Æther

I ſuppose this æther pervades all groſs bodies, but yet ſo as to ſtand rarer in their pores than in free ſpaces, and ſo much the rarer, as their pores are leſs. And this I ſuppose (with others) to be the cauſe, why light incident on thoſe bodies is refracted towards the perpendicular; […] I ſuppose the rarer æther within bodies, and then denſer without them, not to be terminated in a mathematical ſuperficies, but to grow gradually into one another; […]

On Wings the Birds through Æther glide, / And Fiſhes cut with Fins the Tide.

Having ſhewn how the Æther cauſes a great part of the Phænomena of Nature, it may be aſked, whence thi general material Cauſe has its great Activity and Power? […] This Cauſe muſt be either Matter or Spirit, there being nothing in the Univerſe, which we know if, beſides theſe two. But this Cauſe cannot be Matter: for Matter is in own Nature inert, and has not any Activity in itſelf; and conſequently cannot communicate any Power to the Æther. And therefore the Cauſe, which gives the Æther its Activity and Power, muſt be Spirit. Spirit, which intercedes the Particles of Æther, and gives them a repulſive Power, and ordains and executes the Laws, by which Æther and Bodies act mutually on one another, muſt be preſent in all Parts of Space, where there is Æther.

But the moſt valuable Qualities of the ÆTHER are it's medicinal ones; it having been found by repeated Experience to be an excellent Remedy in moſt nervous Diſeaſes; particularly in Fits of all ſorts, whether Epileptic, Convulſive, Hyſteric, Hypochondriac, or Paralytic: […]

The whole matter of the univerſe may be divided into atoms and æther. […] The latter, æther, is a ſubtile elaſtic fluid, whoſe particles have a continual tendency to ſeparate or fly off every way, unleſs impreſſed by ſome body: This æther ſurrounds each atom like an atmoſphere, and preſſes equally towards the center of each.

The luminous æther of his life was not obſcured by any ſhade dark enough to be denominated a defect.

M. Malaguti finds that dry chlorine, while acting in the dark upon oxacid æthers, always attacks, and in a uniform manner, the sulphuric æther which is the base of them. […] The action of potash on the compound chloridized æthers is also constant and uniform: the results are always chloride of potassium, acetate of potash, and an organic salt with a base of potash, the acid of which is that which existed in the compound chloridized æther.

[…] I allude to the æthers formed by the union of fatty acids with different alcohols. […] With regard to the fatty æthers themselves, I prepared them generally by M. Berthelot's method, by heating the alcohol and the acid for a day at 392°F. in a tube hermetically sealed; the product was mixed with a little æther, and it was digested some time with slaked lime in the water-bath, to separate the free acid from the neutral compound.