ALLEN versus DUTTON, consisting of Preliminary Remarks: Affidavits in Reply, and Affidavits in General; and General History of Mrs. Dutton’s Case, as they appeared on this trial.—Price 3s.
“A series of Facts very material to all having care of the Insane.”
The above Works may be had of John Taylor, Upper Gower-street; or through the medium of any country bookseller.
Also, by the same Author.
OUTLINES OF A
COURSE OF LECTURES ON CHEMICAL PHILOSOPHY.
ESSAYS OX CHEMICAL PHILOSOPHY.
In the Annual Review of Medicine and Collateral Science for 1818, of the London Medical Repository, the following notice is taken of these Essays.—
“In the Philosophical Magazine the reader will find a series of Essays by Mr. Allen; rich in ingenuity of argument, and abounding in masterly views on the great subject of chemical agency, as affecting changes in the modes of existing of physical matter. These essays all go upon the principle, that in every change of existence that matter is capable of undergoing, caloric is given out or absorbed in the form of either electricity, of galvanism, of caloric, or of light. Respecting the important question which has recently agitated the philosophical world, and which has been proposed as a prize in one of the Societies abroad; viz. In what does the difference consist between galvanism and electricity? Mr. Allen observes, ‘In electricity we contrive, by mechanical means, to collect the loose and uncombined quantity from the earth and surrounding medium; and this we do in circumstances in which it has nothing to act upon, as free from moisture of any kind as possible; in fact, from every thing readily soluble in heat or in this power. I would therefore, he says, define electricity to be the object of science which treats of the mechanical and natural means of separating this grand agent from some of its combinations, and of ascertaining its actions in this state.’ ‘In galvanism, on the other hand, this solvent power, this electric fire, is produced in circumstances in which it has substances to act upon; substances which are most readily dissolved in it; substances, in fact, which seem to form the grand medium between this power and passive substances, and which are partially dissolved in it. And hence I define galvanism as the electric fire, or grand agent, only partially separated from its combinations; by which I refer principally to oxygen and hydrogen.’ After illustrating this principle, by referring to the circumstances in which the chemical agency of galvanism appears more conspicuous than that of electricity, he adds, ‘thus we perceive, that when the grand agent of nature is more perfectly separated from its combinations it is ELECTRICITY; when partially separated, GALVANISM.’ Of these views and principles we have a more ample illustration and defence as the author proceeds in his investigation; and the whole inquiry is conducted with much philosophical acumen. Hypothetical, of course, part of it must be: but how different are the hypotheses of the present from those of former times, when science was a sort of poetry, and dealt in abstractions and inventions!”
ESSAY
ON CLASSIFICATION.
The better to explain and illustrate my ideas and views on the important subject of Classification, I shall, in the first instance, give a brief description of the present plans, arrangement, and manner of proceeding, in my own establishment.