We have now learned that acids are as the antipodes to alkalis or bases,
and that the two may combine to form products which may be neutral or
may have a preponderance either of acidity or of basicity--in short,
they may yield neutral, acid, or basic salts. I must try to give you a
yet clearer idea of these three classes of salts. Now acids in general
have, as we have seen, what we may call a "chemical appetite," and each
acid in particular has a "specific chemical appetite" for bases, that
is, each acid is capable of combining with a definite quantity of an
individual base. The terms "chemical appetite" and "specific chemical
appetite" are names I have coined for your present benefit, but for
which chemists would use the words "affinity" and "valency"
respectively. Now some acids have a moderate specific appetite, whilst
others possess a large one, and the same may be said of bases, and thus
as an example we may have mono-, di-, and tri-acid salts, or mono-, di-,
and tri-basic salts. In a tri-acid salt a certain voracity of the base
is indicated, and in a tri-basic salt, of the acid.
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