Chemical elements

"You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns—you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold!"

"When we took over Berkshire, gold was at twenty dollars and Berkshire was at fifteen — so, gold is now at sixteen hundred and Berkshire is at a hundred and twenty thousand. So, you can pick different starting periods. Obviously, if you pick anything that has gone up a lot ... in the last month or year, it will beat ninety ... or ninety-five percent of other investments. The one thing I would bet my life on, essentially, is over a fifty-year period not only will Berkshire do considerably better than gold, but common stocks as a group will do better than gold ... and, probably, farmland will do better than gold. ... If you own an ounce of gold now and ... you caress it over the next hundred years, you'll have an ounce of gold a hundred years from now. If you own a hundred acres of farmland, you'll also have a hundred acres of farmland a hundred years from now and you will have taken the crops for a hundred years and sold them — and, presumably, bought more farmland with the process. It's very hard for an unproductive investment to beat productive investments over any long period of time. ... I can say bonds are no good — and Ben Bernanke still smiles at me. ... If you say anything negative about gold, ... it arouses passions with people — which is kind of fascinating — because, usually, if you thought through something intellectually, it really shouldn't make much difference what people say."

"A thirst for gold, The beggar's vice, which can but overwhelm The meanest hearts."

"For gold in phisik is a cordial; Therefore he lovede gold in special."

"And yet he hadde "a thombe of gold" pardee."

"Gold begets in brethren hate; Gold in families debate; Gold does friendship separate; Gold does civil wars create."

"To virgin minds, which yet their native whiteness hold, Not yet discoloured with the love of gold (That jaundice of the soul, Which makes it look so gilded and so foul)"

"Gold! I knew it! Just think of it, Queen. Six bags of gold!" trilled the King. "What will you do with them, King dear?" asked the Queen. "I won't do anything with them. I'll just have them and be rich."

"What female heart can gold despise? What cat's averse to fish?"

"That is gold which is worth gold."

"Gold! Gold! Gold! Gold! Bright and yellow, hard and cold."

"Aurum per medios ire satellites Et perrumpere amat saxa potentius Ictu fulmineo."

"One of the biggest appeals of gold is its relative scarcity. Only around 216,265 tonnes of the metal have ever been mined, according to the World Gold Council trade association.That's enough to fill between three to four Olympic-sized swimming pools. The majority of that was only extracted from the earth since 1950, as mining technology advanced and new deposits were discovered."

"But scarce observ'd the Knowing and the Bold, Fall in the gen'ral Massacre of Gold; Wide-wasting Pest! that rages unconfin'd, And crouds with Crimes the Records of Mankind, For Gold his Sword the Hireling Ruffian draws, For Gold the hireling Judge distorts the laws; Wealth heap'd on Wealth, nor truth nor Safety buys, The Dangers gather as the Treasures rise."

"The lust of gold succeeds the rage of conquest; The lust of gold, unfeeling and remorseless! The last corruption of degenerate man."

"Bright El Dorado, land of gold, We have so sought for thee, There's not a spot in all the globe Where such a land can be."

"L'or donne aux plus laids certain charme pour plaire, Et quo sans lui le reste est une triste affaire."

"Money is gold, and nothing else."

"O you who believe! most surely many of the doctors of law and the monks eat away the property of men falsely, and turn (them) from Allah's way; and (as for) those who hoard up gold and silver and do not spend it in Allah's way, announce to them a painful chastisement, On the day when it shall be heated in the fire of hell, then their foreheads and their sides and their backs will be branded with it: This is what you hoarded up for yourselves, therefore taste what you hoarded."

"Well, I have never had the slightest interest in owning gold. It's a much better life to work with businesses and people engaged in business. I can't imagine a worse crowd to deal with than a bunch of gold bugs."

"Aurea nunc vere sunt specula; plurimus auro Venit honos; auro conciliatur amor."

"Not Philip, but Philip's gold, took the cities of Greece."

"What nature wants, commodious gold bestows; 'Tis thus we cut the bread another sows."

"Imaro exploded. "Why do men fight like starving lions over yellow metal and let valuable cattle go?""

"L'or est une chimère."

"How quickly nature falls into revolt When gold becomes her object! For this the foolish over-careful fathers Have broke their sleep with thoughts, their brains with care, Their bones with industry: For this they have engrossed and pil'd up The canker'd heaps of strange-achieved gold; For this they have been thoughtful to invest Their sons with arts and martial exercises."

"Thou that so stoutly hast resisted me, Give me thy gold, if thou hast any gold; For I have bought it with an hundred blows."

"Commerce has set the mark of selfishness, The signet of its all-enslaving power Upon a shining ore, and called it gold; Before whose image bow the vulgar great, The vainly rich, the miserable proud, The mob of peasants, nobles, priests, and kings, And with blind feelings reverence the power That grinds them to the dust of misery. But in the temple of their hireling hearts Gold is a living god, and rules in scorn All earthly things but virtue."

""Gold," says the Consul, knowing that this is the only syllable that has held its power over the ages."

"But still less should the gold of rich men lazily sleep its heavy sleep in the urns and gloom of treasuries. This so weighty metal, when it becomes the associate of a fancy, assumes the most active virtues of the mind. It has her restless nature. Its essence is to vanish. It changes into all things, without being itself changed. It raises blocks of stone, pierces mountains, opens the gates of fortresses and the most secret hearts; it enchains men; it dresses, it undresses women with an almost miraculous promptitude. It is truly the most abstract agent that exists, next to thought. But thought exchanges and envelops images only, whereas gold incites and promotes the transmutations of all real things into one another; itself remaining incorruptible, and passing untainted through all hands."

"Quid non mortalia pectora cogis, Auri sacra fames?"

"In England the functions of a standardising commodity and of a medium of exchange are both alike performed by gold. Gold is applied to a vast number of purposes in the arts and sciences, and were it more abundant it would replace other metals in many more. Consequently a great number of easily accessible persons actually give a relatively high place to gold on their scales of preference, in virtue of its direct significance to them. It is established by custom (and, so far as that is possible, by law) as the universally accepted commodity; and at the same time it is used as the common measure in terms of which our estimates of all exchangeable things may be stated."

"Gold is one of the things for the non-existence of which man would probably be all the better. It was originally called into existence for the service of the Mishkan and of the Temple."

"Every honest miller has a golden thumb."

": Remember the Golden Rule. : What's that? : Whoever has the gold, makes the rules!"

"Gold is mined in around 80 countries, with approximately 3,200 tons produced every year. The largest producers are China, Australia, Russia, and the US. Most gold comes from large, industrial mines, though 15 to 20 percent of the world's gold comes from small-scale or artisanal mines, primarily in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Jewelry accounts for over 50 percent of the world's gold demand, an estimated 1,600 tons of gold for 2016...Gold from industrial mines may be exported directly to refiners, while artisanal gold may pass from one trader to another before being exported for refining. Gold refiners play a crucial role in the gold supply chain. Because the vast majority of the world’s gold passes through a small number of refiners, these companies are sometimes called the "choke point" of the gold supply chain.Once gold is refined, it is sold to banks, manufacturers, jewelry and watch companies, electronics companies, or other businesses. Jewelry companies may source their gold directly from refiners, or from manufacturers, banks, or international gold traders. China and India are the largest markets for gold jewelry, representing over 50 percent of global jewelry demand."

"I started working when I was 12. Sometimes I help pull out the bags, and sometimes I go underwater. It’s just like digging with a shovel, and putting it in a sand bag. [To breathe] I use the compressor... I bite the hose and release it whenever I need air, inhale, and exhale through my nose... At first, it was hard to think about going down… I don’t use goggles. I basically don’t use my eyes. I use my hands to look for the passage, the canal... Sometimes you have to make it up fast, especially if you have no air in your hose if the machine stops working. It’s a normal thing [for the compressor to stop working]. It's happened to me."

"Just for a handful of silver he left us, Just for a riband to stick in his coat.– Found the one gift of which fortune bereft us, Lost all others she sets us devote; They with the gold to give doled him our silver, So much was theirs who so little allowed."

"It is silver that can pride itself as the overlay of the gods."

"It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver."

"The most pitiful among men is he who turns his dreams into silver and gold."

"After the golden age of Latinity, we gradually slide into the silver, and at length precipitately descend into the iron."

"For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver."

"First of all the Georgian Silver goes, and then all that nice furniture that used to be in the salon. Then the Canalettos go."

"If a man bring to London an ounce of Silver out of the Earth in Peru in the same time that he can produce a bushel of Corn, then one is the natural price of the other."

"Hi-ho, Silver, away!"

"Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding. For the merchandise of it is better than the merchandise of silver."

"Silver and gold have In one; but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk."

"A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver."

"And I said unto them, If ye think good, give me my price; and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver."

"The sayings of the Lord are pure; they are like silver refined in an earthen furnace, purified seven times."

"He was only about as tall as Dorothy herself, and his body was round as a ball and made out of burnished copper. Also his head and limbs were copper, and these were jointed or hinged to his body in a peculiar way, with metal caps over the joints, like the armor worn by the knights in days of old. He stood perfectly still, and when the light struck upon his form it glittered as if made of pure gold."

"The world is an old woman, and mistakes any gilt farthing for a gold coin; whereby being often cheated, she will thenceforth trust nothing but the common copper."

"I looked at the ornaments on the desk. Everything standard and all copper. A copper lamp, pen set and pencil tray, a glass and copper ashtray with a copper elephant on the rim, a copper letter opener, a copper thermos bottle on a copper tray, copper corners on the blotter. holder.There was a spray of almost copper-colored sweet peas in a copper vase. It seemed like a lot of copper."

"I wol yow telle, as was me taught also, The foure spirites and the bodies sevene, By ordre, as ofte I herde my lord hem nevene. The firste spirit quiksilver called is, The seconde orpyment, the thridde, ywis, Sal armonyak, and the firthe brimstoon. The bodys sevene eek, lo! hem heer anoon: Sol gold is, and Luna silver we threpe, Mars iren, Mercurie quyksilver we clepe, Saturnus leed, and Jupiter is tyn, And Venus coper, by my fader kyn!"

"God has made us to be conduits of his grace. The danger is in thinking the conduit should be lined with gold. It shouldn't. Copper will do."

"My copper lamps, at any rate, For being true antique, I bought; Yet wisely melted down my plate, On modern models to be wrought."

"Whilst some with cunning gild their copper crowns, With truth and plainness I do wear mine bare."

"Then I separated twelve of the chief of the priests, Sherebiah, Hashabiah, and ten of their brethren with them, And weighed unto them the silver, and the gold, and the vessels, even the offering of the house of our God, which the king, and his counsellors, and his lords, and all Israel there present, had offered: I even weighed unto their hand six hundred and fifty talents of silver, and silver vessels an hundred talents, and of gold an hundred talents; Also twenty basons of gold, of a thousand drams; and two vessels of fine copper, precious as gold."

"Instead of the copper I shall bring in gold, and instead of the iron I shall bring in silver, and instead of the wood, copper, and instead of the stones, iron; and I will appoint peace as your overseers and righteousness as your task assigners."

"His feet were like fine copper when glowing in a furnace; and his voice was as the sound of many waters."

"Because she lately nimm'd some tin, they have sent her to lodge at the King's Head Inn."

"In clear dry air tin retains a bright appearance for many days. According to studies light dulling was noted after 100 days , and faint yellowish grey tarnish colour after 150 days. When tine is washed with soap and water its reflectivity does not change over long periods."

"Tin Printing, which was introduced about 1875, is the application of the lithographic process to the decoration of metal plate. A substantial percentage of can-label work formerly done by the paper lithographer has in recent years gone to the tin lithographers... Sheets of prepared tin are fed into the press and are then oven dried at high temperature, this procedure being repeated for each additional colour."

"Tin derives its name from the anglo-saxon word ´tin´. It derives its chemical symbol ´Sn´ from the latin word stannum. The first uses of tin appear to have been in alloys with copper and zinc to make brass and bronze, and can be dated back to about 3,500 BC. It is not known who identified tin as an element and it may have been recognized as something that could not be divided any further, or was elemental, by alchemists and experimenters."

"Pweter is an alloy which has 90% tin, 1 to 8% Sb, 0.25 to 5% cu, and a maximum of 0.05 percent Pb and As and it has the same degree of corrosion resistance as pure tin. Alloys within this range are used for decorative items, containers, and flatware."

"In Soft Soft solders with small additions of lead in tin impairs the retention of its bright reflective surface in common atmospheres."

"The big one I missed out on was 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.' MGM wanted me for it, and Warner Bros. wouldn't give me permission to do it."

"The solution of tin used by dyers for the scarlet and for many other colours upon wool, silks, and cotton, are commonly called spirits, or tin spirits."

"Chemical signs ought to be letters, for the greater facility of writing, and not to disfigure a printed book … I shall take therefore for the chemical sign, the initial letter of the Latin name of each elementary substance: but as several have the same initial letter, I shall distinguish them in the following manner:— 1. In the class which I shall call metalloids, I shall employ the initial letter only, even when this letter is common to the metalloid and to some metal. 2. In the class of metals, I shall distinguish those that have the same initials with another metal, or a metalloid, by writing the first two letters of the word. 3. If the first two letters be common to two metals, I shall, in that case, add to the initial letter the first consonant which they have not in common: for example, S = sulphur, Si = silicium, St = stibium (antimony), Sn = stannum (tin), C = carbonicum, Co = colbaltum (colbalt), Cu = cuprum (copper), O = oxygen, Os = osmium, &c"

"Six metals are mentioned in the Bible and in many passages they are listed in the same order: gold, silver, copper, iron, Tin, and lead... The Bible speaks of the high qualifications necessary for the specialized metalwork of the Tabernacle: "I have endowed him with a divine spirit of skill, ability, and knowledge...to make designs for work, in gold, silver, and copper... Solomon was forced to bring the craftsman Hiram from Tyre to work in copper."

"The terms used for this metal are either ba'aẓ or avaẓ, kassitera, kassiteron, and gassiteron (Gr. κασσίτερος). Both ba'aẓ and kassitera are used in the same passages (Men. 28b and elsewhere), which implies that they were two different metals or kinds of the same metal. The Temple menorah was not to be made of them, but when the Hasmoneans cleansed the Temple and needed a new menorah (the golden one having been carried off by Antiochus IV), they made it of seven spears plated with tin. It was forbidden to make weights out of metal – tin and lead being mentioned specially – because metal wears away. The traveler Pethahiah of Regensburg (12th century) reports that in Babylonia people were summoned to synagogue by a tin instrument. In the later Middle Ages up to modern times tin was used extensively for artistic *ritual objects such as Ḥanukkah menorot, seder, Kiddush, and Havdalah plates, etc."

"As they gather silver, and brass, and iron, and lead, and tin, into the midst of the furnace, to blow the fire upon it, to melt it; so will I gather you in mine anger and in my fury, and I will leave you there, and melt you."

"And Eleazar the priest said unto the men of war which went to the battle, This is the ordinance of the law which the LORD commanded Moses; Only the gold, and the silver, the brass, the iron, the tin, and the lead, Every thing that may abide the [[fire, ye shall make it go through the fire, and it shall be clean: nevertheless it shall be purified with the water of separation: and all that abideth not the fire ye shall make go through the water."

"Of Tin Gods you may oft have heard or read. But this one was entirely made of lead."

"I wol yow telle, as was me taught also, The foure spirites and the bodies sevene, By ordre, as ofte I herde my lord hem nevene. The firste spirit quiksilver called is, The seconde orpyment, the thridde, ywis, Sal armonyak, and the firthe brimstoon. The bodys sevene eek, lo! hem heer anoon: Sol gold is, and Luna silver we threpe, Mars iren, Mercurie quyksilver we clepe, Saturnus leed, and Jupiter is tyn, And Venus coper, by my fader kyn!"

"And a 'tin-back' is a party Who 's remarkable for luck, And his food is called his 'tucker, ' Or his ' panum ' or his 'chuck'."

"We economists are going to be the little tin gods of this generation, as the scientists were of the last, and the doctors before that, and the clergymen before them"

"It is a low melting, malleable, ductile metallic element nearly approaching silver in color and luster: used in plating and in making alloys, tinfoil, and soft solders."

