XIV. On the influence of colour on heat and odours

The influence which Colour exerts upon natural bodies has hitherto been little attended to by scientific inquirers; and notwithstanding the advanced state of science in kindred departments of research, the subject of Colour, in its more interesting relations, is nearly unknown. Though Boyle, Franklin, Count Rumford, Sir Humphry Davy, and Sir John Leslie, have incidentally noticed some of the effects of Colour in their investigations into the nature of heat, it does not appear that it had occurred to any of those eminent men to trace its general relations; and even in regard to heat, the inquiries of Count Rumford and Sir John Leslie, the latest investigators, seem to have unaccountably stopped short while a wide field of unknown properties lay in view.