Gilbert Newton Lewis

“Thus we are led to the conception of a cubical atom with an electron at each corner.”

“We are not students of some subject matter, but students of problems. And problems may cut right across the borders of any subject matter or discipline.”

“A detective with his murder mystery, a chemist with his unknown compound, have each something of the triviality of a puzzle, and something of the high dignity of an inquiry into the unknown.”

“An acid is a substance which can employ an electron lone pair from another molecule in completing the stable group of one of its own atoms.”

“The student who uses home made apparatus, which is always going wrong, often learns more than one who has the use of carefully adjusted instruments, to which he is apt to trust and which he dares not take to pieces.”

“In the first place, the two atoms are held together by a pair of electrons and this pair of electrons is held jointly by the two atoms.”

“I have attempted to give you a glimpse... of what there may be of soul in chemistry. But it may have been in vain. Perchance the chemist is already damned and the guardian of the pearly gates will not admit him.”

“The second law of thermodynamics is, without doubt, one of the most perfect laws in science.”

“Science has its cathedrals, built by the efforts of a few architects and of many workers.”

“A base is a substance which can furnish a pair of electrons to form a coordinate bond.”