John Rey Quotes

John Rey Quotes

Jean Rey or John Rey was a French physician and chemist.

Born in Le Bugue, in the Périgord , he studied medicine at the University of Montpellier. He practised medicine in his native town and corresponded with René Descartes and Marin Mersenne.

He discovered that the weight of lead and tin increases when they are calcinated, and attributed this phenomenon to the weight of air, which he believed to become denser when heated . He explained the greater weight of calcinated lead and tin by supposing that calcination involves the incorporation of air in the metal. This hypothesis would later be confirmed by Antoine Lavoisier, over a century later in 1789.

His discovery of the weight of air also made possible the invention of the barometer by Evangelista Torricelli in 1643. He also developed a device called a "Thermoscope", a precursor of the thermometer.

Jean Rey died in Le Bugue, where he had lived all his life. The exact date of his death is disputed. Wikipedia

✵ 1583 – 1645

John Rey: 2 quotes 0 likes

“[N]othing gains weight but by the addition of matter, nor loses it but by its subtraction—so inseparably are matter and weight united, as has been shewn above in the sixth essay.”

John Rey

Art. XI. A Translation of Rey's Essays on the Calcination of Metals, &c. (1822), Essay XV. Air dimishes in weight in three ways. The balance is deceitful, the means of remedying that.

“Hammer a piece of cold iron for a considerable time; you will unite its parts and diminish its bulk, and then it will appear heavier when put into the balance.”

John Rey

Art. XI. A Translation of Rey's Essays on the Calcination of Metals, &c. (1822), Essay XV. Air dimishes in weight in three ways. The balance is deceitful, the means of remedying that.

Time , Appearance , Parting