The Sceptical Chymist:

Oxford: Printed by Henry Hall for Richard Davis and B. Took, , 1680. One of the most significant milestones" in chemistry First edition thus, combining the second edition of The Sceptical Chymist (1661) and the first edition of Experiments and Notes, the latter with a separately dated title page, pagination, and register, which was also issued separately. "The importance of Boyle's book must be sought in his combination of chemistry with physics. His corpuscular theory, and Newton's modification of it, gradually led chemists towards an atomic view of matter. Boyle distinguished between mixtures and compounds and tried to understand the latter in terms of the simpler chemical entities from which they could be constructed. His argument was designed to lead chemists away from the pure empiricism of his predecessors and to stress the theoretical, experimental and mechanistic elements of chemical science. The Sceptical Chymist is concerned with the relations between chemical substances rather than with transmuting one metal into another or the manufacture of drugs. In this sense the book must be considered as one of the most significant milestones on the way to the chemical revolution of Lavoisier" (PMM). With the book label to front pastedown of Calgarth Park, built by the chemist Richard Watson (1737-1816), Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and Professor of Chemistry there from 1764 to 1773; he published his Chemical Essays in five volumes from 1781 to 1787. Octavo (171 x 107 mm). Contemporary calf, marbled edges. Bound without the rare advertisement leaf, as almost always. Old bookseller's description of 1661 edition affixed to rear pastedown. Joints and extremities neatly restored, very light dampstaining at foot. A very good copy. ESTC R16310; Fulton 34; Madan, III, 3260-61; Wing B4022. See Printing and the Mind of Man 141 for the first edition.