The Layers of Chemical Language,I: Constitution of Bodies v . Structure of Matter

Richter coined the term ‘Stoichiometry’ in 1789 to indicate a new mathematical science of chemistry, but German chemists later used it for the weight relations of chemical compounds. I use the term in the latter sense. For Richter's chemistry, see Partington J. R. , “Jeremias Benjamin Richter and the Law of Reciprocal Proportions”, Annals of science, vii (1951), 172–98 and ix (1953), 289–314.

In contrast, the ‘empirical formula’ only expressed the stoichiometric composition of a substance. The distinction was originally Berzelius's, but the precise meaning of ‘rational’ formula changed with constitutional theories: Berzelius J. , Jahresberichte, xiii (1834), 186; Crosland M. P. , Historical studies in the language of chemistry (London, 1962), 323.

von Liebig J. Wöhler F. , “Untersuchungen über das Radikal der Benzoesäure”, Annalen der Pharmacie und Chemie, iii (1832), 249–87, p. 249; translated in T. Benfey (ed.), Classics in the theory of chemical combination (New York, 1963), 15–39, p. 15.

Fisher N. W. , “Organic classification before Kekulé”, Ambix, xx (1973), 106–31 and 209–33; idem; “Kekulé and organic classification”, ibid., xxi (1974), 29–52; Kapoor S. C. , “The origins of Laurent's organic classification”, Isis, lx (1969), 477–527; and idem, “Dumas and organic classification”, Ambix, xvi (1969), 1–65.

Levere T. H. , “Affinity or structure: An early problem in organic chemistry”, Ambix, xvii (1970), 111–26, and Affinity and matter: Elements of chemical philosophy 1800–1865 (Oxford, 1971), 158–97.

Rocke A. J. , Chemical atomism in the nineteenth century: From Dalton to Cannizzaro (Columbus, Ohio, 1984), 191–250.

“The transcendental part of chemistry” was Humphry Davy's phrase that David Knight borrows in his intellectual history of chemistry. Although Knight acknowledges that “to look at the metaphysical positions and wide-ranging theories of chemists is not to see the whole of chemistry, or even necessarily its most important part” (p. iii), he still presumes that the scientific content of chemistry consists of these theories and metaphysics which therefore make up the internal history of chemistry: David Knight, The transcendental part of chemistry (Folkestone, Kent, 1978).

Hannaway O. Holmes F. L. have already made important advances in this direction for the earlier period: O. Hannaway, The chemists and the word: The didactic origins of chemistry (Baltimore, 1975), and “Laboratory design and the aim of science: Andreas Libavius versus Tycho Brahe”, Isis, lxxvii (1986), 585–610; Holmes F. L. , Eighteenth-century chemistry as an investigative enterprise (Berkeley, Calif., 1989).

I deal with this in the second part, “The layers of chemical language, II: Stabilizing atoms and molecules in the practice of organic chemistry”.

Lesch J. E. , “Conceptual change in an empirical science: The discovery of the first alkaloids”, Historical studies in the physical sciences, xi (1981), 305–28, p. 328.

Farber P. L. , “The transformation of natural history in the nineteenth century”, Journal of the history of biology, xv (1982), 145–52.

Knight , The transcendental part (ref. 7), 246.

This is particularly true of Hessts and Thomsen's thermochemical research: M. G. Kim, “Practice and representation: Investigative programs of chemical affinity in the nineteenth century” (Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles, 1990), 196–265.

Holmes F. L. , Lavoisier and the chemistry of life (Madison, Wisconsin, 1985), p. xvi. Holmes intends to reject both the intellectual and the social historical approaches with this statement. I share his critique of the intellectual history, but not of the social history of science.

Nouveau dictionnaire d'histoire naturelle (Paris, 1816), xxi, 1.

Lavoisier A.-L. , Traité élémentaire de chimie (2 vols, Paris, 1789); referred to as Traité hereafter.

Berthollet C. L. , Essai de statique chimique (2 vols, Paris, 1803); referred to as Essai hereafter.

Crosland M. P. , The Society of Arcueil: A view of French science at the time of Napoleon I (London, 1967).

Lavoisier A.-L. , Elements of chemistry (New York, 1965; republication of English translation by Robert Kerr in 1790 (referred to as Elements hereafter), 36, and Traité, 37. Also see Traité, 48, 65, 275 and 529 for similar usages.

Traité, 429–48.

Traité, 345 and 397.

