April 12, 1907] 



SCIENCE 



593 



wliich won him Lis first prize and wiiicli later 

 directed his attention to the early history of 

 alchemy, the foundations of our science. His 

 great erudition, his mastery of the Greek lan- 

 guage and his love of exactitude in securing 

 fundamental facts have given us nine volumes 

 covering the several topics of these researches. 

 They appeared from 1885-1893 and represent 

 his maturer years when the activities and ac- 

 quisitions of middle life were subjected to the 

 criticism of a calm judgment. This phase of 

 Berthelot's character is also seen in his fre- 

 quent minor articles dealing with questions of 

 education, morals and philosophy. He pos- 

 sessed a marvelous memory. He lived in a 

 period when the sciences were rapidly devel- 

 oped. He obtained an extraordinary grasp of 

 their relationship. He lived in an environ- 

 ment which was stimulating. He quickly un- 

 derstood what was fundamental in each, and 

 so at eighty he was one of that type of men, 

 now growing rare because of the intense spe- 

 cialization of our day, known as ' the encyclo- 

 pedists.' 



His first scientific memoir was presented to 

 the Academic des Sciences the twenty-seventh 

 of May, 1850. It described the liquefaction 

 of gases by the pressure secured by the dilata- 

 tion of mercury. He found that pressure 

 alone would not reduce gases to the liquid 

 state. From that date there was no cessation 

 in his labors; he attended, as its perpetual 

 secretary, a meeting of the Academic within 

 an hour of his death, March 18, 1907. 



He became assistant to Balard at the Col- 

 lege de France and obtained his doctorate in 

 1854 with a sensational thesis on the synthesis 

 of natural fats from glycerin and the fatty 

 acids. A continuation of these researches, 

 especially on the polyatomic alcohols led, in 

 1863, to the founding of the chair of organic 

 chemistry at the College de France, that he 

 might have the conditions for carrying out his 

 personal ideas. He thus entered on a field 

 of work which made him famous. Analysis 

 had until this period been the chemist's aim. 

 Synthesis now claimed his attention, and be- 

 fore the end of the nineteenth century wonders 

 were indeed wrought, revolutionizing both 

 philosophy and the arts. 



By causing an electric arc to play between 

 carbon electrodes in an atmosphere of hydro- 

 gen Berthelot secured the direct union of 

 carbon and hydrogen with the production of 

 acetylene. He then converted this by the 

 action of heat into benzene, and from these 

 passed to other syntheses. He also experi- 

 mented with the silent discharge turning oxy- 

 gen to ozone. With the induction current he 

 combined acetylene and nitrogen to hydrocy- 

 anic acid. He obtained formic acid starting 

 from carbon monoxide. By the use of sealed 

 tubes in which chemicals were subjected to high 

 temperature and pressure through considerable 

 time he influenced them to combine, and also 

 gave us a new general method in chemical 

 manipulation. Six important works, in all 

 nine volumes, attest his genius as applied to 

 this department of his labors. His soul was 

 in his work. When one contemplates how his 

 experiments steadily progressed, effecting the 

 grouping of the elements to form hydrocar- 

 bons, alcohols, acids, ethers, sugars, fats, thus 

 simulating natural processes and building up 

 compounds which up to his day were conceived 

 as being solely the result of vital force, we 

 little wonder that he became permeated with 

 the idea that ultimately man would manu- 

 facture his own sustenance. In his address 

 to the second International Congress of Ap- 

 plied Chemistry he says : " No one can deny 

 that the day is perhaps near when the prog- 

 ress of chemistry will realize the manufacture 

 of foods ; in that day the cultivation of wheat 

 and the raising of cattle will be exposed to the 

 same destiny which has overtaken the culture 

 of madder in our day." What perplexing 

 situations will then arise with reference to the 

 pure food law ! 



Berthelot took an active part in the great 

 movement of the middle of the nineteenth 

 century when the correlation of the sciences 

 was discussed and the conservation of energy 

 was established as the basis principle in phys- 

 ics. It was, therefore, natural that he should 

 attempt to measure the energy developed by 

 chemical reactions in definite terms. He 

 labored indefatigably for thirty-five years in 

 founding thermochemistry. The facts and 

 principles are collected in two volumes pub- 



