The old maxim was,
Corpora non agunt nisi soluta. If two substances, a and b, are inclosed
in a glass vessel, c, we do not expect the glass to change them, unless a
or b or the compound a b has the power of dissolving the glass. But if
for a I take oxygen, for b hydrogen, and for c a piece of spongy
platinum, I find the first two combine with the common signs of
combustion and form water, the third in the mean time undergoing no
perceptible change. It has played the part of the unwedded priest, who
marries a pair without taking a fee or having any further relation with
the parties. We call this catalysis, catalytic action, the action of
presence, or by what learned name we choose. Give what name to it we
will, it is a manifestation of power which crosses our established laws
of combination at a very open angle of intersection. I think we may find
an analogy for it in electrical induction, the disturbance of the
equilibrium of the electricity of a body by the approach of a charged
body to it, without interchange of electrical conditions between the two
bodies. But an analogy is not an explanation, and why a few drops of
yeast should change a saccharine mixture to carbonic acid and alcohol,--a
little leaven leavening the whole lump,--not by combining with it, but by
setting a movement at work, we not only cannot explain, but the fact is
such an exception to the recognized laws of combination that Liebig is
unwilling to admit the new force at all to which Berzelius had given the
name so generally accepted.
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