no HISTORT of the SOCIETK 



alchemy, or the myfteries of fupernatural power, thechemifl might 

 afTume to his ftudies. But, in thefe, Bl ack ftill faw no more than 

 refearch and inquiry, far fhort of complete fcience or compre- 

 hensive fyftem, and he characterized the ftudy on which he was 

 to enter, by the ufe of its principal inftruments, Mixture and 

 Heat. If difcoveries have fince raifed it to a higher rank among 

 the branches of natural fcience, he himfelf has contributed his 

 fhare in the progrefs it has made. He had publifhed his difco- 

 very of fixed air, in a pamphlet, about the time that he obtained 

 his degree in medicine J but that of latent heat was never other- 

 wife publifhed than as a part of his academical courfe. His pu- 

 pils, indeed, being numerous, and from different parts of the 

 new, as well as the old world, made his doctrine fufficiently 

 known *. , 



After a few years employed by Cullen in the firft profef- 

 flon to which he was appointed at Edinburgh, he was removed 

 to a different branch of the medical fchool ; and Black, as be- 

 fore, being called to fucceed him, was, on the 17th of April 1766, 

 admitted Profeffor of Chemiftry at Edinburgh. His talent for 

 communication being noway inferior to that which he p /ffeffed 

 for obfervation and inference, his manner of acquitting himfelf 

 in his new fituation gave additional luftre to the fchools of fcience, 

 and rendered him one of the principal ornaments of the Univer- 

 sity, in which he continued, for about thirty years, to teach the 

 different branches of chemiftry, with a reputation always hv 

 creafing. His ftyle was characterized by the moft elegant Sim- 

 plicity. His addrefs in performing experiments was remarkable, 



and 



* The writer of this article has little more than heard of chemiftry as a branch 

 of general fcience, and fondly embraced any dodtrine as it feemed to connect with 

 the fyftem of nature ; but farther, his own ftudies have been fo different, that he 

 would not, if he could, charge his mind with any of its practical details ; and he 

 pleads the reader's indulgence, if, under this defeft in treating of Black, he ha- 

 ptens to fubjoin a defcription of the man to fo imperfect as account of his fcience. 