"It is a metallic element, occurring in cassiterite, that has several allotropes; the ordinary malleable silvery-white metal slowly changes below 13.2°C to a grey powder. It is used extensively in alloys, especially bronze and pewter, and as a noncorroding coating for steel."

"A malleable, silvery metallic element that occurs in igneous rocks. It has a crystalline structure and crackles when bent. Tin is used as an anticorrosion agent and is a part of numerous alloys, including bronze."

"It is metal well known in ancient times. It is the general opinion that the Phoenicians of Tyre and Sidon obtained their supplies of tin from the British Isles. In Ezek (27:12_ it is said to have been brought from Tarshish, which was probably a commercial emporium supplied with commodities from other places. In Isa (1:25) the word so rendered is generally understood of lead, the alloy with which the silver had become mixed. The fire of the Babylonish Captivity would be the means of purging out the idolatrous alloy that had corrupted the people."

"These people are also very ingenious in making tin ware, brooms, cider-brandy, wooden bowls, and tallow candles."

"In cold countries, such as Russia,... it sometimes happens that a roof or other object of tin will suddenly begin to decay in a peculiar fashion....Organ pipes in Central Europe are frequently of tin, and the same disintegration has been observed in their case. It is also that Tin is in unstable condition whenever the temperature is below 18° C."

"As the temperature falls, white tin tends to change to grey at an increased rate, a maximum velocity being reached at —50° C. The white metal first tarnishes, then becomes covered with a number of grey warts, finally crumbling to a powdery mass. Fortunately, at the ordinary winter temperatures in Britain the rate at which this change occurs is very small."

"Many persons still extant, must remember the villainous old coinage of George III.; the tin-like sixpences which added a word to the slang dictionary, and the button-like shillings, of which the image and superscription might have been Caesar's."

"There seems to be a paucity of very ancient objects made entirely of tin — a lack which is sometimes laid at the door of the disintegration of tin through "[[w:Tin pest|tin pest". This is hardly an adequate reason as "tin pest" is difficult enough to initiate."

"Many colonists decorated their homes with objects made out of punched tin. Sometimes they had punched-tin lanterns or candle holders. They also hung punched-tin pictures on their wall."

"If the white tin is brought in contact with gray tin at ordinary temperatures (below + 20° C), it turns very slowly into gray tin, falling to powder, probably because of the increase in volume (this phenomenon is called the "tin-disease")."

"The Little Tin Gods harried their little tin souls. Seeing he came not from Chetham, jingled no spurs at his heels Knowing that, nevertheless, was he first on the Government rolls For the billet of Railway Inspector to little Tin Gods on Wheels."

"There rise her timeless capitals of empires daily born, whose plinths are laid at midnight and whose streets are packed at morn; and here come tired youths and maids that feign to love or sin in tones like rusty razor blades to tunes like smitten tin."

"Periodic table There's antimony, arsenic, aluminium, selenium, And hydrogen and oxygen and, nitrogen and rhenium, And nickel, neodymium, neptunium, germanium, And iron, americium, ruthenium, uranium, Europium, zirconium, lutetium, vanadium, And lanthanum and osmium and astatine and radium, And gold and protactinium and indium and gallium, And iodine and thorium and thulium and thallium. There's yttrium, ytterbium, actinium, rubidium, And boron, gadolinium, niobium, iridium, And strontium and silicon and silver and samarium, And bismuth, bromine, lithium, beryllium and barium. There's holmium and helium and hafnium and erbium, And phosphorus and francium and fluorine and terbium, And manganese and mercury, molybdenum, magnesium, Dysprosium and scandium and cerium and cesium, And lead, praseodymium and platinum, plutonium, Palladium, promethium, potassium, polonium, And tantalum, technetium, titanium, tellurium, And cadmium and calcium and chromium and curium. There's sulfur, californium and fermium, berkelium, And also mendelevium, einsteinium, nobelium, And argon, krypton, neon, radon, xenon, zinc and rhodium, And chlorine, cobalt, carbon, copper, tungsten, tin and sodium. These are the only ones of which the news has come to Harvard, And there may be many others, but theyhaven't been discovered."

"It is inconceivable — and consequently very English! — to have a capital as Simla is entirely of tin roofs, and then the tin roofs monkeying better materials and reducing the whole show to absurdity."

"They reached for the leather cases to which their shields were pinned. Simultaneously, they pinned the tin to their collars and then walked toward the desk behind which another patrolman was seated."

"When our brother Fire was having his dog's day Jumping the London streets with millions of tin cans Clanking at his tail, we heard some shadow say 'Give the dog a bone' - and so we gave him ours; Night after night we watched his slaver and crunch away The beams of human life, the tops of topless towers."

"The simplest fix for better grilling is to line the inside of your barbecue with tin foil. It dramatically affects how evenly the heat is distributed. That crusty black hibachi or Weber grill is doing your food no favors."

"Tin is one of the well-known metals, nearly approaching silver in whiteness and lustre, highly malleable and taking a high polish; used in the manufacture of articles of Tin, in the formation of alloys, as bronze, pewter, etc., and, on account of its resistance to oxidation, for making tin-plate and lining culinary and other iron vessels."

"Block tin is tin of second quality cast into blocks; Solid tin is distinct from tin plate; a receptacle made from this. Grain tin is a very pure tin obtained by fusing stream tin in a blast furnace supplied with charcoal, and breaking it into small pieces. Phosphor tin is an artificial compound of tin and phosphorus. Stream tin is tin ore washed from the sand or gravel in which it occurs."

"A vessel is made of tin, or more usually of tinned iron. Spec is a vessel in which meat, fish, fruit, etc., is hermetically sealed for preservation Locally, a small cylindrical drinking vessel or mug with a handle is made of tin."

"This conversion is known as tin disease or tin pest. Tin pest was a particular problem in northern Europe in the 18th century as organ pipes made of tin alloy would sometimes be affected during long cold winters."

"Some unverifiable sources also say that during Napoleon's Russian campaign of 1812, the temperatures became so cold that the tin buttons on the soldiers' uniforms disintegrated over time, contributing to the defeat of the Grande Armée."

"Another version: The urban legend that tin plague caused the disintegration of tin buttons on the trousers of Napoleon’s Grande Armée as it retreated from Moscow in 1812, supposedly causing a collapse of morale (if not of the trousers)."

"My first phone was two tin cans tied together with string, and it worked pretty good."

"...kinds of Tin Ore being extremely variable, and not properly refinable in such small quantities, and the manner of agreeing for or buying the Tin Ore of all sorts being to give Tin bills or promissory notes to the owners thereof, engaging to deliver them at the next coinage so many hundreds of refined Tin for every twenty hundred weight of the ore or Black Tin."

"I have known a blacksmith, a first-rate workman, unaware of the fact that what are called “tin saucepans" are made of tinned plate iron; and there are abundance of tinmen or tin-plate workers who are entirely ignorant of the process by which tin plates are prepared."

"This change does not proceed with disintegrating effects until considerably lower temperatures, when the ‘Tin-Pest’, experienced in organ-pipes, during cold winters on the Continent, occurs."

"First clean that; iron and brass well and then tin them before placing them together for soldering...The articles can be tinned by rubbing while hot with resin; then rubbing them over with solder."

"He gives the, possibly false, impression, that he has a ‘tin ear’, as his countrymen put it, for many of the popular art-forms he discusses."

"I'm not ready to say whether it's good or bad, but when a man owns the tin, he has a vested interest in it and there is more pride in what he's doing than when he turns it over to a second party."

"The final tin-dip is useful to remove the marks of the brush, and to make the surface uniformly bright."

"The stanniferous small veins, or thin flat masses, though of small extent, are sometimes very numerous, interposed between certain rocks, parallel to their beds, and are commonly called tin-floors."

"There are only two ores of tin: the peroxide, tin-stone, or Cassiterite; and tin pyrites, sulphide of tin, or Stannine: the former of which alone has been found in sufficient abundance for metallurgical purposes."

"In the tin-vat, commonly used for calico-printing, the indigo is reduced by a solution of stannous oxide in caustic potash or soda. The bath is usually mixed with an acid solution of tin, so as to neutralize the alkali and precipitate the indigo-white; the precipitate is then used for printing."

"Significance of [research] work is that it is the first attempt to print conductive patterns with the Sn-containing conductive ink... the synthesis of Sn nanoparticles for interconnection materials have been reported… Two factors, cost and low temperature, are the advantages of the Sn-containing conductive ink... By adding the tin nanoparticles to an ink solution, the researchers printed patterns of highly conductive ink from an inkjet printer. As the first demonstration of inkjet printing with tin nanoparticles, the results show that the new technique looks promising for printing various electronic devices that require conductive patterns."

"According to Sir Isaac Newton's Calculations, the last Comet that made its Appearance in 1680, imbib'd so much Heat by its Approaches to the Sun, that it would have been two thousand times hotter than red hot Iron, had it been a Globe of that Metal; and that supposing it as big as the Earth, and at the same Distance from the Sun, it would be fifty thousand Years in cooling, before it recovered its natural Temper. In the like manner, if an Englishman considers the great Ferment into which our Political World is thrown at present, and how intensely it is heated in all its Parts, he cannot suppose that it will cool again in less than three hundred Years. In such a Tract of Time it is possible that the Heats of the present Age may be extinguished, and our several Classes of great Men represented under their proper Characters. Some eminent Historian may then probably arise that will not write recentibus odiis [fresh hate] (as Tacitus expresses it) with the Passions and Prejudices of a contemporary Author, but make an impartial Distribution of Fame among the Great Men of the present Age."

"Whoever hammers a lump of iron, first decides what he is going to make of it, a scythe, a sword, or an axe. Even so we ought to make up our minds what kind of virtue we want to forge or we labour in vain."

"Iron yields to certain degrees of beatings or repeated pressure; its impenetrable molecules, purified by man and made homogeneous, disintegrate; and, without being in fusion, the metal no longer has the same virtue of resistance. Marshals, locksmiths, tool makers, all the workers who constantly work this metal then express the state of it by a word of their technology: "The iron is retty!" they say, appropriating this expression exclusively devoted to hemp, the disorganization of which is obtained by retting. Well, the human soul, or if you will the threefold energy of body, heart, and spirit, is in an iron-like situation, as a result of certain repeated shocks. It is thus with men like hemp and iron — they are retty."

"With many a stiff thwack, many a bang, Hard crab-tree and old iron rang. ... Ay me! what perils do environ The man that meddles with cold iron!"

"33 His legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay. 34 Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. 35 Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth. 40 And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise. 41 And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters' clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay. 42 And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken. 43 And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay. 45 Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure."

"There is nothing of greater interest connected with the Durham furnace than the manufacture of iron stove plates and their artistic embellishments. ...[T]he manufacture of iron stoves, for heating of buildings, was begun at the furnace about 1741, when controlled by George Taylor, James Logan and James Morgan, father of General , iron master. These were called the "Adam and Eve" stoves from the figures, cast on them. ...In 1745, the furnace began casting the famous "Franklin Stove," or fire-place, and continued until it blew out, 1793. They were favorably received and with minor improvements, extensively manufactured. It was the first stove made that could be utilized for baking and cooking, having an extra door above the fuel door, a plate the whole length of the stove and a descending flue the same as the Prince Rupert stove, 1678, cast in England. It was improved, 1754, by a door on one side. This was known as the Philadelphia pattern, though smaller in size. The Franklin sold at £4. 6s, each at the furnace, and at Philadelphia £18 per ton, the price varying with the metal. About 1775, a stove pattern, artistically decorated with a bony skeleton inscribed on the center of the side plates, grasping a bone in one hand in the act of striking a man, near the end of the plate, while another figure on rear end of plate is standing in a frightened attitude looking on the unequal battle. Beneath the figures is the following inscription:HIR. FEIT. MIT. MIR. DER. BITER. TOTER. BRINCT. MICH.INTOTS. NO.A free translation of this Swedish-German is "Here (man) presumes to fight with me, bitter death, but he cannot overcome death.""

"A prison taint was on everything there. The imprisoned air, the imprisoned light, the imprisoned damps, the imprisoned men, were all deteriorated by confinement. As the captive men were faded and haggard, so the iron was rusty, the stone was slimy, the wood was rotten, the air was faint, the light was dim. Like a well, like a vault, like a tomb, the prison had no knowledge of the brightness outside; and would have kept its polluted atmosphere intact, in one of the spice islands of the Indian Ocean."

"After the golden age of Latinity, we gradually slide into the silver, and at length precipitately descend into the iron."

"I have been driven to assume for some time, especially in relation to the gases, a sort of conducting power for magnetism. Mere space is Zero. One substance being made to occupy a given portion of space will cause more lines of force to pass through that space than before, and another substance will cause less to pass. The former I now call Paramagnetic & the latter are the diamagnetic. The former need not of necessity assume a polarity of particles such as iron has with magnetic, and the latter do not assume any such polarity either direct or reverse. I do not say more to you just now because my own thoughts are only in the act of formation, but this I may say: that the atmosphere has an extraordinary magnetic constitution, & I hope & expect to find in it the cause of the annual & diurnal variations, but keep this to yourself until I have time to see what harvest will spring from my growing ideas."

"Beauty in this Iron Age must turn From fluid living rainbow shapes to torn And sootened fragments, ashes in an urn On whose gray surface runes are traced by a Norn Who hopes to wake the Future to arise In Phoenix-fashion, and to shine with rays To blast the sight of modern men whose dyes Of selfishness and lust have stained our days... ... Reader, pray that soon this Iron Age Will crumble, and Beauty escape the rusting cage."

"Access to talented and creative people is to modern business what access to coal and iron ore was to steel-making."

"As frequent Mention is made in the News Papers from Europe, of the Success of the Philadelphia Experiment for drawing the Electric Fire from Clouds by Means of pointed Rods of Iron erected on high Buildings, &c. it may be agreeable to the Curious to be inform'd, that the same Experiment has succeeded in Philadelphia, tho' made in a different and more easy Manner, which any one may try, as follows."

"When iron was found, the trees began to tremble, but the iron reassured them: 'Let no handle made from you enter into anything made from me, and I shall be powerless to injure you.'"

"We can no more have exact religious thinking without theology, than exact mensuration and astronomy without mathematics, or exact iron-making without chemistry."

"Might and wrong combined, like iron magnetized, are endowed with irresistible attraction."

"Instead of the copper I will bring in gold, and instead of the iron I will bring in silver, Instead of the wood, copper, and instead of the stones, iron; and I will appoint peace as your overseers, and righteousness as your task assigners."

"What I saw in Barcelona – Gaudí – was the work of such strength, such faith, of an extraordinary technical capacity, manifested during a whole life of genius; of a man who carved the stones before his eyes in well thought out pattern. Gaudí is the ‘builder’ of the turn of the century, a man adept with stone, iron and brick."

"And the smith his iron measures hammered to the anvil's chime; Thanking God, whose boundless wisdom makes the flowers of poesy bloom In the forge's dust and cinders, in the tissues of the loom."

"Under a spreading chestnut tree The village smithy stands: The smith, a mighty man is he, With large and sinewy hands; And the muscles of his brawny arms Are strong as iron bands."

"As great Pythagoras of yore, Standing beside the blacksmith's door, And hearing the hammers, as they smote The anvils with a different note, Stole from the varying tones, that hung Vibrant on every iron tongue, The secret of the sounding wire, And formed the seven-chorded lyre."

"Stone walls do not a prison make, Nor iron bars a cage; Minds innocent and quiet take That for an hermitage."

"We put things in order — God does the rest. Lay an iron bar east and west, it is not magnetized. Lay it north and south and it is."

"The fact that a magnet draws iron towards it was noticed by the ancients, but no attention was paid to the force with which the iron attracts the magnet. Newton, however, by placing the magnet in one vessel and the iron in another, and floating both vessels in water so as to touch each other, showed experimentally that as neither vessel was able to propel the other along with itself through the water, the attraction of the iron on the magnet must be equal and opposite to that of the magnet on the iron, both being equal to the pressure between the two vessels."

"In other part stood one who, at the forge Labouring, two massy clods of iron and brass Had melted."

