

 ingenious this mode of summarizing chemical facts may be, it does not amoimt to 

 a theory of Chemistry. 



Two obiections to regarding .such formtdae as any thing more than a chemical 

 short-hand, as it has been termed, seem worth recalling. The first is mentioned at 

 the outset in most text-books in which these formulpe are employed, but some- 

 times, I venture to think, lost sight of afterwards. The arrangement of the atoms 

 of a molecule in one plane is equally convenient in diagrams and improbable as a 

 natm-al fact. But is not this an-angement used as though it were a natural fact 

 when the possible number of isomeric bodies is inferred from the nimiber of 

 ditierent gi-oupings of the atoms which can be eilected on a plane sm-face ? The 

 conceptions of plane Geometry are much simpler than those of solid Geometry 

 (which is another recommendation of the present system of fonnulas) ; but so far 

 as I am able to foUow the similar theories which have recently been propounded 

 independently by MjVI. Le Bel and Van 't Hoti:', the consideration of the possible 

 isomerisms of solid molecules leads to new conclusions *. Wislicenus has found that 

 paralactic acid undergoes the same transformations as ordinary lactic acid when 

 heated and when oxydized. The two acids differ in their action on polarized light. 

 His conclusion is that paralactic acid does not differ in its atomic structure from 

 the lactic acid of fermentation, and that the Irind of isomerism which exists between 

 the two acids is not connected with the difference in the reciprocal arrangement of 

 the atoms, but rather with a difference in the geometric structure of the molecule. 

 To this difference he gives the name of " geometric isomerism " t- The authors 

 named above agi-ee in supposing that the action of substances in solution on 

 polarized light results fi-om an unsymmetrical arrangement of atoms and radicles 

 in tliree dimensions around a nucleus-atom of carbon. 



The second objection relates to the statical character of the account which 

 " developed " formidre give of the difl:erences between difterent kinds of matter. 

 The modern theory of heat supposes not only that the molecides which constitute 



* Bull, de la Soc. Chim. de Paris, t. xxii. p. 337, and t. sxiii. p. 295. 

 t Ann. de Chim. et de Phys., 5e sdrie, t. i. p. 122. 



