The Principles of Chemistry, Volume IMendeleyev, Dmitry Ivanovich
Science
The Principles of Chemistry, Volume I
Mendeleyev, Dmitry Ivanovich
Argon; Chemistry; Periodic law
[32] The theory of heat gave the idea of a store of internal motion
or energy, and therefore with it, it became necessary to
acknowledge chemical energy, but there is no foundation whatever
for identifying heat energy with chemical energy. It may be
supposed, but not positively affirmed, that heat motion is
proper to molecules and chemical motion to atoms, but that as
molecules are made up of atoms, the motion of the one passes to
the other, and that for this reason heat strongly influences
reaction and appears or disappears (is absorbed) in reactions.
These relations, which are apparent and hardly subject to doubt
on general lines, still present much that is doubtful in detail,
because all forms of molecular and atomic motion are able to pass
into each other.
[33] The reactions which take place (at the ordinary or at a high
temperature) directly between substances may be clearly divided
into exothermal, which are accompanied by an evolution of heat,
and endothermal, which are accompanied by an absorption of heat.
It is evident that the latter require a source of heat. They are
determined either by the directly surrounding medium (as in the
formation of carbon bisulphide from charcoal and sulphur, or in
decompositions which take place at high temperatures), or else by
a secondary reaction proceeding simultaneously, or by some other
form of energy (light, electricity). So, for instance, hydrogen
sulphide is decomposed by iodine in the presence of water at the
expense of the heat which is evolved by the solution in water
of the hydrogen iodide produced. This is the reason why this
reaction, as exothermal, only takes place in the presence of
water; otherwise it would be accompanied by a cooling effect. As
in the combination of dissimilar substances, the bonds existing
between the molecules and atoms of the homogeneous substances
have to be broken asunder, whilst in reactions of rearrangement
the formation of any one substance proceeds simultaneously with
the formation of another, and, as in reactions, a series of
physical and mechanical changes take place, it is impossible to
separate the heat directly depending on a given reaction from
the total sum of the observed heat effect. For this reason,
thermochemical data are very complex, and cannot by themselves
give the key to many chemical problems, as it was at first
supposed they might. They ought to form a part of chemical
mechanics, but alone they do not constitute it.
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