Traité , pp. xxxv, 123, 132–8, 155–8, 171, 181, 213, 214, 227, and 487; they are usually translated as ‘substances’, but occasionally as ‘matter’ in Elements.

Traité, 140, 156–7, 227, 409, 410, respectively. Also see 295, 407–19, 448, 452, 469, 477, 535 for similar usages.

Elements , 29 (emphasis added) and Traité, 31. Also see Traité, 101, 405, 415, 468 for similar usages.

Traité, 141 (my translation). Kerr's translation emphasizes the indestructibility of matter more strongly: “We may lay it down as an incontestible axiom, that, in all the operations of art and nature, nothing is created; and equal quantity of matter exists both before and after the experiment; the quality and the quantity of the elements remain precisely the same; and nothing takes place beyond changes and modification in the combination of these elements” (Elements, 130).

Elements , 5 and Traité, 5.

Traité , 5, 6, and 19, respectively; translated as “real substance”, “subtle matter” and “caloric” in Elements, 5, 6, and 19.

Elements , p. xxiv and Traité, i, p. xvii.

Elements, pp. xix and xxii.

Elements , 56 and Traité, 59–60 (emphasis added).

Thenard L. J. , Traité de chimie élémentaire théorique et pratique (2 vols, Paris, 1836), ii, 1 (emphasis added).

Thomson's inclination toward corpuscular ontology can be seen in his two successive editions of A system of chemistry in 1802 and 1804. He embraced Dalton's atomic theory enthusiastically, incorporating it into the third edition of the book in 1807. This was the first published description of Dalton's theory: Mauskopf Seymour H. , “Thomson before Dalton”, Annals of science, xxv (1969), 229–42.

Thomson T. , A system of chemistry (4 vols, Edinburgh, 1802), iii, 132.

Elements , 63 and Traité , 67; also see Traité , 68, 79, 96, 103, 112, 118, 125, 134, and 171 for similar usages.

Elements , 112 and Traité, 120; also see Traité, 123, 155 for similar usages.

See Traité, pp. xvi, xviii, 56–57, 87, 100 and 162.

Elements , p. xxx and Traité , p. xxv; also see Traité , pp. xxiii, 16–17, 55, 60 and 118 for similar occurrences.

See Traité , 54, 64, 66, 70, 94, and 121.

I have noticed one exception in Traité, 65.

Traité, Chapitre X.

Traité, 127. Robert Siegfried has noted the importance of nomenclature in Traité: “Lavoisier's table of simple substances: Its origin and interpretation”, Ambix, xxix (1982), 29–48, p. 39.

Elements, p. xiii.

Elements , p. xxvii and Traité, p. xxi. Also see Traité, 17, 56, 84 and 127.

For a discussion of the eighteenth-century classificatory scheme in relation to chemical composition, see Melhado E. M. , Jacob Berzelius: The emergence of his chemical system (Madison, Wisconsin, 1981), 37–45.

Traité, p. xvi (my translation); also see pp. 30, 47–48, and 51 for similar usages.

Thenard L. J. , “Mémoire sur la bile”, Mémoires de physique et de chimie de la Société d'Arcueil, i (1807), 23–45, p. 40.

Elements, p. xxvi.

Elements, 115 and Traité, 123.

Dumas J.-B. , “Premier mémoire sur les types chimiques”, Annales de chimie et de physique, lxxiii (1840), 73–103, p. 85.

Dumas J.-B. , Leçons sur la philosophie chimique (Paris, 1837). The lectures were published in various editions.

Dumas , Leçons (ref. 50), Première Leçon (delivered on 16 April 1836).

Dumas , Leçons (ref. 50), Sixième Leçon (21 May 1836).

Melhado E. M. , “Mitscherlich's discovery of isomorphism”, Historical studies in the physical sciences, xi (1981), 87–123.

Dumas , “Premier Mémoir” (ref. 49), 100.

Dumas J.-B. , “Mémoire sur la loi des substitutions et la théorie des types”, Comptes rendus, x (1840), 149–78, p. 158.

Dumas , “Mémoire sur la loi” (ref. 55), 162–4.

Ibid., 164.

Laurent Auguste , “Sur la Nitronaphtalase, la Nitronaphtalèse et la Naphtalase”, Annales de chimie et de physique, lix (1835), 376–97, pp. 381–3.

This was a constant source of frustration for organic chemists. The Karlsruhe Congress in 1860 marked a significant turning point in the progress toward a unified convention: deMilt C. , “Carl Weltzien and the Congress at Karlsruhe”, Chymia, i (1948), 153–69 and Rocke , Chemical atomism (ref. 6), 292–9.

