I spent a part of. . . 1923 with. . . Dr. W. W. Keen. . . In the. . Civil War. . . . he was a surgeon. . . and had seen many men die from suppuration of wounds after he had operated. . . . He would hold the sutures in his teeth and sharpen his knife on the sole of his boot, after he had raised up his boot from the muddy ground. That was the accepted practice at the time.
August Kekule
The question whether atoms exist or not. . . belongs rather to metaphysics. In chemistry we have only to decide whether the assumption of atoms is an hypothesis adapted to the explanation of chemical phenomena. . . whether a further development of the atomic hypothesis promises to advance our knowledge of the mechanism of chemical phenomena. . . I rather expect that we shall some day find, for what we now call atoms, a mathematico-mechanical explanation, which will render an account of atomic weight, of atomicity, and of numerous other properties of the so-called atoms.
