Page:Lavoisier-ElementsOfChemistry.pdf/167

 85 grs. of oxygen have combined with the iron, so as to convert it into the state of black oxyd, and 15 grs. of a peculiar inflammable gas are disengaged: From all this it clearly follows, that water is composed of oxygen with the base of an inflammable gas, in the respective proportions of 85 parts, by weight of the former, to 15 parts of the latter.

Thus water, besides the oxygen, which is one of its elements in common with many other substances, contains another element as its constituent base or radical, and for which we must find an appropriate term. None that we could think of seemed better adapted than the word hydrogen, which signifies the generative principle of water, from υδωρ [sic] aqua, and gignorgignor. [sic] We call the combination of this element with calroic hydrogen gas; and the term hydrogen expresses the base of that gas, or the radical of water.