The Sun.
London, England, 1856-08-07 00:00:00

THE PRSSIDENT'S OFENING ADDRESS.

Dr. DAIIBENY, the ['President, delivered the 'usual
opening address, taking for bia subject._" The Pr egress
of Physical Science within the last 20 years." After
some introductory observations, the learned president
commenced his review with the science of chemistry, the
subject with which, he said, he was most familiar. He
first reminded his auditory that at a period not much
more remote than the date at which that association sat
in the city of Bristol, 20 years ago, all that could be
quoted as really worthy the name of chemical science
was comprehended within the limits of the mineral king.
dom :
"There was a world almost as little known to the
chemists of that period as was the Western Hemisphere
to the Macedonian Conqueror—a world comprising an
infinite variety of important products, called into exist-
ence by the mysterious operation of the vital principle,
and therefore placed, as was imagined, almost beyond
the reach of experimental research. This was the new
world of chemistry, which the continental philosophers
in the first instance, and subsequently those of our own
country, had, during the last 20 years, been busy in
exploring, and by so doing had not only bridged over
the gulf which had before separated by an impassable
barrier the kingdsnte of inorganic and of organic na-
ture, but also added provinces as extensive and as
fe:tile as those we are in possession of before to the patri-
mony of science ...
World might never have been discovered, or at all events,
would not have been brought under our subjection, with-
out those improvements in naval architecture which had
taken place prior to the age of Columbus, so the secrets
of organic chemistry would have long remained unelicited
but for the facilities in the methods of analysis which
were introduced by Liebig. Before his time the de-
termination of the component elements of an organic
substance was a task of so much skill as well as labour
that only the most accomplished analysts—such men, for
' instance, as his lamented friend Dr. Prout in this coun-
try, or as the great Berzelius in Sweden—could be de-
pended upon for such a work ; and hence the data upon
which we could rely for deducing any general conclu-
sions went on accumulating with extreme slowness. But
the new methods of analysis invented by Liebig have so
simplified and so facilitated the processes that a student,
after a few months' practical in,truction in a laboratory,
can, in many instances, arrive at results sufficiently pre-
cise to be made the basis of calculation, and thus to
enable the master mind, which is capable of availing it-
self of the facts before it, to breathe life into these dry
numerical details—just as the sculptor, by a few finishing
strokes, brings out the expression of the statue which
has been prepared for him by the laborious chiselling of
a number of subordinate workmen Formerly
it had been the rule to set down the bodies which form
the constituents of the substances we analysed, and
which had never yet under our hands undergone decom-
position, as elementary ; but the discovery of cyanogen
in the first instance, and the recognition of several other
compound radicals in organic chemistry more lately,
naturally suggest the idea that many of the so-called ele-
ments of inorganic matter may likewise be compounds,
differing from the organic) radicals above mentioned
,merely in their constituents being bound together by a
closer affinity. It is curious to reflect that while the
bold speculations of Democritus had been realised by
the Manchester philosopher, the reveries of the alche-
mists derive something like solid support from the minute
investigations of his successors, indeed it is not a little
remarkable how frequently the discoveries of modern
days have served to redeem the fancies of medieval
times from the charge of absurdity. If the direction
of a bit of steel suspended near the earth can, as
General Sabine has proved, be influenced by the posi-
tion of a body like the moon, situated at a distance from
it • mere than 200,00 e miles, who shall say that there
was anything preposterously extravagant in the concep-
tion, however little support it may derive from experience,
that the stars might exert an influence over the destinies
of maul"

Passing to the practical results bearing on the arts of
life which have either been actually deduced, or might
be anticipated to accrue from chemical discovery, the
president remarked—

"Of these, perhaps, the most important is the possibi-
lity of forming by art those compounds which had been
formerly supposed to be only producible by natural pro-
cesses, under the influence of the vital principle. The
last 2 years have added materially to the catalogue of such
bodies artificially produced, as in the formation of several
species of alcohol from coal gag by Berthelot, that of oil
of mustard by the same chemist, and the generation of
taurins, a principle elaborated in the liver by Strecker.
And if the above discoveries should strike you at first
sight rather as curious than practically useful. I would
remark that they afford reasonable ground for hope that
the production of some of those principles of high medi-
cinal or economical value which nature has sparingly
provided, or at least limited to certain districts or cli-
mates, may lie within the compass of the chemist's skill.
If quinine, for instance, to which the Peruvian bark
owes its efficacy, be, as would appear from recent re-
searches, a modified condition of ammonia, why may not
a Hellman be able to produce it for us from its elements,
as he has already done so many other alkaloids of simi-
lar constitution? And thus, while the progress of civilisa-
tion and the development of the chemical arts are acce-
lerating the consumption of those articles which kind
nature has either been storing up for the uses of man
during a vast succession of antecedent ages, or else is at
present elaborating for us in that limited area within
which alone the conditions would seem to be such as to
admit of their production, we are encouraged to hope
that science may make good the loss she has
contributed to create, by herself inventing artifi-
chi modes of obtaining these necessary materials.
In this case we need not to much regard the exhaustion
of our collieries, although nature appears to have pro-
vided no glejua for repleuielaing them nor 'veil be GOB*