"The most general and most probable opinion is, that as only one kind of fire, of air, and of water, so only one kind of simple elementary earth, exists. Alchemists chiefly have endeavoured to discover this primary earth, not with an intention to ascertain its properties, but because they imagined that as gold is the purest of metals, the earth of which it is partly composed must be also the most pure; they have, therefore, searched every where for this earth, which they call pure earth and virgin earth. They have endeavoured to obtain it from dew, rain, the air, ashes of vegetables, animals, and several minerals: but it was impossible to find it in compound bodies; for we shall see that when once this element makes part of a compound body, it cannot be disengaged from the substances with which it has united."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Chemical_element
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Chemical element
48 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Chemical element →
Related Quotes
"It was a great achievement of the early chemists—with the crude experimental techniques available also with the ever-…"
"I have raised a question which may be regarded as heretical. At the time when our modern conception of chemistry firs…"
"1. Small particles called atoms exist and compose all matter; 2. They are indivisible and indestructible; 3. Atoms of…"
"That the forms of natural bodies may depend upon different arrangements of the same particles of matter has been a fa…"
"[[w:Chlorine|[C]hlorine]] possesses the singular power of removing the of certain bodies, replacing it atom for atom.…"
"Some recent work by E. Fermi and L. Szilard, which has been communicated to me in manuscript, leads me to expect that…"
"Although the problem of transmuting chemical elements into each other is much older than a satisfactory definition of…"
"[T]he purpose of my paper would be entirely attained if I succeed in turning the attention of investigators to the re…"
"No matter how properties of simple bodies may change in the free state, something remains constant, and when the elem…"
"I have presented the as a kind of travel guide to an imaginary country, of which the elements are the various regions…"