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³ Lavoisier, A.L., Traits élémentaire de chimie, Paris, 1789Google Scholar, both printed in 2 vols, and in 3 vols; 2nd edn 1793, 2 vols. English editions: Elements of Chemistry, Edinburgh, 1790Google Scholar, trans by R. Kerr (reprinted in New-York, 1965); 2nd edn, Edinburgh, 1793; 3rd edn, 1796; 4th edn, 1799; 5th edn, 2 vols, 1802. See Daumas, M., Lavoisier, théoricien et expérimentateur, Paris 1955, pp. 109–110.Google Scholar

⁴ de Fourcroy, A.F., Leçons élémentaires d'Histoire naturelle et de chimie, Paris, 1782, 2 volsGoogle Scholar, 2nd edn, Eléments d'histoire naturelle et de chimie, Paris, 1786, 4 vols; 3rd edition, 1789, 5 vols; 4th edn, Paris, 5 vols, 5th edn, Paris, An II de la république une et indivisible, 5 vols. English translation, Elementary Lectures on Chemistry and Natural History, trans T. Elliot, 2 vols (Edinburgh, 1785), 5 edn, trans John Thomson, 3 vols (Edinburgh, 1798). Philosophie Chimique ou Vérités fondamentales de la chimie moderne, Paris, 1792Google Scholar, 2nd edn, 1795, 3rd edn, 1806.

⁵ Chaptal, J.A.C., Elémens de Chymie, Montpellier, J.F. Picot, 3 vols, 1790Google Scholar; 2nd edn, Paris, A. Déterville, 3 vols, An III (1794); 3rd edition, 3 vols, Paris, An V (1796), 4th edn, 3 vols, Paris, An XI (1803). English editions, 3 vols, London, 1791, 1795, 1800; American edition, Philadelphia, 1796 (1 vol.), 1802, Boston, 1806, Philadelphia, 1807.

⁶ Lavoisier's papers, Archives of the Academy of Science, Folders 1259 and 1260. The first accounts of the unpublished drafts of a treatise were given by Daumas, M., in ‘L'élaboration du Traité élémentaire de chimie’, Archives Internationales d'Histoire des Sciences, (1950), 3, pp. 570–590Google Scholar; also in Lavoisier, théoricien et expérimentateur, Paris, 1955, pp. 91–112Google Scholar. In the memorandum entitled ‘Sur la manière d'enseigner la chimie’ (Appendix 2), Lavoisier characterized his published treatise as ‘un ouvrage imparfait’. Moreover in 1793, when he wrote to his English translator Robert Kerr, Lavoisier disapproved of the second French edition of his Traité élémentaire, which he regarded as a counterfeit (Letter 6 January 1793, quoted by Daumas, , op. cit. (3), p. 109).Google Scholar

⁷ Lavoisier, , Traité Elémentaire de Chimie, Oeuvres, Paris, Imprimerie Impériale, 1864, T.I, p. 13Google Scholar. Concerning Chaptal, see Lavoisier, , Correspondence, Fascicule IV (1784–1876)Google Scholar, Oeuvres, Paris, 1986, p. 21.Google Scholar

⁸ On the phrase ‘The theory of the French chemists’, see Smeaton, W.A., Ambix, (1959), 7, pp. 49–50CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Ambix, (1989), 36, pp. 1–4.Google Scholar

⁹ The memoirs by Lavoisier and Bucquet are listed in Daumas, , Lavoisier théoricien et expérimentateur, Paris, 1955, pp. 39–40Google Scholar. E. McDonald, who devoted a M.Sc. Dissertation to Bucquet, suggested that Lavoisier's plan for founding a new chemistry originated in Bucquet's mind, see ‘The collaboration of Bucquet and Lavoisier’, Ambix, (1966), 13, pp. 74–83Google Scholar; Perrin, C.E., ‘The Lavoisier-Bucquet collaboration: A Conjecture’, Ambix, (1989), 36, pp. 5–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁰ Lavoisier's papers, Archives de I'Academie de Sciences, Folder 1259. See Daumas, , op. cit. (3). p. 19.Google Scholar

¹¹ In a ‘Notice abrégée de plusieurs mémoires rédigés en commun par MM. Bucquet et Lavoisier et sur les-quels ils prient l'académie de leur donner date avant sa séparation’, Lavoisier wrote ‘Une circonstance particullière ayant mis M. Bucquet dans le cas de répéter dans mon laboratoire (une partie des expériences les plus) toutes les expériences fondamentales du règne minéral nous avons cru devoir profiter de ce travail pour constater differents fails douteux et incertains pour répéter des expériences très anciennes qui exigent un feu violent ou des appareils très compliqués’ (Lavoisier's Papers, Archives de I'Academie de Science, Folder 363), quoted by Perrin, , op. cit. (9) p. 7Google Scholar. Perrin also quoted Bucquet's words ‘nous trouvâmes l'occasion de repéter toutes les expériences fondamentales de la chimie’.

