Chapter X: Part I (5)

These numerous details would have swelled this elementary treatise to much too great a size; besides that, to have gathered the necessary materials, and to have completed all the series of experiments requisite, must have retarded the publication of this book for many years. This is a vast field for employing the zeal and abilities of young chemists, whom I would advise to endeavour rather to do well than to do much, and to ascertain, in the first place, the composition of the acids, before entering upon that of the neutral salts. Every edifice which is intended to resist the ravages of time should be built upon a sure foundation; and, in the present state of chemistry, to attempt discoveries by experiments, either not perfectly exact, or not sufficiently rigorous, will serve only to interrupt its progress, instead of contributing to its advancement.

FOOTNOTES:

[33] This number excludes all triple salts, or such as contain more than one salifiable base, all the salts whose bases are over or under saturated with acid, and those formed by the nitro-muriatic acid.--E.

[34] As all the specific names of the acids in the new nomenclature are adjectives, they would have applied severally to the various salifiable bases, without the invention of other terms, with perfect distinctness. Thus, _sulphurous potash_, and _sulphuric potash_, are equally distinct as _sulphite of potash_, and _sulphat of potash_; and have the advantage of being more easily retained in the memory, because more naturally arising from the acids themselves, than the arbitrary terminations adopted by Mr Lavoisier.--E.

[35] There is yet a third degree of oxygenation of acids, as the oxygenated muriatic and oxygenated nitric acids. The terms applicable to the neutral salts resulting from the union of these acids with salifiable bases is supplied by the Author in the Second Part of this Work. These are formed by prefixing the word _oxygenated_ to the name of the salt produced by the second degree of oxygenation. Thus, _oxygenated_ muriat of potash, _oxygenated_ nitrat of soda, &c.--E.