Antoine Lavoisier's Understanding of Caloric and the Properties of Water

The process of science is a wonderful thing, which is what drives me into trying to understand the history of science.  My recent dive into this is reading Antoine Lavoisier's Elements of Chemistry, as it is one of modern chemistry's first textbook written by one of it's fathers. Now this isn't the easiest piece of literature to read, not because of the language, it excels in that category, but the font chosen makes the s's appear as f's. Difficulties aside, here is a quote I fell in love with, showing his understanding of the cohesion of water molecules before there was an understanding of hydrogen bonds, and heat before there was an understanding of molecular kinetic energy.

It is, perhaps, more natural to suppose, that the particles of caloric have a stronger mutual attraction than those of any other substance and that these latter particles are forced asunder in consequence of this superior attraction between the particles of the caloric, which forces them between the particles of other bodies, that they may be able to reunite with each other.  We have somewhat analogous to this idea in the phenomena which occur when a dry sponge is dipt into water: The sponge swells; its particles separate from each other; and all its intervals are filled up by the water.  It is evident, that the sponge, in the act of swelling, has acquired a greater capacity for containing water than it had when dry.  But we cannot certainly maintain, that the introduction of water between the particles of the sponge has endowed them with a repulsive power, which tends to separate them from each other; on the contrary, the whole phenomena are produced by means of attractive powers; and there are, first, The gravity of the water, and the power which it exerts on every side, in common with all other fluids; 2dly, The force of attraction which takes place between the particles of the water, causing them to unite together; 3dly, The mutual attractions of the particles of the sponge with each other; and, lastly, The reciprocal attraction which exists between the particles of the sponge and those of the water.  It is easy to understand, that the explanation of this fact depends on properly appreciating the intensity of, and connection between, these several powers.  It is probable, that the separation of the particles of bodies, occasioned by caloric, depends in a similar manner upon a certain combination of different attractive powers, which, in conformity with the attractive powers, which, in conformity with the imperfection of our knowledge, we endeavour to express by saying, that caloric communicates a power of repulsion to the particles of bodies.

Just as a background fact, Caloric was Lavoisier's term for kinetic energy, and at that time was considered to be a fluid or gas that would flow through matter, making it either hot or cold.  Just as heat flows from hot to cold, Caloric would flow from a hotter material to a cooler one until it reaches an equilibrium.  All of these observations, now obvious to us, were new and exciting for the scientists at the time, and to think there was a fluid that flows dictating temperature wasn't far off from the truth considering that matter with more kinetic energy expands according to PV = nRT.

I recommend this read to anyone interested in the history of our chemical body of knowledge, or to show respect to the people who worked undyingly hard to make these pivotal discoveries.

References:
Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent. Elements of Chemistry, in a New Systematic Order, Containing All the Modern Discoveries. New York: Dover Publications, 1965. Print.