Note 617 — Chapter VII

The Sceptical Chemist is in Boyle's Works, vol. i. pp. 290–371. It went through two editions in the author's lifetime, an unusual success for a book of that kind. Boyle's Works, vol. i. p. 375, vol. iv. p. 89, vol. v. p. 345. I find from a letter written in 1696 (Fairfax Correspondence, vol. iv, p. 344), that Boyle's works were then becoming scarce, and that there was an intention of reprinting the whole of them. In regard to the Sceptical Chemist, it was so popular, that it attracted the attention of Monconys, a French traveller, who visited London in 1663, and from whom we learn that it was to be bought for four shillings, ‘pour quatre chelins.’ Voyages de Monconys, vol. iii. p. 67, edit. 1695; a book containing some very curious facts respecting London in the reign of Charles II.; but, so far as I am aware, not quoted by any English historian. In Sprengel's Hist. de la Médecine, vol. v. pp. 78–9, there is a summary of the views advocated in the Sceptical Chemist, respecting which Sprengel says, ‘Ce fut cependant aussi en Angleterre que s'élevèrent les premiers doutes sur l'exactitude des explications chimiques.’