Generally speaking, organic
bodies require organic solvents; inorganic bodies, inorganic solvents.
For example, common salt is highly soluble in water, but not in ether,
and many fats are soluble in ether, but not in water. So many cases
like these will suggest themselves to the chemist that I am justified
in making the following generalization: _A body will dissolve in a
solvent to which it is allied more readily than in one to which it in
highly dissimilar._ Exceptions to the law undoubtedly exist, but none
so striking as the following in support of it, viz., that the metal
mercury is the only known true solvent for many metals at the normal
temperature.
_2. Its Connection with Mendeleeff's Periodic Law._
From this standpoint the whole subject of solution is deserving of
fresh attention, as it appears highly probable that, just as Prof.
Carnelley has shown by the use of my meta-chromatic scale, the colors
of chemical compounds come under definite laws, which he has
discovered and formulated in connection with Mendeleeff and Newlaud's
periodic law,[2] so, likewise, may the solubility of an allied group
of compounds, in regard to any given solvent under constant conditions
of temperature, conform to similar laws; that, e.g., the chlorides
of H, Na, Cu, and Ag, in Mendeleeff's Group I.
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