¹² Fourcroy, , Leçons élémentaires d'histoire naturelle et de chimie, Paris, chez Cuchet, 1782, 1st ednGoogle Scholar, ‘Préface’, p. ij.

¹³ Lavoisier, , Traité élémentaire de chimie, Oeuvres, T.I, p. 1.Google Scholar

¹⁴ Lavoisier, ‘Mémoire sur la nécessité de réformer et de perfectionner la nomenclature de la chimie’, in MM. de Morveau, Lavoisier, Bertholletet Fourcroy, Méthode de nomenclature, Paris, 1787, p. 12Google Scholar; in Oeuvres, T.V., Paris Imprimerie Nationale, 1892, p. 359 (my emphasis)Google Scholar. See Crosland, M.P., Historical Studies in the Language of Chemistry, Dover Public., New York, 1st edn, 1962, 2nd edn, 1978.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Ibid, 1787, pp. 16–17; in Oeuvres, p. 360–361.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Siegfried, R., ‘The Chemical Revolution and the History of Chemistry’ in A. Donovan (ed.), ‘The Chem-cal revolution: Essays in reinterpretation’, Osiris, Second series, (1988), 4, p. 38.Google Scholar

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¹⁸ Fourcroy and Cadet de Vaux, ‘Extrait des registres de la societe d'agriculture’ du 5 février 1789Google Scholar, in Lavoisier, Oeuvres, T.I, p. 435.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Chaptal, , Element de Chymie, Montpellier, 1790, T.I, p. xij.Google Scholar

²⁰ Ibid, T.III, p. 453; Chaptal also advocated the alliance of chemistry with medicine, (T. 3, p. 458) and mineralogy (T2. p. 6).

²¹ Fourcroy, , Eléments d'Histoire naturelle et de chimie. 2nd edn, 1786, T.I, pp. Ixv–xcxixGoogle Scholar. In the later editions the number of categories was reduced to fourteen and to twelve in the entry ‘Axiomes’ of the Encyclopédie méthodique, Chimie, vol. II (1792)Google Scholar, reprinted in Philosophie chimique.

²² Ibid., 5th edn, Paris, An II, T.I, p. viij.

²³ For a detailed presentation of this book and information about its reception, see Smeaton, W.A., Fourcroy, chemist and revolutionary, 1755–1809, Cambridge, 1962, pp. 191–195Google Scholar, Fourcroy's twelve headings in the Philosophie chimique, 1792Google Scholar, were: (1) The action of light; (2) the action of caloric; (3) the action of air in combustion; (4) the nature and action of water; (5) the nature and action of earth, and the formation of alkalis; their roles in combinations; (6) the nature and properties of combustible substances; (7) the formation and decomposition of acids; (8) the union of acids with the earths and alkalis; (9) the oxidation and solution of metals; (10) the nature and formation of vegetable matter; (11) the passage of vegetables to the state of animal matter, and the nature of the latter; (12) the spontaneous decomposition of vegetable and animal matters.

²⁴ Langins, J., La République avait besoin de savants, ‘Les débuts de I'Ecole Polytechnique: l'Ecole centrale des travaux publics et les cours révolutionnaires de l'An III’, Paris, 1987, pp. 54–55 and 173–198.Google Scholar

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²⁶ Lavoisier, , Oeuvres, I, p. 15Google Scholar; de Condillac, E.B., La logique ou les premiers développements de I'art de penser, Paris, 1780, p. 114Google Scholar. Albury, W.R. The Logic of Condillac and the Structure of the French Chemical and Biological Theory, 1780–1801, (Ph.D. dissertation, The Johns Hopkins University, 1972).Google Scholar

²⁷ Lavoisier, , ‘Réflexions sur le phlogistique’, 1783, Oeuvres, vol. ii, p. 624.Google Scholar

²⁸ Anderson, W.C., Between the Library and the Laboratory: The language of chemistry in eighteenth century, France, Baltimore, 1984, pp. 132–146.Google Scholar

²⁹ Ibid., pp. 147–151.

³⁰ Fourcroy, , Système des connaissances chimiques, Paris, 1800, 10 octavo vols (or 5 quarto) T.I, p. xxxjGoogle Scholar. English translation, A general System of Chemical Knowledge, trans Nicholson, W. (London, 1804).Google Scholar

³¹ Siegfried, , ‘The Chemical Revolution and the History of Chemistry’Google Scholar, in Donovan, A. (ed.), ‘The Chemical revolution: Essays in reinterpretation’, Osiris, Second series, 1988, 4, pp. 43–50Google Scholar. Langins, J., ‘Fourcroy, historien de la révolution chimique’, paper read at the International Conference ‘Lavoisier, ses collaborateurs et la révolution chimique’, Ecole Polytechnique, 4–5 décembre 1989.Google Scholar