"With the triumph of scientific management, unions would have nothing left to do, and they would have been cleansed of their most evil feature: the restriction of output. To underscore this idea, Taylor fashioned the myth that 'there has never been a strike of men working under scientific management', trying to give it credibility by constant repetition. In similar fashion he incessantly linked his proposals to shorter hours of work, without bothering to produce evidence of "Taylorized" firms that reduced working hours, and he revised his famous tale of Schmidt carrying pig iron at at least three times, obscuring some aspects of his study and stressing others, so that each successive version made Schmidt's exertions more impressive, more voluntary and more rewarding to him than the last. Unlike Harrington Emerson, Taylor was not a charlatan, but his ideological message required the suppression of all evidence of worker's dissent, of coercion, or of any human motives or aspirations other than those his vision of progress could encompass."

"Ferreus assiduo consumitur anulus usu. (The iron ring is worn out by constant use.)"

"Iron, at the same time the most useful and the most fatal instrument in the hand of mankind. For by the aid of iron we lay open the ground, we plant trees, we prepare our vineyard-trees, and we force our vines each year to resume their youthful state, by cutting away their decayed branches. It is by the aid of iron that we construct houses, cleave rocks, and perform so many other useful offices of life. But it is with iron also that wars, murders, and robberies are effected, and this, not only hand to hand, but from a distance even, by the aid of missiles and winged weapons, now launched from engines, now hurled by the human arm, and now furnished with feathery wings. This last I regard as the most criminal artifice that has been devised by the human mind; for, as if to bring death upon man with still greater rapidity, we have given wings to iron and taught it to fly."

"The Iron never lies to you... The iron will always kick you the real deal. The Iron is the real deal. The iron is the great reference point, the all-knowing perspective giver. Always there like a beacon in the pitch black. I have found the Iron to be my greatest friend. It never freaks out on me, never runs. Friends may come and go. But two hundred pounds is always two hundred pounds."

"I saw a smith stand with his hammer, thus, The whilst his iron did on the anvil cool."

"Iron sharpeneth iron."

"We used to think of cow's milk as a nearly perfect food. However, over the past several years, researchers have found new information that has caused many of us to change our opinion. This has provoked a lot of understandable controversy, but I have come to believe that cow's milk is not necessary for children. First, it turns out that the fat in cow's milk is not the kind of fat ("essential fatty acids") needed for brain development. Instead, milk fat is too rich in the saturated fats that promote artery blockages. Also, cow's milk can make it harder for a child to stay in iron balance. Milk is extremely low in iron and slows down iron absorption. It can also cause subtle blood loss in the digestive tract that causes the child to lose iron. ...Some children have sensitivities to milk proteins, which show up as ear problems, respiratory problems, or skin conditions. Milk also has traces of antibiotics, estrogens, and other things a child does not need. There is, of course, nothing wrong with human breast milk — it is perfect for infants. For older children, there are many good soy and rice milk products and even nondairy "ice creams" that are well worth trying. If you are using cow's milk in your family, I would encourage you to give these alternatives a try."

"The labor should include rest breaks so that the worker has time to recover from fatigue. Now one of the very first requirements for a man who is fit to handle pig iron as a regular occupation is that he shall be so stupid and so phlegmatic that he more nearly resembles in his mental make-up the ox than any other type. The man who is mentally alert and intelligent is for this very reason entirely unsuited to what would, for him, be the grinding monotony of work of this character. Therefore the workman who is best suited to handling pig iron is unable to understand the real science of doing this class of work."

"I ordinarily begin with a description of the pig-iron handler. For some reason, I don’t know exactly why, this illustration has been talked about a great deal, so much, in fact, that some people seem to think that the whole of scientific management consists in handling pig-iron. The only reason that I ever gave this illustration, however, was that pig-iron handling is the simplest kind of human effort; I know of nothing that is quite so simple as handling pig-iron. A man simply stoops down and with his hands picks up a piece of iron, and then walks a short distance and drops it on the ground. Now, it doesn’t look as if there was very much room for the development of a science; it doesn’t seem as if there was much room here for the scientific selection of the man nor for his progressive training, nor for cooperation between the two sides; but, I can say, without the slightest hesitation, that the science of handing pig-iron is so great that the man who is fit to handle pig-iron as his daily work cannot possibly understand the science; the man who is physically able to handle pig-iron and is sufficiently phlegmatic and stupid to choose this for his occupation is rarely able to comprehend the science of handling pig-iron; and this in ability of the man who is fit to do the work to understand the science of doing his work becomes more and more evident as the work becomes more complicated, all the way up the scale. I assert, without the slightest hesitation, that the high-class mechanic has a far smaller chance of ever thoroughly understanding the science of his work than the pig-iron handler has of understanding the science of his work, and I am going to try and prove to your satisfaction, gentlemen, that the man who is fit to work at any particular trade is unable to understand the science of that trade without the kindly help and cooperation of men of a totally different type of education, men whose education is not necessarily higher but a different type from his own."

"The magnetism as exhibited in iron is an isolated phenomenon in nature. What it is that makes this metal behave so radically different from all other materials in this respect has not yet been ascertained, though many theories have been suggested. As regards magnetism, the molecules of the various bodies behave like hollow beams partly filled with a heavy fluid and balanced in the middle in the manner of a see-saw. Evidently some disturbing influence exists in nature which causes each molecule, like such a beam, to tilt either one or the other way. If the molecules are tilted one way, the body is magnetic; if they are tilted the other way, the body is non-magnetic; but both positions are stable, as they would be in the case of the hollow beam, owing to the rush of the fluid to the lower end. Now, the wonderful thing is that the molecules of all known bodies went one way, while those of iron went the other way. This metal, it would seem, has an origin entirely different from that of the rest of the globe. It is highly improbable that we shall discover some other and cheaper material which will equal or surpass iron in magnetic qualities."

"The significant thing about the Darbys and coke-iron is not that the first Abraham Darby "invented" a new process but that five generations of the Darby connection were able to perfect it and develop most of its applications."

"Do not flinch from experiences that might destroy your beliefs. The thought you cannot think controls you more than thoughts you speak aloud. Submit yourself to ordeals and test yourself in fire Relinquish the emotion which rests upon a mistaken belief, and seek to feel fully that emotion which fits the facts. If the iron approaches your face, and you believe it is hot, and it is cool, the Way opposes your fear. If the iron approaches your face, and you believe it is cool, and it is hot, the Way opposes your calm. Evaluate your beliefs first and then arrive at your emotions. Let yourself say: "If the iron is hot, I desire to believe it is hot, and if it is cool, I desire to believe it is cool.""

"Having former knowledge and delight in Iron Works of my Fathers, when I was but a Youth; afterward at 20 years, Old, was I fetched from Oxford, then of Bayliol Colledge, Anno 1619, to look and manage 3 iron works of my fathers, 1 furnace, and 2 forges, in the Chase of Pensnet, in Worcester-shire, but Wood and Charcole, growing then scant, and Pit-coles in great quantities abounding near the furnace, did induce me to alter my furnace, and to attempt by my new invention, the making of iron with pit-cole, assuring myself in my invention, the loss to me could not be greater then others, not so great, "although my success should prove fruitless; but I found such success at first tryal animated me, for at my tryal or blast I made iron to profit with pit-cole, and found Facere est addere Invention!."

"After I had made a second blast and tryal the fesibility of making iron with pitcole and sea-cole I found by my new invention, the quality to be good and profitable, but the quantity did not exceed above 3 tuns per week."

"So that being with Law-Suites, and Riots, wearied and disabled to prosecute his Art and. Invention at present, even until the first Patent was extinct: Nothwithstanding the Author his sad. Sufferings, Imprisonments wrongfully for several thousand pound in the Counter in London, yet did obtaine a new Patent, dated the 2d of May, Anno 14. Caroli Primi of ever Blessed Memory, not only for the making of Iron into cast-works, and bars, but also for the Melting, Extracting, Refing and Reducing of all Mines, Minerals and. Mettals, with Pit-cole, Sea-cole, Peat, and Turf, for the preservation of Wood and Timber of this Island; into which Patent, the Author, for the better support and management of his Invention, so much opposed formerly at the Court, at the Parliament, and at the Law, took in David Ramasey, Esquire, Resident at the Court; Sir George Horsey, at the Parliament; Roger Foulke, Esquire, a Counsellour of the Temple, and an Ingenious Man; and also an Iron Master, my Neighbour, and one who did well know my former Sufferings, and what I had done in the Invention of making of Iron with Pit-cole, etc."

"There is no evidence that the Swedish and Dutch settlers on the Delaware made any attempt to manufacture iron. In the Journal of a Voyage to New York, in 1679 and 1680... it is expressly declared that iron ore had not been seen... on Tinicum island, or elsewhere in the neighborhood. Jasper Dankers says: "As to there being a mine of iron ore upon it, I have not seen any upon that island, or elsewhere; and if it were so, it is of no great importance, for such mines are so common in this country that little account is made of them.""

"In 1682... William Penn sailed up the Delaware, and in the following year... mentions the existence of "mineral of copper and iron in divers places" in his province. In 1685, speaking of "things that we have in prospect for staples of trade," he says: "I might add iron, (perhaps copper, too,) for there is much mine, and it will be granted to us that we want no wood." In 1702 he urges James Logan, the secretary of the province, to make an effort to secure the establishment of iron works by certain persons who are referred to, to which appeal Logan replies that no "considerable vein" of iron ore had yet been found by them."

"[W]e find mention made in a [1692] metrical composition, by Richard Frame... or a successful experiment in the manufacture or iron having been made in the [Pennsylvania] province as early as that year. Frame says A certain place her is, where some begun To try some Mettle, and have made it run, Wherein was Iron absolutely found, At once was known some Forty Pound. The "uncertain place" mentioned... is unfortunately very uncertain. The experiment would doubtless be made in a or ordinary blacksmith's fire."

"In 1698 Gabriel Thomas published at London an account... alluding to Pennsylvania, he says: "There is likewise ironstone or ore, lately found which far exceeds that in England, being richer and less drossy. Some preparations have been made to carry on an iron work." But neither these preparations, nor that [mentioned] by Richard Frame, led to satisfactory results."

"The first successful attempt... to establish iron works in Pennsylvania, occurred in 1716... briefly described in one of Jonathan Dickinson's letters... [1717] quoted by Mrs. James in her Memorial of Thomas Potts Junior: "This last summer... Thomas Rutter, a smith... of his own strength has set upon making iron. ...[A]ll the smiths here... say that the best of the Sweed's iron doth not exceed it. And we have the accounts of others that are going on with iron works." Rutter's enterprise was a forge... ', published... 1729-30 ..."Philadelphia, March 13. On Sunday night last died here Thomas Rutter, senior... He was the first that erected an iron work in Pennsylvania." In his will he is styled a blacksmith."

"Dr. Benjamin Rush... was a great-grandson of Thomas Rutter. ...Mrs. James ...gives a verbatim copy of the original patent of William Penn to Thomas Rutter for three hundred acres of land "on Manahatawney creek," date February 12, 1714-15."

"Durnham furnace, on the Delaware river... was built in 1727, by a company of fourteen persons, of which James Logan, (Penn's secretary,) was a member. Its first blast... the spring of 1728, and in November of that year James Logan shipped three tons of Durnham pig-iron to England. In 1770 there were two furnaces and two forges at Durnham. Much of the iron... was taken to Philadephia, in boats fashioned somewhat like an Indian canoe, and first built at Durnham, hence the term... "Durnham boats.""

"In 1728 James Logan wrote that "there are four furnaces in blast in the colony." Colebrook and Durnham were certainly two... The iron industry of Pennsylvania may fairly be said to have been established on a firm foundation at this period. In 1728-29 the colony exported two hundred and seventy-four tons of pig-iron to the mother country."

"Samuel Nutt died in 1737. In his will he made provision for the erection of a new furnace by his wife... commenced in 1737 and probably finished in 1738. This... was called Warwick. In 1740 its management fell into the hands of , who had married into the Nutt family, and was a friend of Benjamin Franklin. In 1742 Franklin invented his celebrated stove, the model of which he presented to his friend Grace, who afterwards cast many stoves at the furnace. Warwick furnace continued in operation... to 1867, when its last blast came to an end... During the Revolution it was very active casting cannon for the Continental army"

"In 1751 there was a forge for the conversion of pig-iron into bar-iron at the mouth of the East Valley creek, a... tributary of the ... advertised for sale as the property of Daniel Walker, Stephen Evans, and Joseph Williams. It was then called Mount Joy forge... some years afterward... it came to be known as Valley Forge. The pig-iron used at Valley Forge was hauled from Warwick furnace. In September, 1777, the forge was burned by the British, and in December... the army under Washington was intrenched on the... side of Valley Creek, opposite Valley Forge. General Washington's headquarters were established at the substantial stone-house of Isaac Potts... After the Revolution another Valley Forge was built on the... [other] side of Valley creek; it was in ruins in 1816."

"This work of Dr Gilbert's relates chiefly to the , and what we call magnets; that is, pieces of steel which have acquired properties similar to those of the loadstone. But he extends the term magnetism and the epithet magnetic, to all bodies which are affected by loadstones and magnets, in a manner similar to that in which they affect each other. In the course of his investigations, indeed, he finds that these bodies are only such as contain iron in some state or other; and in proving this limitation he mentions a great variety of phenomena which have a considerable resemblance to those which he allows to be magnetical, namely, those which he called electrical, because they were produced in the same way that is made to attract and repel light bodies. He marks, with care, the distinctions between these and the characteristic phenomena of magnets. He seems to have known, that all bodies may be made electrical, while ferruginous substances alone can be made magnetical."

"Amongst the many other ingenious contrivances frequently alluded to in his book, Gilbert mentions the versorium, an iron needle moving freely upon a point, with which he was enabled to measure excited electricity. He is besides the inventor of "two most ingenious and necessarie Instruments for Sea men to find out thereby the latitude of any place upon sea or land, in the darkest night, that is without the helpe of Sunne, Moone or Starre." These instruments are described in Thomas Blunderville's quarto work entitled "The Theoriques of the seven Planets, shewing their diverse motions... printed at London 1602.""

"By the publication in 1600 of the ' of Dr. William Gilbert the science of electricity was founded. ...Trying the properties of s in innumerable experiments lasting over many years, he was led to several notable discoveries, and to one generalization of immense importance. He discovered the augmentation of the power of a by arming or capping it with soft iron cheeks. Gilbert called such a cap an armatura..."

"Gilbert also discovered the screening effect of a sheet of iron; the method of magnetizing iron by hammering it while it lies North and South; the destruction of magnetism by heat; and the existence around the magnet of an "orbe of virtue," [i.e.,] a magnetic field. He perfected the dipping-needle of Norman, and other instruments of observation. He collected data as to the declination and inclination of the compass in different regions. Using loadstones of many different shapes he observed their actions on one another and on compass-needles. In particular he studied the magnetic properties of a globular loadstone or and found that compass-needles were directed toward its poles, and dipped at various angles over its surface, just as compass-needles do at various regions of the earth's surface. ...His book, over which he spent eighteen years, was published in 1600, and for the next hundred years became the standard work on magnetism. Though denounced by the Church, the theory of terrestrial magnetism was by Gilbert thus firmly established on an enduring basis of fact, and remained a permanent acquisition in science. The publication of the book marked an epoch in scientific development. It was praised by Sarpi, by Galileo, by Kepler. Sir Christopher Wren proposed to erect a statue to its author, while Dryden sang of his enduring fame."

"Mercury doesn't contribute its valence electrons readily to the soup [electron soup]. The thinner soup can't bind the mercury atoms together very strongly. Mercury atoms easily slip past and away from each other. Heat easily overcomes the weak binding between mercury atoms, and mercury boils and melts at lower temperatures than any other metal. Because the valence electron soup is thinner for mercury, its electrical and thermal conductivity are poor."

"As there are six kinds of metals, so I have also shown with reliable experiments... that there are also six kinds of half-metals: a new half-metal, namely Cobalt regulus in addition to Mercury, Bismuth, Zinc, and the reguluses of Antimony and Arsenic."

"On the periodic table of elements, the chemical symbol for mercury is Hg, from the Latin word - Hydrargyrum - meaning liquid silver. For quite some time, we have known that high concentrations of mercury can be toxic to humans; the first account of mercury poisoning was recorded as early as 50 B.C. Today, we recognize that mercury is a neurotoxin and that high levels of exposure can lead to serious illness and, in extreme cases, death. Since the 1950s and 1960s, a growing body of scientific evidence has suggested that mercury emissions from human activities, called anthropogenic emissions, are having widespread impacts on environmental and human health."

