(339.) The atomic theory, or the law of definite proportions, which is the same thing presented in a form divested of all hypothesis, after the laws of mechanics, is, perhaps, the most important which the study of nature has yet disclosed. The extreme simplicity which characterizes it, and which is itself an indication, not unequivocal, of its elevated rank in the scale of physical truths, had the effect of causing it to be announced at once by Mr. Dalton, in its most general terms, on the contemplation of a few instances[53], without passing through subordinate stages of painful inductive ascent by the intermedium of subordinate laws, such as, had the contrary course been pursued by him, would have been naturally preparatory to it, and such as would have led others to it by the prosecution of Wenzel’s and Richter’s researches, had they been duly attended to. This is, in fact, an example, and a most remarkable one, of the effect of that natural propensity to generalize and simplify (noticed in 171.), which, if it occasionally leads to over-hasty conclusions, limited or disproved by further experience, is yet the legitimate parent of many of our most valuable and soundest results. Instances like this, where great and, indeed, immeasurable steps in our knowledge of nature are made at once, and almost without intellectual effort, are well calculated to raise our hopes of the future progress of science, and, by pointing out the simplest and most obvious combinations as those which are actually found to be agreeable to the harmony of creation, to hold out the cheering prospect of difficulties diminishing as we advance, instead of thickening around us in increasing complexity.
(340.) A consequence of this immediate presentation of the law of definite proportions in its most general form is, that its subordinate laws--those which limit its generality in particular cases, which diminish the number of combinations abstractly possible, and restrain the indiscriminate mixture of elements,--remain to be discovered. Some such limitations have, in fact, been traced to a certain extent, but by no means so far as the importance of the subject requires; and we have here abundant occupation for chemists for some time.