³² Fourcroy, , Système des Connaissances Chimiques, 1800, T.1, p. xl, xli.Google Scholar

³³ Smeaton noticed that Guyton de Morveau was named first in the Méthode de nomenclature (1787)Google Scholar; in the Essai sur le phlogistique translated from Kirwan (1788), in the list of eight editors of the Annales de chimie (1789)Google Scholar. (‘Monsieur et Madame Lavoisier in 1789: The Chemical Revolution and the French Revolution’, Ambix, (1989), 36, pp. 1–4)Google Scholar. A systematic and quantitative analysis of mutal citations of chemists before and during the chemical revolution leads to the striking result that a number of French chemists rose to the top of entailment chains close to Lavoisier; Macquer, Morveau, Berthollet, in the entailogramm for the period 1785–1788; Fourcroy and Berthollet for the period 1791–1795. White, D.R. and McCann, H.G., ‘Cites and fights: material entailment analysis of the eighteenth-century chemical revolution’, in Wellman, B. and Berkowitz, S.D. (eds) Social Structures. A Network Approach, Cambridge, 1988, pp. 380–400.Google Scholar

³⁴ Fourcroy, , Encyclopédie Méthodique, Dictionnaire de Chimie, T.3, 1797.Google Scholar

³⁵ Chaptal, , Elémens de chymie, 3rd edn, Paris, An V, T.1, p.1.Google Scholar

³⁶ Ibid. p. Iviv.

³⁷ Smeaton, , op. cit. (33).Google Scholar

³⁸ Lavoisier, , Oeuvres, II, p. 104.Google Scholar

³⁹ One of Lavoisier's colleagues, however, seemed to agree with him. Guyton de Morveau celebrated Lavoisier as the founder of the new chemistry in 1786, when he gave up the phlogiston theory, and wrote a second Foreword to the first volume of the dictionary of chemistry in the Encyclopédie métbodique. Using the resources of academic rhetoric, Guyton portrayed Lavoisier as a hero fighting against dogmatism and error. He compared him with le ‘grand Descartes’, (1Guyton de Morveau, L.B., Dictionnaire de chimie de I'Encyclopédie Méthodique, T.1, 1786, p. 628)Google Scholar. See Bensaude-Vincent, B., ‘A Founder myth in the History of Sciences? The Lavoisier case’, in L. Graham, W. Lepenies and P. Wiengart (eds), Functions and Uses of Disciplinary Histories, vol. vii, 1983, pp. 53–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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⁴³ The drafts kept in the Archives de l'Academie de Science (Folder 1260), include two projects. One, dated 12 December 1792, only detailed the first and the second part under the heading ‘Table des chapitres d'un cours de chimie expérimentale’. The second, dated 18 December 1792, is entitled ‘Table générale d'un cours de Philosophie expérimentale’ and gives an outline of six parts, though the second one is lacking.

⁴⁴ Lavoisier Papers, Archives de I'Academie de Science, 1260Google Scholar, ‘Seconde édition d'un cours de chimie’, ‘Prolégomènes’, fol. 1.

⁴⁵ Guerlac, H., ‘Chemistry as a branch of physics: Laplace's collaboration with Lavoisier’, Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences, (1976), 7, pp. 193–276CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Melhado, E.M., ‘Chemistry, Physics, and the Chemical Revolution’, Isis, (1985), 76, pp. 195–211Google Scholar; Donovan, A., ‘Lavoisier and the origins of modern chemistry, Osiris, (1989), 4, pp. 214–231.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁶ In emphasizing ‘decombustion’, as a symmetric reaction to combustion, Lavoisier referred to Fourcroy: ‘Presque tous les phénomènes de la nature, suivant M. de Fourcroy, peuvent se rapporter à deux classes principals, la combustion et la décombustion. Dans la combustion, le corps combustible passe à l'état incombustible. Dans la décombustion, le corps incombustible passe à l'état combustible. Nous ne connaissons guère de décombustion que par des affinités très composées’. In a separate note on decombustion, Lavoisier noticed that decombustion was necessary to balance the preponderant tendency of nature towards combustions: ‘La végétation est une décombustion. Cette opération doit produire les effets inverses de la combustion et doit être accompagnée d'absorption de lumière et de calorique. Elle doit être aussi lente que la combustion est rapide. Nous sommes environnés de corps dans lesquels s'opère une décombustion lente’.

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⁴⁸ Smeaton, , Fourcroy: Chemist and Revolutionary, Cambridge, 1962.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Fourcroy, , Système des connaissances chimiques, Paris, 1800, T.I, p. xxj.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Ibid., p. xxiij.

⁵¹ Ibid., p. xxx.

⁵² Darnton, R., The Business of Enlightenment. A publishing History of the Encyclopédie, 1775–1800, 1979.Google Scholar

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