"It is the only metal that is a liquid at room temperature and it evaporates, or vaporizes, relatively easily. Mercury can also combine with other metals to make "amalgams", or solutions of metals, and has been used in the extraction of gold because of this property. One of the first metals to be mined, it was found in Egyptian tombs dating back to 1500 B.C. Mercury has been a part of the occult arts and human folklore and has been used in medicine, science and technology for millennia. In the modern world, there are many cultural, commercial and industrial uses for the metal still in practice."

"Mercury, quicksilver, found in 1560s, and Latin means hydrargyrus, from Greek hydrargyros, from hydr-, stem of hydor "water" + argyros "silver". Hence the chemical abbreviation Hg for the element mercury."

"Fluoride seems to fit in with lead, mercury and other poisons that cause chemical brain drain. The effect of each toxicant may seem small, but the combined damage on a population scale may be serious, especially because the brain power of the next generation is crucial to all of us."

"Scarily, cadmium is not even the worst poison among the elements. It sits above mercury, a neurotoxin. And to the right of mercury sit the most horrific mug shots on the periodic table—thallium, lead, and polonium—the nucleus of poisoner’s corridor."

"The astronomical symbol of Mercury [☿] can be traced to a medieval Greek manuscript where it takes the form?. The horizontal cross is a modern addition. The "horns" at the top of the symbol represent the wings of this speedy planet It is from the use of the name Hermes for Mercury that the usage of Hermean for characteristics of Mercury became popular during the 19th century and continues to be used by some today."

"As Hermes Psychopompos, he also serves as a guide of souls into the underworld. Under his Roman name of Mercury, Hermes is the prime god of the alchemists who hoped to transform base matter into refined, spiritual gold. Mercury is “quick silver”, the spirit that existed in matter."

"Quicksilver is a useful thing for many purposes. For instance, neither silver nor copper can be gilded properly without it. And when gold has been woven into a garment and the garment becomes worn out with age so that it is no longer respectable to use, the pieces of cloth are put into earthen pots, and burned up over a fire. The ashes are then thrown into water and quicksilver added thereto. This attracts all the bits of gold, and makes them combine with itself. The water is then poured off, and the rest emptied into a cloth and squeezed in the hands, whereupon the quicksilver, being liquid, escapes through the loose texture of the cloth, but the gold, which has been brought together by the squeezing, is found inside in a pure state."

"It is a fluid but does not moisten, and runs about, though it has no feet."

"Mercury was known to the ancient Chinese and Hindus, and has been found in Egyptian tombs dating back to 1500 or 1600 B.C. Dioscorides mentioned its preparation from cinnabar, while Pliny gave a method of purifying it by squeezing it through leather, and stated that it is poisonous. Earle R. Caley has shown by quotations from Aristotle, Theophrastus, Dioscorides, Pliny the Elder, Vitruvius, and the Leyden Papyrus of the third century A.D. that mercury has been known much longer than most persons realize. He states that cinnabar was probably the only mercury compound known to the ancients and that they used it both as a pigment and as a source of the metal. In his "Metallurgic Chemistry," C. E. Gellert (1713-1795) stated that “The only ore of mercury hitherto known is native cinnabar". The most ancient specimen of quicksilver known is probably that which H. Schliemann found in a little cocoanut-shaped in an Egyptian tomb at Kurna dating from the fifteenth or sixteenth century B.C."

"Theophrastus, a disciple of Plato and successor to Aristotle, described quicksilver as a useful substance "obtained from native Cinnabar, rubbed with Vinegar in a brass Mortar with a brass Pestle."

"The factitious cinnabar is from the country a little above Ephesus; it is but in small quantities, and is had only from one place. It is only a sand, shining like scarlet, which they collect, and rub to a very fine powder, in vessels of stone only, and afterwards wash in other vessels of brass, or sometimes of wood: What subsides they go to work on again, rubbing it and washing it as before."

"One Callius, an Athenian, who belonged to the silver mines, invented and taught the making of this artificial Cinnabar. He had carefully got together a great Quantity of this sand, imagining from its shining appearance that it contained gold: But when he had found that it did not, and had had an opportunity, in his trials, admiring the beauty of its colour, he invented and brought into use this preparation of it. And this is no old thing, the invention being only of about ninety years date; Praxibulus being at this time in the Government of Athens."

"In the first century A.D., Dioscorides Pedanios of Anazarbus, Cilicia, gave the following process for preparing metallic mercury: Putting an iron spoon having Cinnabaris in an earthen pot, they cover the cup, darwing it about with clay, then they make a fire under with coals; and ye soot that sticks to ye pot, being scraped off & cooled, becomes Hydrargyrum [mercury]. It is found also in ye place where silver is melted, standing together by drops on ye roofs. And some say that Hydrargyrum is found by itself in ye mines. But it is kept in glassen, or leaden, or tinnen, or silver vessels, for it eats through all other matter, and makes it run out."

"Many do not even know that mercury comes out of cinnabar (tan sha). When told, they still refuse to believe it, saying that cinnabar is red, and how can it produce a white substance? They also say that cinnabar is a stone that stones when heated turn to ashes: and how then can anything else be expected of tan sha?"

"Natural cinnabar consists of much mercury and some sulfur and earth; these three together make a hard body, a very beautiful red color varying in brightness according to the purity of the ore and the place where it is found. It is brought to us from different localities, as from Transylvania and Hungary and from many places in Germany; the handsomest, however, is found in Carinthia."

"The mercury mines of Almaden had been worked for at least 2287 years and that cinnabar from them was sent to ancient Rome in the form of powder or sand. A. de Galvez Canero believed that the Spanish mercury mines have been worked since the third or fourth century B.C. (28)."

"He was surprised to find that the crops, trees, and inhabitants were not injured by the fumes, and that springs near the mine yielded good potable water. The slaves who worked and ate in the mine however suffered severely from mercury poisoning."

"The Incas labored long in the Peruvian mercury mines without knowing what quicksilver was, seeking only cinnabar, or vermilion to use as war paint."

"The Spaniards discovered the mercury mines of Huancavelica in 1566-67. The red substance llimpi with which the Indians used to paint their faces was the same as the Castilian . After the mines of Palcas in the territory of Guamanga had been discovered in this way, much of the mercury obtained from them was shipped to Mexico to be used in the refining of silver]]."

"There was very little use or consumption of quicksilver before the beginning of this new Silver age in the world, then they only wasted it in Mercury sublimate, Cinabrio, or Vermillion, and the powders made thereof called Precipitate, which are also called in Spain the powders of Juanes de Vigo, which have been used to such mischievous purposes that the world was said to have too much of them, although in bulk and quantity then they had but little; but since it hath been used to collect the Silver together out of Oar, which is ground small (an invention which the Ancients had scarcely arrived to, and practised it but very little), it is incredible how great a quantity is consumed by the Founders of Metals of this Kingdom: for if the abundance of Silver that hath gone out of this Kingdom hath filled the world with riches and admiration, by it may be estimated the consumption and loss of Quicksilver, which after a most extravagant expense thereof at first, being now by good experience regulated within terms of moderation, is found to be equal in weight to the Silver extracted; and very seldom that the waste is so little."

"The famous mine of Huancavelica is located on Mount Santa Barbara, south of the city of Huancavelica.... The discovery of the great mercury mine is generally attributed to the Indian, Gonzalo Abincopa, or Navincopa; but it certainly occurred long before the year 1567, for even the Incas used cinnabar [llimpi] for their cosmetics, getting it from the mountains of Palcas. The working of the mine on Mt. Santa Barbara, for the crown, did not begin until about the month of September in 1570, the year in which Fernandez de Velasco introduced Mexican amalgamation into Peru."

"Indians living near the old Santa Clara Mission, about fifty miles from the present city of San Francisco, California, used to apply red and yellow pigments from the "Cave of the Red Earth" near there for personal adornment. In 1845 Captain Andres Castillero of the Mexican Army, who had studied chemistry and metallurgy at the College of Mines in Mexico City, discovered near the Santa Clara Mission an ore in which he easily detected metallic mercury. When Don Manuel Herrera of that College of Mines analyzed specimens of this ore he found an average mercury content of 35.5 per cent and reported that some pieces were practically pure cinnabar."

"When gold was discovered near Sutter's Fort, California, in 1848 the operation of the gold mines that were opened up during the "gold rush of '49" was greatly facilitated by the nearby supply of mercury for amalgamation."

"A method for preparing a rather pure mercurous chloride (calomel) was known to Parisian physicians before 1608."

"Tyrocinium Chymicum a "mild sublimate" was made by rubbing corrosive sublimate with as much mercury as could be "killed" or made to combine with it."

"Calomel, corrosive sublimate, and vermilion have been manufactured for centuries at Hankow, China. Chemists of India prepared both chlorides of mercury as early as the twelfth century. A detailed description of the process was given in the thirteenth or fourteenth century . A mixture of common salt, brick dust, alum, Indian aloe, and mercury was heated for three days in a closed earthen pot. The Japanese and Chinese also prepared calomel by similar methods."

"The Freezing of Mercury: Until the middle of the eighteenth century, chemists believed that fluidity was an essential property of mercury. During a blizzard on the twenty-fifth of December, 1759, A. Braune (or Braun) and M. V. Lomonosov of the Academy of Sciences of St. Petersburg thought it would be interesting to see how much farther the temperature could be lowered by artificial means. In the presence of several fellow members of the Academy, they packed a mercury thermometer in a mixture of nitric acid and snow. The mercury fell rapidly and solidified."

"...mercury use, as well as many of its treatment techniques are in fact as ancient as the Pharaohs and the Romans; and while recorded history proves that the Egyptians followed by the Greeks and Romans used mercury for cosmetic and medical preparations over five thousand years ago; we are now taking about ppt level, which mocks the expression “splitting hair”."

"Mercury does not react with most acids, such as dilute sulfuric acid, although s such as concentrated sulfuric acid and nitric acid or aqua regia dissolve it to give sulfate, nitrate, and chloride salts. Like silver, mercury reacts with atmospheric hydrogen sulfide."

"Mercury dissolves many other metals such as gold and silver to form amalgams. Iron is an exception and iron flasks have been traditionally used to transfer mercury."

"Mercury readily combines with aluminum upon contact, to form a mamagam that destroys Aluminium oxide layer which protects metallic aluminum from oxidizing in-depth."

"Mercury minerals in deposits in nature consist mainly of corderiote (Hg3S2CL2), livingstonite (HgSb4S7), montroydite (HgO), terlinguaite (Hg2OCL), HgS, calomel Hg2CL2,coloradoite HgTe, and teimannite HgSe."

"Mercury exists in two oxidation states: mercurous (valence+1) and mercuric (valence+2). Organic compounds of weak reducing activity such as amines, aldehydes, and ketones often break Mercury compounds to compounds of lower oxidation state and metal."

"Isotopes: There are seven stable isotopes of mercury with 202Hg being the most abundant (29.86%). The longest-lived radioistopes are 194Hg with a half-life of 444 years, and 203Hg with a halflife of 46.612 days. Most of the remaining radioisotopes have half-lives that are less than a day."

"The toxicity of mercury is not a recent discovery either. Galen, who died about 200AD wrote about the toxicity of mercurials. As to the therapeutic uses of mercury compounds the “Chemical technology reference” makes this statement: “...in the 13th century, as a result of Arabian influence, such therapeutic uses of mercury were finally recognized by Western Europe. Some of these uses are specially supported by recorded history in Egypt 5000 years ago and, in China and India dating over 4000 years ago."

"Inorganic mercury compounds are formed when mercury combines with elements other than , such as , , or oxygen. Elemental mercury is a form of inorganic mercury."

"Organic compounds of mercury, are known in which mercury is bound directly to oxygen, nitrogen, sulphur. In oxygen-linked compounds, the mercury generally behaves as in inorganic salts. Compounds containing a N-Hg link will be formed if you allow for a reaction of mercuric salts or alkyl and arylmercuri-compounds with amines and amides."

"Atmosphere/air: Air samples are collected when mercury pollution is believed to be present in the atmosphere or . Since mercury concentrations in the atmosphere vary greatly, sampling points must be selected in order to clarify the mercury distribution with consideration given to prevailing winds and the distance from the contamination source."

"Blood: For people who eat large quantities of fish and , the mercury concentration ratio of to (serum) is approximately 10:1, and most mercury contained in the red blood cells is in the form of ; therefore, methylmercury exposure can be evaluated by measuring total mercury in blood. It is believed that 50% of inorganic mercury is present in the plasma and the mercury concentration in the plasma increases in relation to the amount of inorganic mercury accumulated in the kidneys."

"A French saltpetre manufacturer, Courtois, in 1811 discovered a strange substance in the soda obtained from sea plants; he told his discovery to Clément, who showed the body in question to Davy. Davy soon demonstrated its elementary nature and Gay Lussac, after a complete investigation of iodine, as he called it, and its compounds, succeeded in showing its marked likeness to chlorine."

"Laurent, in 1837, striving after the real truth of substitution, had pictured the organic molecule as a prism, the angles of which were occupied by carbon atoms, the centres of its edges by hydrogen atoms, or failing these by chlorine, bromine, or iodine atoms."

"From this time oxygen began to be conventionally spoken of as the "supporter of combustion," and substances which burn in it were called "combustibles." Yet this manner of speaking is purely conventional, and is due to the abundance of oxygen in the atmosphere. Combustion is merely a special case, in which the heat of combination is exceptionally augmented. After the discovery of chlorine, bromine, and iodine, and when bodies were found to burn in the vapours of these substances, as well as in oxygen, the term "supporter of combustion" was extended to every substance capable of forming vapour in which others could burn; but as the same substance may act at one time as a "supporter," and at another time as a "combustible," the distinction has gradually become obsolete."

"Gay-Lussac was one of the most brilliant of the French chemists, and spent his whole life in research. His principal subjects of investigation [included]... Iodine and its compounds. ...Gay-Lussac's Memoir on Iodine appeared in 1814. This substance had been discovered three years previously by Bernard Courtois. Davy, in respect of its analogy to chlorine, had declared it to be an elementary body. Gay Lussac, doubting this conclusion, made a careful investigation of iodine, and described its peculiar properties and those of its compounds. This substance was shortly afterwards recognised as an element."

"In 1812 [Humphry Davy's] Elements of Chemical Philosophy was published, and next year he travelled on the Continent. During this journey, while in Paris, he examined iodine, and declared it to be an element."

"Berthollet's conclusion that chlorine is oxymuriatic acid was universally accepted until Gay-Lussac and Thénard in 1809 endeavoured to decompose the gas and failed. They concluded that it contained water because it yielded water when passed over litharge. Their researches read to the Institute in 1809 led Davy to investigate muriatic acid (hydrochloric acid) gas, which in 1808 he had shown to be decomposed by potassium, with evolution of hydrogen. In 1810 he proved that chlorine is an element, and that muriatic acid gas is a compound of chlorine and hydrogen. He thus overturned the oxygen-acid theory, and demonstrated that muriates are compounds of metals with chlorine. He pointed to the fact that some acids, such as sulphuretted hydrogen, contain no oxygen, and argued that muriatic acid gas was one of these, chlorine in it taking the place of oxygen. ...The conclusions of Davy were at first doubted, but when iodine and bromine were also discovered, Gay-Lussac and his followers adopted Davy's views. The latter worked out fluorine, and proved that hydrofluoric acid (HF) contains no oxygen. Berzelius also opposed Davy until the discovery of iodine, but embraced the latter's opinion in 1820."

"Never have experiments been conducted with greater care, caution, and exactitude than those of Stas. It is said that the greatest variation between his many individual determinations of the atomic weight of the same element was from .005 to .01. ...Some illustrations may be given of his care in purifying materials. He purified iodine either (1) by dissolving it to saturation in an aqueous solution of potassium iodide, precipitating it with an excess of water, rather less than was sufficient to throw down the full amount possible, washing, distilling with steam, and drying under a bell-glass beside calcium nitrate (the only salt which was found not to affect the purity of iodine); or (2) by acting with solution of ammonia on the iodine to be treated, thus forming nitrogen iodide, or diodamine, as he considered it, decomposing the violently explosive body by heating with excess of water to 60° or 65° Centigrade, and distilling and drying as before. By this latter method he treated some 10 kilogrammes of iodine in lots of 500 grains at a time."

