Chemical Elements

"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."

"[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-."

"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."

"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."

"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..."

"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!"

"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."

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

"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."

"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."

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

"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."

"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 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."

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

"(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."

"[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."

"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."

"[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."

"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."

"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."

"[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 ..."

"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."

"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."

"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..."

"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."

"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."

"'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.'"

"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."

"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."

"[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."

"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."

"[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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."