Editing Robert Boyle (section)

==== Chemistry ====
Robert Boyle was an [[alchemy|alchemist]];<ref name="More1941">{{Cite journal |doi=10.2307/2707281 |last=More |first=Louis Trenchard |title=Boyle as Alchemist |journal=Journal of the History of Ideas |volume=2 |issue=1 |pages=61–76 |publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press |date=January 1941 |jstor=2707281}}</ref> and believing the [[wikt:Transmutation|transmutation]] of metals to be a possibility, he carried out experiments in the hope of achieving it; and he was instrumental in obtaining the repeal, by the [[Royal Mines Act 1688]] ([[1 Will. & Mar.]] c. 30), of the statute of [[Henry IV of England|Henry IV]] against multiplying gold and silver, the [[Gold and Silver Act 1403]] ([[5 Hen. 4]]. c. 4).<ref name="sep-boyle">{{cite encyclopedia |last1=MacIntosh |first1=J. J. |last2=Anstey |first2=Peter |chapter=Robert Boyle |title=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |editor-first=Edward N. |editor-last=Zalta |chapter-url=http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/boyle/notes.html#4 |year=2010 |edition=Fall |at=note 4}}</ref><ref name="EB1911" /> With all the important work he accomplished in [[physics]], [[chemistry]] was his peculiar and favourite study. His first book on the subject was ''[[The Sceptical Chymist]]'', published in 1661, in which he criticised the "experiments whereby vulgar [[Spagyric|Spagyrists]] are wont to endeavour to evince their Salt, [[Sulphur]] and [[Mercury (element)|Mercury]] to be the true Principles of Things". For him, chemistry was the science of the composition of substances, not merely an adjunct to the arts of the alchemist or the physician.<ref name="EB1911" />