"Meyer published along with [Paul] Jacobson a "Text book of Organic Chemistry" [Lehrbuch der Organischen Chemie], which was not finished; also, either alone or in conjunction with his pupils, upwards of 300 memoirs and papers... His researches [included]...Di- and tri-bromobenzene, in work on which he gained further evidence in support of his view that in the case of the chlorine, bromine, iodine, and nitroxyl (NO2) derivatives of aromatic amines, obtained by the direct substitution of an element, it is always the hydrogen contiguous to the NH2 group that is replaced."

"Curious relations, triads and octaves, were discovered to exist among the atomic weights of substances possessing similar physical characters and chemical properties. Chlorine, iodine, and bromine formed such a triad. Adding the atomic weights of chlorine and iodine, 35 and 125, the sum is 160. The mean or half, therefore, is 80, which is the atomic weight of bromine. These three substances are strictly analogous in their modes of combination, their salts are isomorphous, and with the increase in their atomic weight there is a uniform modification of their properties—chlorine is a green gas, bromine a very volatile red liquid, and iodine a slate-coloured solid, volatilised only by heat. Chlorine is the most active chemically, and can expel the others, bromine is next, and iodine is least active. Chloride of silver is easily soluble in ammonia, the bromide soluble with difficulty, and the iodide quite insoluble."

"In developing his ideas of nuclei which were used as a basis of classification in Gmelin's large Handbook of Chemistry [Handbuch der Chemie], as well as in his own Chemical Method, and in his theory of types, he introduced to science the words "anhydride," "amide," "imide," "amidic acid," and others. His Theory of Nuclei was originally mentioned in his Inaugural Dissertation at the Faculté des Sciences at Paris in 1837, but it must not be forgotten that these doctrines are also associated with the name of Gerhardt, who has a share in the honour of their conception and introduction. The Nucleus Theory amounted to this:—The molecules of organic bodies, he said, are either nuclei, or compounds of nuclei, with other substances placed outside them. These nuclei are groups of carbon atoms united with other elements, and are either (1) fundamental nuclei, consisting of carbon and hydrogen only, or (2) derivative nuclei, derived from the fundamental nuclei by substitution. The bodies substituted are generally chlorine, bromine, iodine, oxygen, or nitrogen, but compound bodies, acting as radicles, may be in like manner substituted for hydrogen and enter into the nucleus... In constructing his nuclei and comparing them to prisms, he abandoned the dualistic system, and viewed the compound as a single unitary whole like a crystal. Although the Nucleus Theory has not survived, it laid the foundation of the theory of types which we still use."

"Speaking broadly... we understand by the Atomicity of a chemical element its power of combining with other elements in equivalent proportions; by its Valency or quantivalence, the difference between that element and other elements in their respective powers of combining with hydrogen as a standard. Thus... Hydrogen, chlorine, bromine, iodine, and fluorine combine with hydrogen atom for atom and are termed Monovalent elements or Monads."

"Iodine was discovered by Courtois of Paris in 1812 in the mother-liquors collected in the process of manufacturing the sodium salts from kelp or burnt sea-weeds. The name is derived from a Greek word meaning "violet" in allusion to the colour of the vapour of iodine. Its elementary character was established by Gay-Lussac in 1815."

"I need only remind you of Davy's great researches: nitrous oxide; electric conduction and decomposition—resulting, on the one hand, in the separation of potassium and sodium, the decomposition of the earths following as a necessary consequence, and on the other in the electro-chemical theory; iodine and chlorine—resulting in the extension and confirmation of the word element, the discovery of the so-called hydrogen acids, and the important modification of the French theory of the constitution of acids; the investigation of gaseous explosion and of flame, and the invention of the safety lamp. These are the contributions to science which stand out more prominently in connection with Davy. But over and above all this is the peculiar manner of his discoveries. He was no patient plodder. He did not elaborate his work in minute detail. He dashed it off in broad masses; but just on that account there has never been anyone to follow up his investigations. Davy's mantle fell on no one, not even on Faraday."

"Gay Lussac's work is of a different kind. Less broad and striking, it is of the most thorough and comprehensive kind. Though he did not discover potassium, he invented a mode of preparing it in practical quantity. He did not at once grasp the significance of the elemental characters of iodine and chlorine, and was not at once prepared to accept the hydrogen acid theory, but he did at last give in his adherence, and his monograph on iodine and its compounds is a classical research, and exhausted the subject."

"Lavoisier believed that oxygen was the essential constituent in every acid and gave the element its name on that account. ... If muriatic acid contains oxygen then oxymuriatic acid (chlorine) must contain still more, but all Davy's attempts to obtain oxygen from it were equally fruitless. ...Numerous chemists who admired Lavoisier and valued a logical system more than experimental evidence, preferred for some time longer to make this assumption, and Gay-Lussac and Thénard were particularly hard to convince. Indeed, they supported the muriaticum theory with some very ingenious experiments. As fate would have it, however, they soon themselves furnished the most satisfactory evidence against the theory. In 1813 Gay-Lussac published a famous paper upon iodine, then recently discovered by Courtois, and in the following year another paper on cyanogen which is equally noteworthy. These investigations involved a study of hydriodic and hydrocyanic acids; and the important analogies which connect these with hydrochloric, together with the certainty that there is no oxygen in hydrocyanic acid soon satisfied all that there was no oxygen in any of them."

"In 1812 and 1813 iodine, discovered by Courtois, a French soapmaker, and investigated by Gay Lussac, was added to the list of acidifiers."

"Gay-Lussac (1778 1850)... enriched chemical literature by many excellent investigations, working often in company with Thenard, Humbolt, and Liebig. His most noteworthy work was upon iodine, cyanogen (the first compound radical), the alkaline oxides, the isolation of boron, improved methods for organic analysis, and many similar studies."

"Dumas devised an accurate and excellent method for determining the specific gravities, or densities, of gases which could be used at high temperatures, thus enabling him to experiment upon the vapor densities of iodine, phosphorus, sulphur, mercury, etc. His results, instead of confirming, tended rather to disprove the law of volumes. The trouble lay in the complex nature of the molecules experimented upon, but of course this was unknown to Dumas. He finally declared that even in the case of the simple gases like volumes did not contain equal numbers of chemical atoms. ...The atomic weights determined by him with the greatest care were those of silver, potassium, sodium, lithium, lead, chlorine, bromine, iodine, sulphur, and nitrogen."

"The first numerical regularities observed between the atomic weights were the triads of Döbereiner. This chemist seems to have observed first that the combining weight of strontium was the arithmetical mean of those of calcium and barium. A like regularity was noted with regard to certain physical properties of these elements and some of their compounds. This led him for a while to question the independent existence of strontium. Several similar triads were discovered among the other elements as lithium, sodium, and potassium; chlorine, bromine, and iodine; sulphur, selenium, and tellurium. He was careful not to let this grouping depend upon the atomic weights alone but insisted that only elements exhibiting decided analogies of properties should be considered together. This idea was taken up by other chemists, notably by Gmelin in his Handbook, and many analogies and groups were sought for. In 1857 [Ernst] Lennsen returned to this grouping, endeavoring to force all the elements into some twenty groups. Then Odling sought to build upon them an elaborate system of the elements which he called the Natural System. Such groupings were often forced, and failures. The science was not far enough advanced to enable one to understand the real meaning of these regularities."

"The table of Mendeleeff was changed but little for thirty years. Its anomalies, as the omission of hydrogen and the rejection of the atomic weight as the deciding factor in such cases as cobalt and nickel, tellurium and iodine, etc., were recognized; but greater knowledge was needed before these could be explained or the underlying law grasped."

"Drebbel conceiv’d, that 'tis not the whole body of the Air, but a certain Quintessence (as Chymists speake) or spirituous part of it, that makes it fit for respiration, which being spent, the remaining grosser body, or carcase to cherish the vitall flame residing in the heart: So that (for ought I could gather) besides the Mechanicall contrivance of his vessell he had a Chymicall liquor, which he accounted the chiefe Secret of his submarine Navigation. For when from time to time he perceiv’d, that the finer and purer part of the Air was consum'd, or over clogg’d by the respiration, and steames of those that went in his ship, he would, by unstopping a vessell full of this liquor, speedily restore to the troubled Air such a proportion of Vitall parts, as would make it againe, for a good while, fit for Respiration, whether by dissipating, or precipitating the grosser Exhalations, or by some other intelligible way, I must not now stay to examine; Contenting my selfe to add, that having had the opportunity to do some service to those of his Relations, that were most Intimate with him, and having made it my business to learne what this strange Liquor might be, they constantly affirm'd that Drebell would never disclose the Liquor unto any, nor so much as tell the matter whereof he made it, to above one Person, who himselfe assur'd me that it was. ...I have been sometimes inclin'd to favourable thoughts of their opinion, who would have the Aire necessary to ventilate, and cherish the vitall flame, which they do suppose to be continually burning in the heart. For we see, that in our Engine the flame of a Lamp will last almost as little after the Exsuction of the Air, as the life of an Animall ..."

"If... too much blood is supplied to the brain, congestion of the vessels takes place, and irregularity in its action is at once produced; if too little, the brain (and, therefore, the nervous system) becomes first irritable and then lethargic. The quality of the blood supplied is also of great importance. As it courses through the body it has two principal functions to perform — to supply oxygen and to provide nutrition to the different organs of the body; and if it be unable adequately to fulfill either of these functions, a certain disorganization will follow. If the supply of oxygen to the brain be deficient, it becomes overcharged with carbon dioxide, and heaviness and lethargy very shortly supervene. A common example of this is the feeling of dullness and sleepiness which frequently overtakes one in a crowded and ill-ventilated room; owing to the exhaustion of the oxygen in the room by the continued respiration of so large a number of people, the brain does not receive its due modicum, and therefore is unable to do its work properly."

"You are (we hope!) consuming oxygen as you read."

"Sir Humphrey Davy Abominated gravy. He lived in the odium Of having discovered sodium."

"The first difficulty that faced us was the identification of the forms seen on focusing the sight on gases. We could only proceed tentatively. Thus, a very common form in the air had a sort of dumb-bell shape... we examined this, comparing our rough sketches, and counted its atoms; these, divided by 18—the number of ultimate atoms in —gave us 23.22 as atomic weight, and this offered the presumption that it was sodium. We then took various substances—common salt, etc.—in which we knew sodium was present, and found the dumb-bell form in all. In other cases, we took small fragments of metals, as iron, tin, , silver, gold; in others, again, pieces of ore, mineral waters, etc... In all, 57 chemical elements were examined, out of the 78 recognized by modern chemistry. In addition to these, we found 3 chemical waifs: an unrecognized stranger between and which we named occultum, for purposes of reference, and 2 varieties of one element, which we named kalon and meta-kalon, between and ... Thus we have tabulated in all 65 chemical elements, or chemical atoms, completing three of Sir William Crookes' s, sufficient for some amount of generalization."

"was discovered by Courtois of Paris in 1812 in the mother-liquors collected in the process of manufacturing the sodium salts from kelp or burnt sea-weeds. The name is derived from a Greek word meaning "violet" in allusion to the colour of the vapour of iodine. Its elementary character was established by Gay-Lussac in 1815."

"In a sense, human flesh is made of stardust. Every atom in the human body, excluding only the primordial hydrogen atoms, was fashioned in stars that formed, grew old and exploded most violently before the Sun and the Earth came into being. The explosions scattered the heavy elements as a fine dust through space. By the time it made the Sun, the primordial gas of the Milky Way was sufficiently enriched with heavier elements for rocky planets like the Earth to form. And from the rocks atoms escaped for eventual incorporation in living things: , , oxygen, and sulphur for all living tissue; for bones and teeth; sodium and for the workings of nerves and brains; the iron colouring blood red… and so on. No other conclusion of modern research testifies more clearly to mankind’s intimate connections with the universe at large and with the cosmic forces at work among the stars."

"I need only remind you of Davy's great researches: nitrous oxide; electric conduction and decomposition—resulting, on the one hand, in the separation of and sodium, the decomposition of the earths following as a necessary consequence, and on the other in the electro-chemical theory; iodine and chlorine—resulting in the extension and confirmation of the word element, the discovery of the so-called hydrogen acids, and the important modification of the French theory of the constitution of acids; the investigation of gaseous explosion and of flame, and the invention of the safety lamp. These are the contributions to science which stand out more prominently in connection with Davy. But over and above all this is the peculiar manner of his discoveries. He was no patient plodder. He did not elaborate his work in minute detail. He dashed it off in broad masses; but just on that account there has never been anyone to follow up his investigations. Davy's mantle fell on no one, not even on Faraday."

"The distinction would only come to Mendeleev halfway through writing his Principles of Chemistry. ...chemical practice and not chemical theory had provided his initial organizing principle... Up to this point [Chapter 20], Mendeleev had only treated four elements in any detail: oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, and hydrogen—the so-called "organogens." Mendeleev began this chapter as usual by purifying the central substance, sodium chloride, from sources such as seawater. A discussion of sodium and chlorine followed in the next few chapters, and finally the halogens appeared... that were closely related to chlorine... and the alkali metals (the sodium family) form the first chapter of volume 2. ...he had dealt with only 8 elements, relegating 55... to the second volume. ...Mendeleev's earlier system of pedalogically useful organization—using laboratory practices... could no longer sustain the burden of exposition. He needed a new system... and he hit upon the idea of using a numerical marker for each element. Atomic weight seemed the most likely candidate for a system that would (a) account for all remaining elements; (b) do so in limited space; and (c) maintain some pedagogical merit. His solution, the periodic system, remains one of the most useful tools in chemistry."

"Study of the conduction of electricity in liquids became possible at the beginning of the nineteenth century, following the discovery of the electrolytic cell by Volta in 1800, which provided the first continuous source of electric current. It was soon discovered that the conduction of electricity by solutions is accompanied by chemical reactions at the electrodes which serve to conduct the current into and out of the solution. Nicholson and Carlisle demonstrated the decomposition of water into and oxygen by a current in 1801. Davy's discovery of sodium and metals by electrolysis of moist soda and [caustic] potash was a striking example of the novelty of electrochemical decomposition. Many of the phenomena of were already known when Michael Faraday began his researches."

"Abnormal sodium metabolism may be critical in the causation of certain forms of hypertension, particularly salt-sensitive hypertension. Long-term restriction of sodium intake in patients at high risk for the development of hypertension may reduce the chances of established hypertension occurring later. These high-risk patients in whom subsequent hypertension may be prevented include normotensive patients with family histories of hypertension, elderly patients, black patients, and those with low-renin hypertension. Treatment of hypertension with moderate sodium restriction to 70 mEq/day will significantly reduce blood pressure in a large percentage of patients, particularly known salt-sensitive hypertensive patients. This degree of restriction is also an effective adjunctive therapy for patients receiving antihypertensive medications. There is convincing experimental, epidemiologic, and clinical evidence that moderate sodium restriction helps prevent and assists in the treatment of hypertension in those patients who are genetically predisposed to develop primary hypertension or who already have hypertension. There is no evidence that this degree of sodium restriction is harmful."

"[T]he conditions for BEC in alkali gases are reached by combining two cooling methods. is used to precool the gas. The principle of laser cooling is that scattered photons are on average blue-shifted with respect to the incident laser beam. As a result, the scattered light carries away more energy than has been absorbed by the atoms, resulting in net cooling. Blue-shifts are caused by Doppler shifts or ac Stark shifts. The different laser cooling schemes are described in the 1997 Nobel lectures in physics... After the precooling, the atoms are cold enough to be confined in a magnetic trap. Wall-free confinement is necessary, otherwise the atoms would stick to the surface of the container. It is noteworthy that similar magnetic confinement is also used for plasmas which are too hot for any material container. After magnetically trapping the atoms, forced evaporative cooling is applied as the second cooling stage ... In this scheme, the trap depth is reduced, allowing the most energetic atoms to escape while the remainder rethermalize at steadily lower temperatures. Most BEC experiments reach quantum degeneracy between 500 nK and 2 μK, at densities between 1014 and 1015 cm-3. The largest condensates are of 100 million atoms for sodium, and a billion for ; the smallest are just a few hundred atoms."

