ARTIFICIAL PRODUCTION OF ORGANIC COMPOUNDS. 3 
the alkaloids which are found in plants, but produced by 
artificial processes in the laboratory. These bodies, which 
are termed artificial alkaloids , or artificial organic bases , are 
mostly volatile. Their constitution is much simpler than 
that of the native bases; the very processes which give rise 
to their formation often permit a very clear insight into the 
mode in which the elements are grouped, and in the rela¬ 
tion existing between these substances and ammonia.” 
Berzelius assumed that all the alkaloids contain ammonia 
ready formed, and that their basic properties are due to it; 
an opinion, it appears, not universally adopted, from its 
being unsupported by sufficient experimental evidence, 
although some of the alkaloids are constituted as repre¬ 
sented by the theory of Berzelius, but many others are 
not. 
It need scarcely be said that, if chemistry continues thus 
to progress, the barrier that once divided the organic from 
the inorganic kingdom of nature will be broken down ; and 
should it be that simpler means are devised, it will be more 
economical to resort to the artificial production of com¬ 
pounds, than to wait for their formation by the vital func¬ 
tions, for time is an important element, both in science and 
in commerce. It is true that the constitution of many of 
these “ radicals ” may not be yet clearly understood, and the 
means resorted to for their artificial formation may bear 
little or no analogy to the method nature adopts, by which 
they are produced in the tissues of plants; yet if their 
action and uses be the same, all that is wanted is obtained. 
And if w T e extend this reasoning to the production of food, 
w r ho can foresee the results? Time,” says Professor 
Frankland, in a lecture lately delivered by him at the Royal 
Institution of Great Britain— 
“Time is an important element in the natural production of food, 
and although it is true, that the amount of labour required for the pro¬ 
duction of a given weight of food is not considerable, yet it is never¬ 
theless true that this weight requires a whole year for its production. 
By the vital process of producing food, we can only have one harvest 
in each year. But if we were able to form that food from its elements 
without vital agency, there would be nothing to prevent us from obtain¬ 
ing a harvest every week; and thus we might, in the production of 
food, supersede the present vital agencies of nature, as we have already 
done in other cases, by laying under contribution the accumulated 
forces of past ages, which would thus enable us to obtain in a small 
manufactory, and in a few days, effects which can be realised from 
present natural agencies only when they are exerted upon vast areas of 
land, and through considerable periods of time.” 
The same author, speaking on the subject w'hich has occu¬ 
pied the former part of this paper, states that— 
