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* LAVOISIER. 21 LAW. chemical thought williuut tlic aid of a system of names whicii might constantly remind of the com- position and properties of compounds. In con- junction with BerthoUet, Fourcroy, and Guyton de Morveau, at the instance of the last-named, Lavoisier devised a system of rational nomencla- ture, which is in its main features still used in the chemistry of to-day. All of his ideas were based on observations which had already been made by others. It is a sad but well-established fact that he often pub- lished such obsenations as his own. But the shadow of his petty scientific plagiarism dwin- dles into nothing in the light of the brilliant achievements which were indisputably his. Lavoisier's works include: Sur la combugtion en gcneriil (1777); Jiefiexions sur Iv phlogis- tique (1777); Considerations sur la nature des acides (1778) ; Memoire sur Vaflinite du principe oxygene avcc les differentes substances auxquellcs it est susceptible de s'unir (1782); Mcthode de nomenclature chiniique (jointly with Guyton de Morveau, BerthoUet. and Fourcroy, 1787 ) ; Memnire sur la respiration des animaux (jointly with Seguin. 1789) ; Traite elimentaire de chimic (2 vols., 1789), giving a list of 33 elementary substances, including calorie and light; Opuscules physiques ct chimiques (1774 and 1801). In 1789 he founded the Annates de cliimie. Two volumes of his Memoircs de chiniie were pub- lished posthumously in 180.5. His complete works have been published bj- the French Gov- ernment under the title: CEuvres de Lavoisier publiees par les soins de Son Excellence, le Min- istre de V Inst ruction Publique(G vols., 1864-93). Xumerous accounts of Lavoisier's life and work have been written. An admirable sketch of his achievements forms part of Wurtz's intro- duction to his Dictionnaire de chimie pure et appliquee. Consult, also: Grimaux. Lavoisier d'apres sa correspondence, ses manuscrits, ses papiers de famillc et d'autre» documents inedits (Paris, 1888) ; and Schultze, Lavoisier, der Be- griinder d' r t'hemie (Hamburg. 1894). LA VOISIN, la vwa'z;-i.' ( ?-1680). A French sorceress. She was a midwife, but, not finding this profitable enough for her debaucheries, began to tell fortunes and the like, and people in high society Ijecame her customers. When the ilar- quise deBrinvilliers (q.v.) made her confessions, fhe people of Paris were panic-stricken at the revelations, and La Voisin was suspected of hav- ing sold poison to bring about the death of vari- ous persons. She was arrested in 1679 and im- prisoned in the Bastille, together with forty of her supposed accomplices. In the following year she was brought before a chambre ardante (q.v.) which condemned her to death, and on February 22. 1680, .she was burned at the stake. LA'W (AS. lagu, from liogan, Goth.. OHG. liqan. Ger. liegen, to lie; connected with OChurch Slav. Irzhali, to lie, Lat. lectus. coucli. Gk. xot, lochos, lair). Coxceptiox. The social life of men, like the life of the individual, is largely shaped and governed by what we call nature. In this word we sum up the condi- tions which man has not created, and which he can but slightly modify, and the forces which he does not exert and which he has been able to uti- lize only to a limited extent. In so far as con- stant relations (coexistence, sequence, cause, and elTect) are observed in the phenomena of nature, we speak of the laws of nature. The social life of men is further shaped and governed by condi- tions which man has established and which he can largely modify, such as the economic, the social, and the political organization, and by the liunian as well as the natural forces which man puts at work in the struggle for e.i.-:.tence, enjoy- ment, wealth, and |)ower. Here again constant rela- tions of phencinena are observed which we call eco- nomic or social laws; and here again the term law de.scribes a relation of coexistence or of .sequence of cause and effect, v.hidi man has apparently no power to modify. He can modify the antecedent facts, but the facts once given, the results appear to be inevitable. Again the social life is shaped and governed by relations of cause and eflect which man has himself established. Society it- self attaches to certain acts and omissions of men such results as social ridicule or contempt or scorn and ostracism ; and in such cases we sometimes say that society is enforcing, by psy- chical sanctions, laws of etiquette or of honor, or moral laws. Finally society, or the community (acting always in modern times through the ma- chinery of the State ) orders and regulates all the principal forms of human association and largely regulates the intercourse of individuals by what we call law, in the strict sense positive law. Rules of positive law resemble all the laws we have pre- viously noticed, in that they also represent a sequence of plienomena. A legal rule tells us what results are to attach to certain antecedent facts. Legal rules differ from the laws of nature and from economic or social laws in that the results are determined by man's will. They differ from moral laws in that the community (acting always in modern times through the machinery of the State) will, if necessarv". secure the results it has decreed by resort to pliysical force (legal sanction). Many rules which govern the social life — the majority of the rules which govern the intercourse of indi iduals — are at the same time rules of morals and rules of law; but law and morals have each a distinct field. There are social rules which cannot be enforced by any but psychical nenalties, and many more which it would be unwise to attempt to enforce by the ruder processes of the law; and there are many cases in which the social interest requires that a rule shall be established and enforced, but in which it is ethically immaterial what the rule shall be. Of the rules which society enforces without or with the sanction of the State, a certain propor- tion is rather imposed upon society by its own organization than established by its own volition. In any given stage of .social development there are numerous rules which appear to he essential to the existence of that particular form of social life. In all stages of social development we find certain fundamental rules (not very numerous), which app"ar to be essential to the existence of any social life. These fundamental rules have some- times been described as "natural law' (q.v.). and of all the uses of the term 'natural' in juris- prudence, this is perhaps the most defensible. It should be noted, however, that all these funda- mental rules are primarily rules of morals; and that when they are recocnizcd and enforci^l as rules of law. the mode of their enforcement, i.e. the positive law. may and does assume various forms. On the whole, therefore, it seems correct to relegate natural law to the field of morals. Defixitioxs. Of the numerous definitions of