"The purpose of cow's milk is to turn a 65-pound calf into a 400-pound cow, as rapidly as possible. Cow's milk is baby calf growth fluid. That's what this stuff is. Everything in that white liquid, the hormones, the s, the protein, the sodium, the growth factors, the IGF, every one of those is meant to blow that calf up to a great big cow, or it wouldn’t be there. And whether you pour it onto your cereal as a liquid, whether you clot it into yogurt, whether you ferment it into cheese, whether you freeze it into ice cream, it's baby calf growth fluid. And women eat it and it stimulates their tissues, and it gives women breast lumps, it makes the uterus get big, and they get fibroids and they bleed and they get hysterectomies, and they need mammograms, and it gives guys man-boobs. Cow's milk is the lactation secretions of a large bovine mammal who just had a baby. It's for baby calves. I tell my patients, "Go look in the mirror. Do you have big ears, do you have a tail? Are you a baby calf? If you’re not, don’t be eating baby calf growth fluid." In any level, there’s nothing in it people need."

"Before we can rightly understand the principles of spectroscopic astronomy, we must go back to the life and work of its founder—Joseph von Fraunhofer. ...Allowing light from the Sun to pass through a prism attached to the telescope, he was amazed to find several dark lines in the spectrum. ...Fraunhofer named the more prominent lines by the letters of the alphabet from A in the red to H in the violet. They are now known as the Fraunhofer lines. ...He expressed the belief that the pair of lines in the solar spectrum which he marked D, coincided with the pair of bright lines emitted by incandescent sodium. Although he doubtless suspected that the lines conveyed intelligence regarding the elements in the Sun, he never was able properly to decipher their meaning. ...Had he lived he would probably have made the great discovery."

"Black... set himself the problem of accurately determining the differences in composition between burnt (or caustic) and unburnt (or mild) alkali, and he solved the problem most successfully. He showed that the properties of mild alkalis differ from those of caustic alkalis, because the composition of the former differs from that of the latter; and he showed exactly wherein this difference of composition consists, viz. in the possession or non-possession of fixed air. Strange we may say that this discovery did not induce Black to prosecute the study of caustic alkalis: surely he would have anticipated Davy, and have been known as the discoverer of and sodium."

"When a strong electric current is passed through melted salt, a light, shining, metal-like solid [sodium], and a yellow gas [ chlorine ], having a very penetrating odour, are formed in place of the salt."

"Alkali. (Arabic, al Kali.) A name applied to a well-defined class of bodies characterized by the following properties. They turn red blue, completely neutralize s, they are soluble in water, and their solutions exert a caustic action upon animal matter. The alkalies proper are the oxides of , sodium, , and cæsium. To these must be added the compound alkali , the oxide of the hypothetical metal , which used to be called the volatile alkali, in contradistinction to potash and soda, which were called fixed alkalies. The alkaline earths are the oxides of , , , and . The oxides of some other metals, such as silver, , and , are also somewhat soluble in water, and possess slight alkaline properties."

"Dumas devised an accurate and excellent method for determining the specific gravities, or densities, of gases which could be used at high temperatures, thus enabling him to experiment upon the vapor densities of iodine, , sulphur, mercury, etc. His results, instead of confirming, tended rather to disprove the law of volumes. The trouble lay in the complex nature of the molecules experimented upon, but of course this was unknown to Dumas. He finally declared that even in the case of the simple gases like volumes did not contain equal numbers of chemical atoms. ...The atomic weights determined by him with the greatest care were those of silver, , sodium, , , , , iodine, sulphur, and ."

"The first numerical regularities observed between the atomic weights were the triads of Döbereiner. This chemist seems to have observed first that the combining weight of was the arithmetical mean of those of and . A like regularity was noted with regard to certain physical properties of these elements and some of their compounds. This led him for a while to question the independent existence of strontium. Several similar triads were discovered among the other elements as , sodium, and ; , , and iodine; sulphur, , and . He was careful not to let this grouping depend upon the atomic weights alone but insisted that only elements exhibiting decided analogies of properties should be considered together. This idea was taken up by other chemists, notably by Gmelin in his Handbook, and many analogies and groups were sought for. In 1857 [Ernst] Lennsen returned to this grouping, endeavoring to force all the elements into some twenty groups. Then Odling sought to build upon them an elaborate system of the elements which he called the Natural System. Such groupings were often forced, and failures. The science was not far enough advanced to enable one to understand the real meaning of these regularities."

"If you pass the light from a sodium flash through a , you get a pattern very different from the familiar continuous rainbow that Newton elicited from natural sunlight. Instead of a continuous pattern, in which all gradations of pure color are apparently represented, the sodium flash generates a series of lines of light. ...in the musical analogy, sodium produces a chord where sunlight produced all possible tones—"white noise." Other elements produce other chords."

"We will now consider more closely the characteristics of the several spectra, the knowledge of which is of importance from a practical standpoint, and indicate the advantage which the chemical analytical method founded upon it furnishes."

"SODIUM. Of all the spectral reactions that of sodium is the most sensitive. The yellow line Naα, the only one which is shown in the sodium spectrum coincides with Fraunhofer's line D and is characterized by its peculiarly sharp boundary and its extraordinary brilliancy. If the temperature of the flame is very high and the quantity of the substance used very great, traces of a continuous spectrum are seen in the immediate neighborhood of the line."

"Lines of other substances, in themselves very weak, lying near it appear still weak and will, therefore, often first be visible after the sodium reaction has begun to disappear."

"Swan has already called attention to the minuteness of the quantity of common salt which can produce the sodium line clearly."

"The following investigation shows that chemistry produces no single reaction which in the remotest degree can compare in sensitiveness with this analytical spectral determination of sodium."

"We detonized in one corner of the experiment room which contained about 60 cubic meters of air and as far as possible from our apparatus three milligrams of chlorate of sodium with milk sugar while the non-luminous flame was observed before the slit. After some minutes, the flame, becoming gradually colored pale yellow, gave a strong sodium line, which, after ten minutes, again completely vanished."

"From the weight of the detonized salt and the air contained in the room it is easy to calculate that in a unit weight of the latter not a \frac{1}{20000000}th part of sodium smoke could have been suspended. ...[I]t follows that the eye is capable of detecting less than \frac{1}{3000000}th of a milligram of sodium salt with the greatest distinctness. With such a sensibility of the reaction it is evident that only rarely is a sodium reaction not visible in glowing atmospheric air."

"The earth is covered over more than two-thirds of its surface with a solution of chloride of sodium, which, by the waves breaking into foam, is transformed continually into spray; the particles of sea-water, which reach the atmosphere in this way, evaporate and leave behind them motes of salt which vary in magnitude, but, as it appears, are rarely absent from the atmosphere, and, perhaps, serve to supply the small organisms the salt which the larger plants and animals secure from the ground."

"If, as we yet can scarcely doubt, there are catalytic influences which are the cause of the miasmic spread of disease, it is possible that an substance, such as , even in vanishingly small quantities, may indeed not be without definite influence upon such processes in the air. From daily and long continued spectrum observation it would be easy to learn whether the variation in the intensity of the spectral line Naα, produced by the sodium combination in the air, is related in any degree to the appearance and the spread of endemic diseases."

"In the exceedingly delicate sodium reaction may also be sought the reason why all bodies exposed to the air show the sodium line after a time when heated in the flame, and why it is possible with only a few compounds to eliminate the last trace of the sodium line Naα by crystallizing it out ten or more times from water which has come in contact with vessels only."

"A hair wire of , which has been freed, by heating, from every trace of sodium, shows the reaction most vividly again, if it is exposed some hours to the air. Dust which settles in the room from the air shows it in the same degree, so that, for example, the slapping of a dusty book is quite sufficient to produce at a distance of several spaces the most brilliant flashes of the Naα line."

"Mercury as a liquid metal is capable of dissolving other metals and forming metallic solutions. These are generally called 'amalgams.' The formation of these solutions is often accompanied by the development of a large amount of heat—for instance when and sodium are dissolved... but sometimes heat is absorbed, as... when is dissolved. It is evident that phenomena of this kind are exceedingly similar to the phenomena accompanying the dissolution of salts and other substances in water, but here it is easy to demonstrate that which is far more difficult to observe in the case of salts: the solution of metals in mercury is accompanied by the formation of definite chemical compounds of the mercury with the metals dissolved. This is shown by the fact that when pressed (best of all in chamois leather) such solutions leave solid, definite compounds of mercury with metals. It is, however, very difficult to obtain them in a pure state, on account of the difficulty of separating the last traces of mercury, which is mechanically distributed between the crystals of the compounds. Nevertheless, in many cases such compounds have undoubtedly been obtained, and their existence is clearly shown by the evident crystalline structure and characteristic appearance of many amalgams."

"[T]he sulphate of sodium prepared at chemical works is converted into soda ash—that is, , Na2CO3 , which is used for many purposes. In the form of carbonates, the metallic oxides behave in many cases just as they do in the state of s or s, owing to the feeble acid properties of . However, the majority of the salts of carbonic acid are insoluble, whilst sodium carbonate is one of the few soluble salts of this acid and therefore reacts with facility. Hence sodium carbonate is employed for many purposes, in which its alkaline properties come into play. Thus, even under the action of feeble organic acids it immediately parts with its carbonic acid, and gives a sodium salt of the acid taken. Its solutions exhibit an alkaline reaction on litmus. It aids the passage of certain organic substances (tar, acids) into solution, and is therefore used, like caustic alkalies and soap (which latter also acts by virtue of the alkali it contains), for the removal of certain organic substances, especially in bleaching cotton and similar fabrics."

"[A] considerable quantity of is used for the preparation of or caustic soda, which has also a very wide application. In large chemical works where sodium carbonate is manufactured from Na2SO4, it is usual first to manufacture , and then by its aid to convert common salt into , and lastly to convert the sodium sulphate thus obtained into carbonate and caustic soda. Hence these works prepare both alkaline substances (soda ash and caustic soda) and acid substances (sulphuric and s), the two classes of chemical products which are distinguished for the greatest energy of their reactions, and are therefore most frequently applied to technical purposes. Factories manufacturing soda in this manner are generally called alkali works."

"Pure sodium is a lustrous metal, at the ordinary temperature as white as silver and as soft as wax, but it becomes brittle in the cold. In ordinary moist air it quickly tarnishes and becomes covered with a film of NaHO and Na2CO3, formed at the expense of the water and CO2 in the air. In perfectly dry air sodium retains its lustre for an indefinite time. Its density at the ordinary temperature is equal to 0.975, so that it is lighter than water; it fuses very easily at a temperature of 97°, and distils at a bright red heat (742°, according to Perman, 1889). Scott (1887) determined the density of sodium vapour and found it to be nearly 12 (if H = 1). This shows that its molecule contains one atom (like mercury and ), Na. It fuses with most metals, forming indefinite compounds called s. Thus, if sodium, having a clean surface[,] be thrown into mercury, especially when heated, there is a flash, and such a considerable amount of heat is evolved that part of the mercury is transformed into vapour. Compounds or solutions of sodium in mercury, or amalgams of sodium, even when containing only 2 parts of sodium to 100 parts of mercury, are solid. Only those amalgams which are the very poorest in sodium are liquid. Such alloys of sodium with mercury are often used instead of sodium in chemical investigations, because in combination with mercury sodium is not easily acted on by air, and is heavier than water, whilst at the same time it retains its principal properties, such, for instance, as the power to decompose water, forming NaHO."

"The most important chemical property of sodium is its power of easily decomposing water and evolving from the majority of the hydrogen compounds, and especially from all s and s in which the presence of hydroxyl must be recognised. This depends on its power of combining with the elements which are in combination with the hydrogen. ...[S]odium disengages hydrogen, not only from water, , and all other acids, but also from , with the formation of sodamide, NH2Na, although it does not displace hydrogen from the hydrocarbons. Sodium burns both in and in oxygen, evolving much heat. These properties are closely connected with its power of taking up oxygen, chlorine, and similar elements from most of their compounds."

"It would seem from his description of its properties that the potassium he obtained was most probably alloyed with sodium derived from impure potash. Potassium is solid up to 143° F.; but, as Davy subsequently found, an alloy of potassium and sodium is fluid at ordinary temperatures."

"The "basis" of soda is described as a white opaque substance of the lustre and general appearance of silver. It is soft and malleable, and is a good conductor of heat and electricity. Its specific gravity was found by flotation in a mixture of oil of sassafras and naphtha... It was found to fuse at about 180° F. (the real melting point of sodium is 197.5°). Its action on a number of substances—oxygen, hydrogen, water, etc.—is then described, and its general behaviour contrasted with that of the "basis" of potash."

"He then enters upon some general observations on the relations of the "bases" of potash and soda to other bodies."

"He begins by again drawing attention to the various surmises which had been made respecting the true nature of potassium and sodium. Although these substances had been isolated, and in the hands of chemists for upwards of two years, their properties were so extraordinary when compared with those of the metals in general, that many philosophers hesitated to consider them as true metals."

"[A]lthough the plans of the edifice of the electromagnetic theory of light were laid in 1880 by H. A. Lorentz, and even indicated much earlier by W. Weber, a full 10 years were required before the discoveries of Heinrich Hertz gave the impetus to collect the building stones and work them into shape. In the years 1890-93 a number of works appeared by F. Richarz, H. Ebert and G. Johnstone Stoney, mostly dealing with the mechanism of the emission of luminous vapours, and in which attempts are made, on the basis of the kinetic theory of gases, to determine the magnitude of the elementary electrical quantity, called by Stoney by the now universally accepted name of electron. ...H. Ebert proved that the amplitude of an electron in luminous sodium vapour need only be a small fraction of a molecular diameter in order to excite a radiation of the absolute intensity determined by E. Wiedemann. The way of determining the amount of electricity contained in the electron is very simple. The quantity of electricity required for the electrolytic evolution of 1 cubic cm. of any monatomic gas is divided by Loschmidt's number—i.e., the number of gas molecules contained in 1 cubic cm."

"In view of the facility with which Lorentz's theory explains the dispersion and observation phenomena, a direct proof of its truth was hardly required. But that was also forthcoming. In 1896 a pupil of Lorentz, P. Zeeman, discovered a phenomenon whose existence Faraday had vainly sought for in 1862. If a luminous vapour, say a sodium flame, is brought into a strong magnetic field, the spectrum lines of the vapour show peculiar changes, consisting of a doubling or trebling, according to the line of vision. These changes are predicted by Lorentz's theory. The Zeeman phenomenon further permitted a determination of the inert mass connected with the vibrating charges, and then a striking result was obtained: the vibrating electron is always negatively charged, while the positive charge is stationary. ...The original and almost tacit assumption that the whole ion—i.e., the chemical atom plus its valency charge—was in oscillation must, therefore, be abandoned. We must suppose that the charge, just as is the case in electrolysis, has also an independent mobility in the light-emitting molecule, and that the mass concerned in the Zeeman phenomenon is that of the electron itself."

"The publication of Davy's discovery created an extrordinary sensation throughout the civilised world, a sensation not less profound, and certainly more general from its very nature, than that which attended his lecture of the previous year. But at the very moment of his triumph, it seemed that the noise of the universal acclaim with which it was received was not to reach him."

"Have and at all justified the hope that they would facilitate the means of procuring the comforts and conveniences of life? I have not the time... to attempt to follow the many changes in the metallurgy of the metals of the alkalis of the past century. Let me... show how the matter stands at the end of a hundred years."

"The general properties and chemical activities of potassium and sodium are so very similar that as a matter of commercial production that metal which can be most economically obtained is necessarily the one most largely manufactured, and of the two that metal is sodium. To-day, sodium is made by thousands of tons, and by a process which in principle is identical with that by which it was first made by Davy, i.e., by the of fused caustic soda."

"[A]fter a series of revolutions in its manufacture, sodium, having been produced from time to time on a manufacturing scale by a variety of metallurgical methods involving purely thermal processes of reduction and distillation, entirely dissociated from electricity, we should have now got back to the very principle of the process which first brought the metal to light. And that this has been industrially possible is entirely owing to another of Davy's discoveries - possibly indeed the greatest of them all—Michael Faraday."

"As we all gratefully acknowledge, it is to the genius and labours of Faraday—Davy's successor in this place—that the astonishing development of the application of electrical energy which characterises this age has taken rise."

"The modern method of production of sodium is based, therefore, as regards principles upon the conjoint labours of Davy and Faraday."

