The Sceptical Chymist : or Chymico-Physical Doubts & Paradoxes, Touching the EXPERIMENTS whereby VULGAR SPAGIRISTS Are wont to Endeavor to Evince their SALT, SULPHUR and MERCURY, to be True Principles of Things. To which in this Edition are subjoyn'd divers Experiments and Notes about the Producibleness of Chymical Principles.
Oxford: Henry Hall for Ric. Davis and B. Took at the Ship in St. Pauls Church-Yard 1680. Second Edition. Two works bound in one volume. A^8a^2; B-Z^8;Aa-Ee^8;Ff^4; *^8;**^4;A^4 B-R^8;S^4; [20], 440 pp., [28], 268 pp. 8vo. Modern calf to period style with simple ruling and tooling. Spine in five compartments with simple label "BOYLE's SCEPTICAL CHYMIST." Generally bright and clean internally. Occasional short closed tears to top edges from flipping pages and page corners creased throughout. This copy with signature of "Saml. Gray 1780" at head of title page with note "By the Hon Robert Boyle" written under "Things" also on the title page. In (Sceptical Chymist) leaf F1 is misfolded, and leaf T1 has a small burn hole affecting a few letters. In (Experiments and Notes) there is a small paper hole in leaf *8, marginal tears and creases in leaves I6, K1, and M3 (the latter affecting a few letters with no loss of meaning) and some marginal inked manuscript annotationsin an unknown hand on pages 185, 187, 196-7, 199, and 214. Very Good. Boards. [29044]
The first edition of the Sceptical Chymist was published in 1661. The second edition [as here] was published in 1680 with the addition of a new work Experiments and Notes. Experiments and Notes has it's own sub-title page and pagination. This copy does not have the very rare advertisement page noting the work was printed in 1679 but not offered for sale until January of 1680.
"The Sceptical Chymist is concerned with the relations between chemical substances rather than with transmiting one metal into another or the manufacture of drugs. In this sense the book must be considered as one of the most significant milesetones on the way to the chemical revolution of Lavoisier in the late eighteenth century." (PMM, p84)
"The age of modern chemistry began with Robert Boyle, the Irish chemist. His most important work was the sceptical chymist...which contains hist definition of an element which has come down unchanged to the present...The first edition [1661] is so rare that it is literally unobtainable. The second edtiion of the sceptical chymist (1680) is also a rarity. It has been included in the Collection because it contains nearly twice as much material as the first edition. Here Boyle set down his corpuscular theoruy of the constitution of matter, which finally freed chemistry from the restrictions of the Greek concept of the four elements, and was the forerunner of Dalton's atomic theory..." (Sparrow, p17)
LITERATURE:
Fulton, John F., "A Bibliography of the Honourable Robert Boyle, Second edition", Oxford: At the Clarendon Press: 1961. #34 (pp 28-29).
Sparrow, Milestones of Science, Buffalo Society of National Sciences, #26
Carter and Muir, Printing and the Mind of Men, 2nd edition, Pressler: Munchen, 1983, #141 (the following referring to the first edition of 1661)
Horblit, One Hundred Books Famous in Science, The Grolier Club: New York, # 14
Dibner, Bern, "Heralds of Science, Burndy Library: Norwalk, Conn: 1955, #39
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