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PROFESSOR KOPP ON THE SPECIFIC HEAT OF SOLID BODIES. 
in the nature of the case that the certain basis of fact and of what can be empirically de- 
monstrated must be left. It must also not be forgotten that these conclusions only allow 
something to be supposed as to which of the present indecomposable bodies are more 
complex and which of simpler composition, and nothing as to the question what sim- 
pler substances may be contained in the more complex ones. The consideration of the 
atomic heats may say something as to the structure of a compound atom, but in general 
gives no clue as to the qualitative nature of the simpler substances used in the construc- 
tion of the more complex atoms. But even if these suppositions are not free from un- 
certainty and imperfection, they appear worthy of attention in a subject which, for 
science, is still so much in darkness, as is the nature of the indecomposable bodies. 
