BERGMAN, Sir Torbern, a celebrated chemist and natural philosopher, was born in the year 1735, at Catha-∙ rineberg, in West Gothland. His father was receiver-general of the finances, and had destined him to the same employment; but nature had designed him for the sciences. To them he felt an irresistible inclination from his earliest years, and nature proved more powerful than the will of his friends. His first studies were confined to the mathematics and physics; and the efforts that were made to divert him from science having proved ineffectual, he was sent to Upsal, with permission to follow the bent of his inclination. Linnaeus at that time filled the whole kingdom with his fame. Instigated by his example, the Swedish youth flocked around him; and accomplished disciples leaving his school, carried the name and the system of their master to the most distant parts of the globe. Bergman, struck with the splendour of his renown, attached himself to the man whose merit had procured it, and by whom he was very soon distinguished. He applied himself at first to the study of insects, and made several ingenious researches into their history, particularly into that of the genus of tenthredo, so often and so cruelly preyed on by the larvae of the ichneumons, that nestle in their bowels and devour them. He discovered that the leech was oviparous; and that the coccus aquaticus is the egg of this animal, from which issue ten or twelve young. Linnaeus, who had at first denied this fact, was struck with astonishment when he saw it proved. Vidi et obstupui, were the words he pronounced, and which he wrote at the foot of the memoir when he gave it his sanction. Mr Bergman soon distinguished himself as an astronomer, naturalist, and geometrician; but these are not the titles by which he acquired his fame. The chair of chemistry and mineralogy, which had been filled by the celebrated Valierius, becoming vacant by his resignation, Mr Bergman appeared among the number of the competitors; and without having before this period discovered any particular attention to chemistry, he published a memoir on the preparation of alum that astonished his friends as well as his adversaries. Nobody was able to conceive how in so short a time he could have made a course of experiments so complete on a subject so new to him. His dissertation was warmly attacked in the periodical publications, and Wallerius himself criticised without reserve. But in the midst of so many enemies he possessed a firm friend. The Pnnce Gustavus, afterwards king of Sweden, and then chancellor of the university, took cognizance of the affair. After having consulted two persons most competent to give him advice, and whose testimony went in favour of Bergman, he addressed a memorial, written with his own hand, in answer to all the grievances alleged against the candidate, to the consistory of the university and to the senate, who in consequence confirmed the wishes of his royal highness.

Mr Bergman had now a hard duty to fulfil. He had to satisfy the hopes which had been conceived of him, to fill the place of Wallerius, and to put envy to silence. He! did not follow the common track in the study of chemistry. As he had received the lessons of no master, he was tainted with the prejudices of no school. Accustomed to precision, and having no time to lose, he applied himself to experiments without paying any attention to theories; repeating frequently those which he considered as the most important and instructive, and reducing them to method,—an improvement till then unknown. He first introduced into chemistry the process by analysis, which ought to be applied to every science; for there should be’ but one method of teaching and learning, as there is but one of judging accurately. These views have been laid down by Mr Bergman in an excellent discourse, which contains his profession of faith in what relates to the sciences. It is here that he displays himself without disguise to his reader; and it is here that it is of most importance to study him with attention.

The productions of volcanoes had never been properly analyzed when Messrs Ferber and Troil brought a rich collection of these into Sweden. At the sight of them Mr Bergman conceived the design of investigating their nature. He examined first of all the matters least altered by the fire, and the forms of which were still to be discerned: he followed them in their changes progressively; he determined, nay even imitated, their more complicated appearances; and he knew the effects which would result from the mixture and decomposition of the saline substances which are found abundantly in these productions. He discovered such as were formed in the humid way, and then in his laboratory observed the process of nature—that combat of flames and explosions, that chaos in which the elements seem to clash and to confound one another, unveiled itself to his eyes. He saw the fire of volcanoes kindled in the midst of pyritical combinations, and sea-salt decomposed by clays; he saw fixed air, as it was then called, disengaged from calcined calcareous stones, spreading upon the surface of the earth, and filling caverns in which flame and animal life are equally extinguished; he saw the sulphurous acid thrown out in waves, convert itself into the sulphuric by mere contact with the air, and, distilling through the rocks, form the alum veins of the Sol-faterra. He saw the bitumens as they melted; the inflammable and sulphurous airs exhaling; and the waters become mineral, and impregnated with the fire and vapours of these stupendous furnaces, preparing for the beings that move and dispute on the crust of the abyss, a remedy for pain and a balsam for disease.

The continual application which Mr Bergman bestowed on his studies having affected his health, he was advised to suspend them if he wished to prolong his life; but he found happiness to consist only in study, and wished not to forfeit his title to reputation by a few years more of inactivity and langour. He exhausted his strength, and died in the month of June 1784. The university of Upsal paid the most distinguished honours to his memory; and the academy of Stockholm consecrated to him a medal to perpetuate the regret of all the learned of Europe for his· loss. His Physical and Chemical Essays have been collected and translated by Dr Edmund Cullen, and published in 2 vols. 8vo.