"These principles took their present form of application at the hands of... Hamilton Y. Castner... It is by Castner's process that all the sodium of to-day is manufactured. In the Castner process melted caustic soda produced by the of a solution of common salt by a method also devised by Castner, is brought into an iron vessel shaped like a large cauldron, mounted in brickwork, and provided with an extension adapted to receive the negative electrode. Suspended directly above the cathode is an iron vessel attached to a lid; to its lower edge is secured iron-wire gauze, which, when the receptacle is in position, completely surrounds the cathode. The positive electrode is connected with the lid of the vessel, which is provided with openings for the escape of the gases resulting from the electrolysis, and is suitably insulated."

"As the electrolysis proceeds the alkali metal, being much lighter than the molten caustic, rises from the negative electrode and passes into the receiver, the gases escaping around the edges of the cover. The molten metal collects on the surface of the caustic, and is removed by means of a large perforated spoon, the perforations enabling the melted caustic to flow out, while the metal remains in the spoon. As the several vessels are thus skimmed in succession the fused sodium is collected into an iron vessel, whence it is poured into moulds in which it congeals, forming blocks of the size and shape of an ordinary building brick. These, after being trimmed to remove adherent oxide, are immersed in paraffin oil, and are then packed into large iron drums... capable of being closed air-tight, and protected in transit by an outer casing of wood."

"The due regulation of the volume and intensity of the current is a matter of the greatest importance in order to obtain the most economical yield of the metal. No very high temperature is needed; indeed, the temperature of the fused caustic soda should not be much higher than that of its melting point. By suitably regulating the current, the soda, in fact, may be maintained at the proper temperature and in the proper degree of fluidity without extraneous heat. Fresh melted caustic soda is added to the vessel from time to time to replace the metal removed, and in this manner the process is made continuous."

"The greater quantity of the sodium made in England is... converted into ... for use in the extraction of gold. As gold is... generally considered the principal material factor in procuring the comforts and conveniences of life, Davy's great discovery may be thus said to have secured the primary object which the projectors of the had in view. Other important uses of sodium are in the manufacture of peroxide for bleaching purposes, of artificial , and of a number of other synthetic dye stuffs and of drugs like antipyrin."

"[T]his extraordinary development of the manufacture has not been without its influence on the price of sodium. A quarter of a century ago it was a comparatively rare metal, and a stick of it was regarded as a chemical curiosity, to be handled with circumspection and care. Even as late as 1890 its selling price was as high as 8s. per lb. To-day it is 8d. Sodium now takes rank, therefore, with , tin, copper, or as a common, ordinary metal of commerce."

"I am indebted to the directors of the Castner-Kellner Company... or affording me the opportunity, in connection with this lecture, of actually witnessing the modern process of manufacturing sodium as it is carried out at ... And in concluding may I be permitted to recall here the feelings to which that visit to Wallsend gave rise. ...Before me, stretching down to the river, was the factory where a score of workers, clad in helmets and gauntlets and swathed like so many , travel-stained and war-worn, their visages lit up by the yellow soda flames, and their ears half-deafened with the sound of exploding hydrogen—a veritable inferno—were repeating on a Gargantuan scale the little experiment first made a century ago in the cellars of this building; turning out, day and night, hundredweights of the plastic metal in place of the little pin-heads which then burst upon the astonished and delighted gaze of Davy."

"Behind me was the magnificent power-house... furnishing not only the electrical energy which transformed the soda into sodium, but diffusing this energy for a multitude of other purposes over an entire district—a noble temple to the genius and prescience of Faraday. Surely one might here say, if you desire to see the monuments of these men, look around!"

"The composition of every cell is different from that of the material in which it exists. ...The striking feature of a neuron at rest ...its contents are one-tenth as rich in sodium s as the external fluid and... ten times richer in ions. ...[S]odium ions will leak into the cell and potassium will leak from it. ...[T]he membrane possesses pumps to offset the flow ...sodium-potassium adenosine triphosphotase pumps ...can steadily exchange three sodium ions for two potassium ...Every neuron contains about a million pumps... and every pump can swap about 200 sodium ions for 130 potassium ions every second.. ...The pumps ...maintain that sodium potassium imbalance, and... the inside of each neuron at seventy millivolts negative to the outside. ...[T]hat helps to explain the near-permanent demand for oxygen ..."

"[A] change in the electrical state of the nerve cell... hurries along the axon in advance of the impulse... partnered by an alteration in the permeability of the membrane... permitting sodium ions to pour into the cell... [T]he more... ions rush in the more channels are opened to increase this torrent. Suddenly, with a change in the membrane potential from negative to positive... sodium channels close. Another group... opens, permitting potassium ions to flow out... until the... minus seventy millivolts is achieved again."

"The transmission of an impulse is not electrical... The so-called spike... the shift in membrane potential between -70 millivolts and +40 millivolts, is the electrical manifestation of each nerve impulse. ...[T]here is plainly more to it—with channels opening, pumps operating, and sodium scurrying back and forth—than... an electrical impulse along a copper wire."

"[C]onsiderable attention has been paid to the 'blood-brain barrier'. ...[I]n 1909 ...it was realized that certain substances, such as dyes, did not reach the brain. ...[T]hey arrived swiftly within every other tissue but not the brain or spinal cord. ...There was apparent restriction both to foreign substances (sucrose, insulin, penicillin) and natural ones (urea, sodium, potassium, creatinine). By comparison with muscular tissue, where there is equilibrium between blood and tissue for the injected substance within seconds or minutes, such a balance in the brain may take hours."

"There are several ways of performing Tas'id, (a rising up) in the (the sublimatory apparatus), and the substances which the chemists sublime in it are Mercury, Arsenic sulfide, Sulfur and Sal-Amoniac. They are placed after treatment in the aludel, and the cover being fitted in position over it, a fire is lit. Then the substance rises up, and settles on the shelf..."

"The natural principles in the mines are mercury and sulphur. All metals and minerals whereof there be sundry and diverse kinds are begotten of these two. But I must tell you that nature always intendeth and striveth to the perfection of gold. But many accidents coming between change the metals, for according to the purity and impurity of the two afore said principles, mercury and sulphur, pure and impure metals are engendered. Sulphur is not the last amongst the principles because it is a part of the metal. Yea, and the principle part of the philosopher's stone, and many wise men have left in writing diverse and very true things of sulphur. For the blood of sulphur is that inward virtue and dryness which congeals quicksilver into gold, and imparts health and perfection in all bodies."

"If you prudently desire to make our elixir, you must extract it from a mineral root. For as Geber saith, you must obtain the perfection of the matter from the seeds thereof. Sulphur and mercury are the mineral roots, and natural principles, upon which nature herself acts and works in the mines and caverns of the earth, which are viscous water, and subtil spirits running through the pores, veins, and bowels of the mountains. Of them is produced a vapour or cloud, which is the substance and body of metals united, ascending, and reverberating upon its own proper earth, (as Geber sheweth) even till by a temperate digestion through the space of a thousand years, the matter is fixed, and converted into a mineral stone, of which metals are made."

"Volcanic ash, despite the name, is dense as rock and can cause significant damage to structures, power lines and communications. It is also toxic because it contains chemicals such as sulfur, chlorine or fluorine, and it can therefore affect water supplies."

"There is another type of exploding supernova that also seeds the Galaxy with elements. This is the . This explosion involves a binary system in which a star and an intermediate-mass star (a ) orbit each other. The two stars are so close to each other that the white dwarf gradually pulls a considerable amount of material from the outer envelope of the expanding red giant. At a certain point the white dwarf will acquire so much mass that it collapses under its own weight and produces an explosion that blasts the bulk of its material into the interstellar medium—mostly in the form of iron, but also some sulfur, and . Such explosions contributed about 70 percent of the iron we see today in the Galaxy."

"'isn't it brimstone morning?' 'I forgot, my dear,' rejoined Squeers; 'yes, it certainly is. We purify the boys' bloods now and then, Nickleby.' 'Purify fiddlesticks' ends,' said his lady. 'Don't think, young man, that we go to the expense of flower of brimstone and molasses, just to purify them; because if you think we carry on the business in that way, you'll find yourself mistaken, and so I tell you plainly. ...They have the brimstone and treacle, partly because if they hadn't something or other in the way of medicine they'd be always ailing and giving a world of trouble, and partly because it spoils their appetites and comes cheaper than breakfast and dinner. So, it does them good and us good at the same time, and that's fair enough I'm sure.'"

"Proposals for chemical weapons that arose during the American Civil War are described. Most incendiary and all biological agents are excluded. The described proposals appeared primarily in periodicals or letters to government officials on both sides. The weapons were usually meant to temporarily disable enemy combatants, but some might have been lethal, and Civil War caregivers were ill-prepared to deal with the weapons’ effects. Evidently, none of the proposed weapons were used. In only one instance was use against civilians mentioned. Among the agents most commonly proposed were cayenne pepper or other plant-based irritants such as black pepper, snuff, mustard, and veratria. Other suggested agents included chloroform, chlorine, hydrogen cyanide, arsenic compounds, sulfur, and acids. Proponents usually suggested that the chemicals be included in explosive artillery projectiles. Less commonly proposed vehicles of delivery included fire engines, kites, and manned balloons. Some of the proposed weapons have modern counterparts."

"From this theoretical structure of nature evolved the assumptions upon which alchemy was based: the unity of the universe and relatedness of all natural phenomena as expressed by the idea of from which all bodies were formed and into which they might again be dissolved, and the existence of a potent transmuting agent capable of promoting the change of one kind of material into another... This transmuting agent became known as the philosopher's stone, an object so quintessential it could not only transmute metals, but cure illness and prolong life....The process was composed of three stages. In the first, the alchemist heated the primary material, usually a blend of salt, mercury and sulfur, until it dissolved and turned black with decay. Under this continuous heat the liquid became dry, powdery and white. If all was done properly, the materials would eventually recombine and become a brilliant red, the color of the philosopher's stone."

"...let us rather choose Arm'd with Hell flames and fury all at once O're Heav'ns high Towrs to force resistless way, Turning our Tortures into horrid Arms Against the Torturer; when to meet the noise Of his Almighty Engin he shall hear Infernal Thunder, and for Lightning see Black fire and horror shot with equal rage Among his Angels; and his Throne it self Mixt with Tartarean Sulphur, and strange fire, His own invented Torments."

"The crude sulphur found in Sicily and other places is heated in pots, whereupon the sulphur melts and floats on the surface of the earthy matter which remains at the bottoms of the pots; the melted sulphur is poured into moulds, where it solidifies, and the earthy matter left in the pots is thrown away."

"In some parts of the East, sulphur is separated from the earthy matter wherewith it is mixed in the soil, by heating the crude material very strongly in earthen pots, each covered with another similar pot inverted on it. The sulphur melts and then becomes gaseous and the gaseous, sulphur condenses in the upper pots, which are comparatively cool; the fine yellow powder which condenses is approximately pure sulphur; the earthy impurities remain in the lower pots."

"Recent "clean coal technologies" and use of low sulfur fuels have resulted in decreasing sulfate concentrations..."

"Putting a low price on valuable environmental resources is a phenomenon that pervades modern society. Agricultural water is not scarce in California; it is underpriced. Flights are stacked up on runways because takeoffs and landings are underpriced. People wait for hours in traffic jams because road use is unpriced. People die premature deaths from small sulfur particles in the air because air pollution is underpriced. And the most perilous of all environmental problems, climate change, is taking place because virtually every country puts a price of zero on carbon dioxide emissions."

"Mineral bodies are vapors which have coagulated in nature in the course of long lapses of time, and the first things which coagulate are quicksilver and sulphur, for these and not water or oil (oleum) are the elements of minerals, for the first... (quicksilver) is generated from a water and the other (sulphur) from an oil. Upon these things there operates a gentle digestion constantly with heat and moisture until they are solidified and from them (metallic) bodies are generated by gradual mutation in thousands of years. For if they remain in their minerals, nature purifies them until they arrive at a kind of gold or silver. But by the subtlety of the artist, transmutation of this kind is made in one day or in a brief space of time."

"There are seven things that can be elongated by hammering at the furnace, namely Sol, that is gold, luna (silver), tin, copper (aes), iron, lead. These are formed in nature under the earth. Gold is generated in the earth by the great heat of the sun from excellent quicksilver and red and pure sulphur by digestion in the rocks for a hundred years or more; silver from pure quicksilver and pure sulphur digested for a hundred years. But copper (...cuprum instead of aes) from impure quicksilver and impure sulphur digested for a hundred years. ...Lead, the philosophers say, is made under the earth from impure and thick quicksilver and from the worst sulphur and is a crude mixture and not well digested. And lead... renders gold breakable... Tin, however, is made from excellent and pure quicksilver, but from the poorest sulphur impure and not well digested. Iron is from thick quicksilver and thick red sulphur, and is not sufficiently digested."

"Now, according to the ancient Sages there are two principles of things, and more particularly of metals, namely, Sulphur and Mercury; according to the Moderns there are three: Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury, and the source of these principles are the elements; of which it therefore behoves us to speak first. Be it known to the students of this art that there are four elements, and that each has at its centre another element which makes it what it is. These are the four pillars of the world. They were in the beginning evolved and moulded out of chaos by the hand of the Creator; and it is their contrary action which keeps up the harmony and equilibrium of the mundane machinery; it is they which, through the virtue of celestial influences, produce all things above and beneath the earth."

"He can perform a thousand things, and is the heart of all. He can perfect metals and minerals, impart understanding to animals, produce flowers in herbs and trees, corrupt and perfect air; in short, he produces all the odours and paints all the colors of the world. ...Know friend, that sulphur is the virtue of the world. And though Nature's second-born, yet the oldest of all things. To those who know him, however, he is as obedient as a little child. He is most easily recognized by the vital spirit in animals, the colour in metals, the odour in plants. Without his help his mother can do nothing."

"Whip me, ye devils, From the possession of this heavenly sight! Blow me about in winds! Roast me in sulphur! Wash me in steepdown gulfs of liquid fire! O Desdemon! dead, Desdemon! dead! O! O! O!"

"Of Sulphur, Pliny states, there are four kinds, but he makes no very intelligible characterization of their differences. "Live" sulphur (sulphur vivum), ocurring in masses or blocks is the only kind used in medicine. The others are used respectively by fullers, for the fumigation of wool, and the preparation of lamp wicks (...evidently ...as we use it in matches). Sulphur was also used in religious ceremonies, and for fumigating houses, and for fumigating (bleaching) cloth. The virtues of sulphur are to be perceived in certain hot mineral springs, and there is no substance that ignites more readily, "a proof that there is in it a great affinity for fire.""

"On November first, 1772, Lavoisier had deposited a sealed note with the Secretary of the Academy of Sciences, in which he states that he has discovered the sulphur and when burned gained weight. "This increase of weight is due to a great quantity of air which becomes fixed during the combustion and which combines with the vapours." He expresses his conviction that the same is true of all combustions and s."

"His alchemical doctrine, that everything consisted of three elements—mercury, sulphur, and salt—is adapted from old authors, but he was the first to use the word "alcahest" to indicate the universal menstruum or , which at that time was a special object of research. He describes this liquor, alcahest, as having great power over the , comforting and confirming it, and preserving it from dropsy and other diseases that take their origin within it. ...Unhappily, he does not give precise directions for the preparation of this invaluable remedy."

"He arranged the several parts of man, his own universal elements, and the Aristotelian elements in triplets, thus :—"

"(1523-83)... adopted the reasoning of scholastic philosophy and thus weakened the force of his attack, but he pointed out many contradictions in the writings of Paracelsus and his followers, denied the existence of the philosopher's stone, and combated the idea that mercury, sulphur, and salt are the elements of living bodies."

"After a visit to Germany, France, England, and the Scottish lead mines, Thurneysser started mining and sulphur-extracting in 1558..."

"[T]he writings and labours of the alchemists were both extensive and important. ...[T]heir studies, although misdirected, were not... haphazard. The alchemists had a definite, and... logical, system of philosophy... [T]hey recognised—(1) the unity of matter; (2) the three principles—philosophical mercury, sulphur, and salt; (3) the four elements—fire, air, water, and earth; and (4) the seven metals—gold, silver, mercury, copper, , tin, and ."

