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‘On Documentation’

2015

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Various species of common matter that exist,

Whose nature and properties are the same,

However different in appearance they may be;

Between the capacity of a lump of clay

And of a piece of flint;

Between the flexibility of lead and of iron;

Between the elasticity of steel and of whalebone;

And between the expansibility of gases in general

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A proposition, such as this, may be solved with as much certainty

By a child of five years of age,

As much by a man who has lived to the years of Methuselah:

A child will, at once, affirm that strokes or impressions made on him by a rod,

Give him pain; that a rose is fragrant; that gold is yellow; silver; white; jet, black, sugar,

Sweet, vinegar, sour, fire, hot, snow, cold.

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We see coloured light perpetually radiating

From bodies in a state of combustion

The quality of the colour seems altogether to depend on the nature

Of the materials of which the base is composed;

Subservient to that process ; different kinds of

Coal and of peat, will produce a peculiarity

In the colour of the flame

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