Essai Analytique sur l'Air pur, et les différentes Espèces d'Air

3 p.l., 474, [2] pp. 8vo, cont. sheep-backed boards (several small wormholes in margins of final few leaves), spine ruled in gilt, brown morocco lettering piece on spine. Paris: Rue et Hotel Serpente, 1785.

First edition. La Métherie (1743-1817), an inveterate opponent of Lavoisier’s theories, was chief editor of the famous Journal de Physique from 1785 until the year of his death. He wrote a number of important works on mineralogy and was a friend to many of the leading scientists of his time, especially Cuvier.

In this work, La Métherie stated that “all combustibles (including perhaps diamond) contain inflammable air, which he (truncated) identified with phlogiston and thought it is contained in metals...He called oxygen ‘pure air’ and nitrogen (phlogisticated air) ‘impure air’. Pure air consists of vesicles inflated by the principle of heat. Nitrous air (nitrous oxide) is a compound of nitric acid and inflammable air or phlogiston. Fixed air, which he called ‘acid air’, can be converted into phlogisticated air or into pure air.”–Partington, III, pp. 494-95.

A very good copy. Old library stamp and prize inscription to “Cassé” with his signature and a Revolutionary date on front endpapers.

❧ Cole 742–“The book is a survey of existing information concerning various kinds of airs and the experiments and discoveries of Lavoisier, Priestley, Scheele and others.” D.S.B., VII, pp. 602-04. Duveen, p. 335. Neville, II, pp. 5-6. (Inventory #: 2388)