Thomson , A system (ref. 33), iii, 141; Turner E. , Elements of chemistry including the recent discoveries and doctrines of the science (6th American edn, Philadelphia, 1840), 124; Thénard , Traité de chimie (ref. 31), i, 1–6.

Berthollet , Essai (ref. 17), i, 1.

Berthollet , Essai (ref. 17), i, 2 (emphasis added).

Berthollet C. L. , Recherches sur les lois de l'affinité (Paris, 1801).

Kim M. G. , “Practice and representation” (ref. 13), 133–4.

Traité, pp. xxxvii–xliv; Lavoisier used the term ‘rapport’ exclusively as ‘ratio’.

Berthollet , Essai (ref. 17), i, 13–14.

Berthollet , Essai (ref. 17), ii, 5–6.

Duncan A. M. , “The functions of affinity tables and Lavoisier's list of elements”, Ambix, xvii (1970), 28–42, p. 31.

Rappaport R. , “Rouelle and Stahl — The Phlogistic Revolution in France”, Chymia, vii (1961), 73–102; Fichman M. , “French Stahlism and chemical studies of air, 1750–1770”, Ambix, xviii (1971), 94–122.

Terrall M. , “Maupertuis and eighteenth century scientific culture” (Ph. D. Dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles, 1987), 198–236.

Crosland M. P. , “The development of chemistry in the eighteenth century”, Studies on Voltaire and the eighteenth century, xxiv (1936), 369–441, p. 384; Duncan A. M. , “The functions of affinity tables” (ref. 68) and “Some theoretical aspects of eighteenth-century tables of affinity”, Annals of science, xviii (1962), 177–94; Roberts L. , “Setting the table: The disciplinary development of eighteenth-century chemistry as read through the changing structure of its tables”, in Dear Peter (ed.), The literary structure of scientific argument (Philadelphia, 1991), 99–132.

Various scholars have noted Geoffroy's use of ‘rapport’ instead of ‘attraction’. Crosland and Smeaton relegate it to a possible Cartesian influence, while Duncan interprets it as a move to avoid “any theoretical interpretation”: Crosland, “The development” (ref. 71), Smeaton W. A. , “E. F. Geoffroy was not a Newtonian chemist”, Ambix, xviii (1971), 212–14, and Duncan , “Some theoretical aspects” (ref. 71), 184.

Geoffroy E.-F. , “Table des différens rapports observés en chymie entre différentes substances”, Mémoires de l'Académie Royale des Sciences , 1718, 202–12, translated in Leicester H. M. Klickstein H. S. (eds), Source book in chemistry: 1400–1900 (Cambridge, Mass., 1952), 67–75, p. 68. ‘Rapports’ is consistently translated as ‘affinity’.

Macquer P.-J. , Élémens de chymie théorique (Paris, 1749), 22.

Macquer P.-J. , Dictionnaire de chymie (1st edn, Paris, 1766; 2nd edn, Paris, 1778). W. C. Anderson offers a detailed analysis of the rhetorical and philosophical dimensions of the discourse of the Dictionnaire in Between the library and the laboratory: The language of chemistry in eighteenth-century France (Baltimore, 1984).

Macquer , Dictionnaire (1778), i, 57; quoted in Anderson, Between the library (ref. 75), 56.

Duncan , “Some theoretical aspects” (ref. 71), 192.

Stahl originally proposed the distinction between ‘constituent parts’ and ‘integrant parts’ to secure the empirical basis of chemistry in the wake of corpuscular philosophy: Melhado , Jacob Berzelius (ref. 44), 32.

The commonsense connotation of the word affinity survived, however, well into the nineteenth century: Dumas , Leçons (ref. 50), Dixième Leçon (18 June 1836).

Terrall , Maupertuis (ref. 70), 209.

Macquer , Élémens de Chymie-Théorique , 2nd edn (Paris, 1753), 19–20; quoted in Duncan , “Some theoretical aspects” (ref. 71), 190 (my translation).

Duncan , “Some theoretical aspects” (ref. 71), 193.

Boerhaave H. , Elements of chemistry , trans. by Dallowe Timothy (London, 1735), 19; quoted in Roberts , “Setting the table” (ref. 71), 107.

Roberts , “Setting the table” (ref. 71), 114.

