Note 207 — Chapter XI

On Transformations produced by Catalytic Bodies: by Lyon Playfair, Esq.; Phil. Mag., vol. xxxi. p. 191, 1847.—“Facts have been brought forward to show that there is at least as much probability in the view that the catalytic force is merely a modified form of chemical affinity exerted under peculiar conditions, as there is in ascribing it to an unknown power, or to the communication of an intestine motion to the atoms of a complex molecule. Numerous cases have been cited, in which the action results when the assisting or catalytic body is not in a state of change; and attempts have been made to prove, by new experiments, that the catalytic power exercises its peculiar power by acting in the same direction as the body decomposing, or entering into union, but under conditions in which its own affinity cannot always be gratified.”