"All metals and minerals consist of certain principles. These were at first called "mercury" and "sulphur," not the ordinary substances... but a philosophical mercury and a philosophical sulphur."

"Traces of these ancient conceptions are still to be recognised in the word "quick-silver," that is living silver, a literal translation of argentum vivum. A term "quick-sulphur" (sulphur vivum) was also in use, but it has long since disappeared."

"The mercury of a metal... represented its lustre, volatility, fusibility, and malleability; the sulphur of the metal, its colour, combustibility, affinity, and hardness."

"The salt of the was merely a means of union between the mercury and the sulphur, just as the vital spirit in man unites soul and body. It was doubtless devised to impart a triple form to the idea, in conformity with the method of the theological schoolmen."

"Mercury, sulphur, and salt were not three matters, but one, derived from the '."

"[W]hen an alchemist converted a metal into its oxide, or, as they expressed it, "made a " of it, he thought he had volatilised its mercury and fixed its sulphur. When he distilled ordinary mercury and found a solid residue in the , he called it the "sulphur" of mercury; when he found a sublimed product in the receiver (mercury bichloride), he termed it the "mercury" of mercury or "corrosive sublimate.""

"The more logical mind of Artephius Longaevus introduced a modification of this theory. He distinguished two properties in a metal—the visible and the occult. The former, comprehending its colour, lustre, extension, and other properties visible to the eye, he called its "sulphur"; the latter, comprehending its fusibility, malleability, volatility, and other properties not visible until after... special treatment, he called its "mercury.""

"They were thus able to apply the conception of the three principles to that of the four elements. Earth corresponded to philosophical sulphur, and water to philosophical mercury. Later, when they conceived philosophical salt, they devised a fifth element called "quintessence" or "ether." which corresponded to the third principle. Thus, if an alchemist distilled wood and obtained an inflammable gas, a liquid oil and a solid residue, he said that he had decomposed the wood into its elements—fire, water, and earth."

"The sulphur of a metal was its active principle; the mercury its passive; the salt was the link which united the other two."

"The sulphur, the property of dryness and heat, ultimately overcame the mercury, the property of wetness and cold, and thus changes were effected. ...[S]ulphur was the father, mercury the mother, and metals were conceived between them. In this expression the philosophical principles are meant, not the ordinary substances called sulphur and mercury."

"[A]lchemists accounted for the diversity of metals by five causes:— 1. Variation in the proportion of the principles, mercury and sulphur. 2. Variation in the purity of these principles. 3. Variation in the duration of the period of concoction to which the compound was subjected in the bowels of the earth. 4. Variation in planetary influences. 5. Variation in accidental influences."

"At a still later date it was argued that exact and natural sciences proceed by induction and deduction, and occult and spiritual sciences by analogy. Following out this line of thought the alchemists produced the following remarkable :—"

"These mystic alchemists interpreted the three principles in their own fashion. Mercury, the passive and female principle, was matter; sulphur, the active and male principle, was force; and salt, the middle term in the proposition, was movement, which applied force to matter. Or, expressed in another shape, mercury was the subject: sulphur, the cause; and salt, the effect. Symbolically, the theory was represented by an equilateral triangle, in one angle of which was the sign of sulphur or force; in the second, the sign of mercury or matter; and in the third, the sign of salt or movement."

"He asserted that the metals are composed of the mercury and sulphur of the philosophers, to which he added philosophical salt. The philosopher's stone, he said, is composed of the same materials."

"He strongly maintained the virtues of aurum potabile (liquid gold), and wrote a book entitled Medicinae Chymicae et Veri Potabilis Auri Assertio (1610). Another tract, De Lapide philosophorum et Lapide Rebis, related to the older alchemy. ...[I]n alchemical symbolism "Rebis" was the name given to the hermaphrodite figure representing the union of the great philosophical principles, sulphur and mercury, in the operation of making the philosopher's stone..."

"He observed that the fumes of sulphur blacken ; he purified by means of arsenic and ; he made artificial rubies and other precious stones by tinting glass with metallic oxides; he described fluor spar as a flux for metals and their oxides; he oxidised sulphur with ; he knew that alcohol is obtained by distilling the fermented juice of sweet fruits; he proved that the acid extracted from and from ferrous sulphate (green vitriol) is the same as that obtained by burning sulphur with saltpetre, that is to say, it is sulphuric acid; and he discovered tin tetrachloride (stannic chloride), which is sometimes called Liquor fumans Libavii. It is a truly remarkable record of practical work, considering the age in which Libavius lived."

"Paracelsus had discarded the disgusting decoctions of Galen and introduced chemical medicines, while Libavius and Sala had dismissed the fanatical conceptions which disfigured and almost nullified the teachings of both Paracelsians and Rosicrucians, but chemists still adhered either to the Aristotelian doctrine of the four elements, or to the later theory of the three principles (mercury, sulphur, and salt). (1577—1644) was the first to deny these propositions, and to begin a revolution in the philosophy of chemistry."

"Sulphuric acid he made by distilling green vitriol (ferrous sulphate), and by distilling nitre (potassium nitrate), and (double sulphate of potassium and aluminium). he prepared, but said it was of little use as a medicine."

"In 1648 he demonstrated the possibility of making blue vitriol () by boiling copper with sulphuric acid."

"[T]he most valuable work of Cavendish was contained in the two papers "Experiments on Air" (1784-5)... to determine the phlogistication of air... [i.e.,] the change in air when s are calcined in contact with it, and when sulphur, , or similar substances, are burned in it."

"He noticed that when copper and sulphur are mixed, they exhibit an , which increases with increasing temperature until finally they combine, and all traces of electricity disappear. Hence, he inferred that the same forces which, acting on masses at a distance, produce electric phenomena, when acting on atoms at small distances, produce chemical combination, the positive electricity of the one atom attracting and holding the negative of the other. In the positive charge is on one and the negative on the other, but these two charges have to be discharged through the electrode before the elements are set free. This is the reverse of what takes place in combination. Davy in this view differed from the electro-chemical theory of Berzelius."

"By 3000 BCE the Sumerians, perhaps while heating copper to make it more malleable, had discovered that more copper could be retrieved from the fire if the metal were heated with certain types of dirt and stones—that is, certain earths. These earths were the metal s, and the process they discovered, ', reduced metal salts to pure metal by the action of in the fire. The process of changing metal salts into pure metal is known as reduction because the metal without the accompanying oxygen, , or sulfur of the salt weighs less than the ore. Eventually metal workers learned to distinguish various metal-bearing ores by color, texture, weight, flame color, or smell when heated (such as garlic odor of ores) and they could produce a desired material on demand."

"The did not arrive in China until around 1500 BCE, and iron appeared only about 500 BCE, but by the beginning of their alchemical age, around 100 CE, the Chinese had knowledge of and ... mercury, sulfur and several of the common salts, such as ."

"Pliny recorded processes involving metals, salts, sulfur, glass, mortar, soot, ash, and a large variety of s, earths, and stones."

"[C]hemical weapons were not new to the world. Besieged towns had thrown pots of burning sulfur, asphalt and pitch on soldiers since at least 200 CE."

"Reminiscent of Aristotle, Jabir proposed... two exhalations: "earthy smoke" (small particles of earth on their way to becoming fire) and "watery vapor" (small particles of water on their way to becoming air). These, he believed, mingled to become the metals. But Jabir modified the Aristotelian approach by proposing that exhalations underwent intermediate transformations into sulfur and mercury before becoming metal. The reason for the existence of different types of metals, he believed, was that the sulfur and mercury were not always pure. He proposed that if the right proportions of sulfur and mercury with the right purity could be found... gold would result."

"Paracelsus' greatest triumph was the use of mercury to treat , the new disease of the day. ...Paracelsus may have heard of the treatment in his travels... or the discovery may have been serendipitous, based on... the extension of the mercury-sulfur theory of the Islamic alchemists to a tria prima... of mercury (soul), sulfur (spirit), and salt (body). But... there is no record of the number of people he adversely affected while experimenting with potions that were not effective, which may have been considerable."

"I am holding... one of the most extraordinary substances known to the human race... sulfur... known... since the dawn of humanity. ...[I]t was found in volcanic regions ...and one of the most remarkable things they found about this yellow solid ...is that it burns."

"It's burning with a blue flame... giving off the most foul and acrid fumes... So there is our "burning stone," which in old English was called brimstone."

"[O]ne of the things that's associated with sulfur and... its compounds is unpleasant smells."

"This is a volcano... that cloud of smoke... is... full of sulfurous fumes..."

"The word sulfur... goes... back to... the Hindu civilization... over 5,000 years ago. They had a word for sulfur... in... Sanskrit... sulvere... the enemy of copper. ...[T]hat is the ...destruction of the copper by the hot sulfur vapors... [T]he copper turns into... ...a black crumbly solid. ...The Latin [derived from sulvere] ...becomes sulphur."

"[S]ulfur beautifully burning in a gas jar full of oxygen... is a blue flame... [W]e now have a jar full of sulfurous fumes... [W]e allow the water to mix... The water has been colored green with a... ... As if by magic, the water... [turns] red and now it's gone yellow. ...[T]he ...gas ...when it reacts with water ...makes ."

"[I]t comes out of... volcanoes. ...[I]n ...human history things ...from underground have had... evil connotations... During the rise of various religions and... cultures sulfur was associated with evil... especially... in Christianity... connotations of hell, damnation... the dark underworld... punishment for... sins. ...[C]onnatations which we today ...know are not true..."

"[W]hen you heat fool's gold... some crushed s... [y]ou can see the appearance of this yellow color, and ...a little bit of crackling... . ...[T]he crystals... are breaking up into a powder ...because when you heat things up, they expand on the outside, but not on the inside. ...The yellow stuff is beginning to collect ...It is sulfur ..."

"[P]yrites is the most widely distributed mineral of sulfur ...the chemical name is iron sulfide. ...It has the formula FeS2 and ...thousands of years ago people ...recognized that when you heat it, you ...make sulfur ..."

"This mineral ...is .... It's lead sulfide. ...Beautiful silver crystals. If you heat this strongly, this too will make sulfur come off."

"There are many other sulfides, but this one is... special... Known in the ancient world as dragon's blood, and the reason... this red color. ...[W]hen they heated this strongly ...(This was particularly well known in ancient China and... in southern Spain.) ...it makes two... remarkable substances. One of them is sulfur... the other... is the liquid metal... mercury. ...[T]his fired up the imagination of ...ancient philosophers ...asking questions about ultimately what are all s made of."

"[T]he great Arabic alchemists... in the 8th or 9th century AD... came up with the idea that ultimately all metals are composed of sulfur and mercury..."

"[T]he sulfur-mercury theory... reasoning was... straightforward. They said... "If you mix this [mercury] with this [sulfur] in the right proportion, you can make any metal.""

"Science is very difficult, and... the ancient world... was... a world of correspondences. ...[S]omething ...could well be ...actually made of things that make it look like something. ...That was the cleverest way ...people used to view the world in those days."

"This sulfur-mercury theory... people continued to believe... for a thousand years."

"I have some beautiful crystals... these green ones and the blue ones... have been observed... [from] water evaporating on the side of lakes... close to volcanoes... [T]hey have... a glassy appearance. ...[T]he Sumerians, 2000 years ago ...described these ...The Latin word for glass is vitriolus [or vitrum] and so glassy substance became known as vitriols. ...[T]he medieval chemists discovered that if you heat these [crystals] very strongly... they give off a... terribly powerful smell and... a liquid which is capable of dissolving... metals. ...It was called oil of vitriol because it came from those glassy substances, but today we call it ."

"[T]he types of substances... made when metals dissolve in [sulfuric] acids...are called s. In the olden language they were called s. ...Here I have some beautiful crystals of copper sulfate ...blue vitriol. ...Here... iron sulfate... iron [or green] vitriol, which is the first sulfate... that they made the... sulfuric acid from, and... some crystals of white vitriol... . ...But I want to show you a most interesting [clear] mineral ...extremely beautiful. ...This comes out of the ground ...[A]lmost everyone ...would have lots of this in your houses. ...The mineral is called . The chemical name is ...[from which] we make plaster. ...Once again sulfur playing a key role in our everyday lives."

"We have wonderful uses of on an everyday basis. ...[J]ust about every ...motorcar [which runs on diesel or on petrol] ...has sulfuric acid ...inside the car battery."

"[T]he fact that sulfur has a low melting point of 115°C... has been exploited in making molds..."

"I'm going to melt the sulfur. ...The ...sulfur has molecules whose formulae are S8 ...They're pocket rings. They're like little crowns. ...[W]hen you get to roughly 160°C ...they break up ...and they start making a . They polymerize, like a plastic. ...I'm going to pour it into some cold water. ...like golden syrup. ...It's what we call plastic sulfur. ...[I]t's neither a liquid nor a solid."

"[the gas produced by burning sulfur]... has been used as a bleach and a fumigant since ancient Egyptian times."

"[A]bout 1,200 years ago... Al Razi... started making ... and... introduced marzipan into Europe... the tradition of using... sulfur for [marzipan] molds..."

"[A]n electric machine... first produced by ... is based on... attractor forces. ...[I]f you take a lump of sulfur and... rub it with a silk cloth... it will start to pick up bits of paper... hair... feather... [A]nother mineral... [Latin electrum]... had the same property. ...Otto von Guericke made a special globe out of sulfur ...and he described the remarkable reactions of things being ...attracted to it ...[I]t was the birth of ..."

"[T]he reason why is so interesting and why... the chemistry of sulfur is so interesting, is because sulfur is a very, very reactive element. Not only is it reactive, but it can form many different kinds of chemical combination..."

"The way we test... for... is to put in a burning splint... and you see it has gone out."

"This gas comes out of volcanoes as well as sulfur dioxide, and... is called . ...It has a phenomenally unpleasant smell of rotten eggs. Apart from that, it's unbelievably poisonous. ...[I]t undergoes an extraordinarily interesting reaction with sulfur dioxide. ...The lower jar is going yellow ...[W]e have made sulfur. ...also ...water. ...Two gases have reacted together to make a solid and a liquid. Secondly, two compounds of sulfur have made the element sulfur... Furthermore... it's... a redox reaction in which sulfur is reduced in one... and oxidized in the other. ...[M]any geologists believe that these two gases come out of volcanoes together and... make huge deposits of sulfur... found at the mouths of volcanoes."

"Sulfur is today obtained mainly from extraction from fossil fuels, from , from gas and from crude oil."

"This is a jar full of sulfur dioxide. ...[W]hen we pour solution, which is purple. ...It's lost its color. Let's try... [yellow] solution... Magic [as it turns ]? No, it's chemistry... [T]he sulfur dioxide is acting as a . It has caused them to change color on account of the change in of from +7 to +2, from +6 to +3."

"[T]here's burning, and... we lower it into sulfur dioxide. It carried on burning for a little while... [I]n sulfur dioxide, magnesium... breaks the bonds between the sulfur and the oxygen... itself becoming ... and releasing a little... sulfur... [T]hat's an example of sulfur dioxide as an ."

"Sulfur dioxide... is... present in many wines. ...Usually ...sulfur dioxide is used as a food preservative, ...but they usually call it ...SO3^2-."

"[S]ulfur is unbelievably reactive. ...Sulfur can form 4 hooks, 2 hooks, -2. s +4, +6 and -2, 0 in... the element..."

"is adding tiny amounts of sulfur to rubber to make it much stiffer. ...If not for ...vulcanization, we'd have no tires ...on motorcars, on airplanes or bicycles. We'd have no hoses in cars and so on... The world would be quite different. Vulcanization was invented by in 1840, one of the most important uses of sulfur today."

"These are the three ingredients in , which were known to the Chinese ...about 1,000 years ago: sulfur, and potassium nitrate. ...[T]hey're used in explosives and fireworks..."

"Californium-252 (Cf-252) is a radioactive chemical element that was discovered in 1950 at the University of California Radiation Laboratory. Since then, Cf-252 has become a leading neutron source for a variety of applications ranging from neutron spectroscopy to gold and silver prospecting, and much more. Strong neutron emissions from Cf-252 enable it to serve as a powerful fuel and information source. However, the element’s extremely radioactive nature can create health risks if one is directly exposed to it. Just one microgram of Cf-252 can release 170 million neutrons per minute, and, if ingested, can damage the skeleton, liver, and other parts of the body."