For a similar historiographical observation, see Christie J. R. R. Golinski J. V. , “The spreading of the word: New directions in the historiography of chemistry, 1600–1800”, History of science, xx (1982), 235–66.

Levere , Affinity and matter (ref. 5), 199. Levere understands affinity largely as the forces associated with the particles of matter.

Dumas , Leçons (ref. 50), Dixième Leçon (18 June 1836).

Lectures at the Sorbonne, 1839–40; Levere , Affinity and matter (ref. 5), 163.

Laurent , “Sur la Nitronaphtalase” (ref. 58), 386. For other examples, see Laurent A. , “Sur la série naphtalique: 31e Mémoire sur les types”, Revue scientifique et industrielle, ed. by Quesneville G. A. , xi (1842), 361–74; idem, “Sur l'Hydrobenzamide”, Annales de chimie et de physique, lxii (1836), 23–31, esp. pp. 27–28; and Gerhardt C. , “Sur la constitution des sels organiques à acides complexes, et leurs rapports avec les sels ammoniacaux”, Annales de chimie et de physique, lxxii (1839), 184–214, esp. pp. 184–5.

Turner , Elements (ref. 60), 3.

Mauskopf S. H. , “Crystals and compounds: Molecular structure in nineteenth-century French science”, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, lxvi (1976), part 3.

Marcet J. , Conversations on chemistry, 6th edn (London, 1819), 9 (emphasis added).

Dalton J. , A new system of chemical philosophy (Manchester, 1808), i, 141–4.

Berthollet , Essai (ref. 17), i, 3.

Melhado , Jacob Berzelius (ref. 44), 316.

‘Metamorphoses’ referred to reactions between organic substances for which chemists had sufficient stoichiometric resolution, but chemists tended to offer different interpretations of the term depending on their theoretical affiliations.

Dumas J.-B. Liebig J. , “Note sur l'état actuel de la chimie organique”, Comptes rendus, v (1837), 567–72.

Dumas J.-B. , “Considerations générales sur la composition théorique des matières organiques”, Journal de pharmacie et des sciences accessoires, xx (1834), 261–94, p. 265.

Laurent A. , Méthode de chimie (Paris, 1854).

Laurent A. , Chemical method, notation, classification, & nomenclature, trans. by Odling William (London, 1855), p. xiii.

Ibid., p. xv.

Ibid., p. xvi.

Ibid., p. xi (emphasis added).

Ibid., 194–5.

Dumas , “Premier mémoire” (ref. 49), 73; quoted and translated in Kapoor , “Dumas” (ref. 4), 22–23. The model was short-lived.

The use of the word ‘arrangement’ when referring to systematics was quite common among naturalists. See, for example, Bicheno J. E. , “On systems and methods in natural history”, Transactions of the Linnean Society, xv (1827), 479–96.

Silliman R. H. , “Fresnel and the emergence of physics as a discipline”, Historical studies in the physical sciences, iv (1976), 137–62, esp. pp. 139–44.

Gray A. , Elements of chemistry containing the principles of the science, both experimental and theoretical, 4th edn (New York, 1848), 21–22.

Coleman W. , Georges Cuvier, zoologist: A study in the history of evolution theory (Cambridge, Mass., 1964); Outram D. , Georges Cuvier: Vocation, science, and authority in post-revolutionary France (Manchester, 1984); Appel T. A. , The Cuvier-Geoffroy debate: French biology in the decades before Darwin (Oxford, 1987); Limoges C. , “The development of the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle of Paris, c. 1800–1914”, in Fox R. Weisz G. (eds), The organization of science and technology in France 1808–1914 (Cambridge, 1980), 211–40.

Ampère A.-M. , “Essai d'une classification naturelle pour les corps simples”, Annales de chimie et de physique, i (1816), 295–308 and 373–94; ii (1816), 5–32 and 105–25.

Kapoor discusses Dumas's elaboration of the method of classification as the legitimate theory of organic chemistry, distinguishing it from the “purely empirical” approach of observation and description. He still distinguishes, however, Dumas's “classificatory schemes” from the contemporary “chemical theories” in which he includes atomic and electrochemical theory, isomerism and isomorphism: Kapoor , “Dumas” (ref. 4).

Levere , Affinity and matter (ref. 5), p. viii.

Falk R. , “What is a gene?”, Studies in history and philosophy of science, xvii (1986), 133–73.

Gooding D. Pinch T. Schaffer S. (eds), The uses of experiment: Studies in the natural sciences (Cambridge, 1989), pp. xiii–xiv.