Matthew Moncrieff Pattison Muir (1848- 1931) was a British chemist and author. His works include: Heroes of Science: Chemists (1883), Elementary Chemistry (1887) and The Story of Alchemy and the Beginnings of Chemistry (1902). "The Story of Alchemy and the Beginnings of Chemistry is very interesting in itself. It is also a pregnant example of the contrast between the scientific and the emotional methods of regarding nature; and it admirably illustrates the differences between well-grounded, suggestive, hypotheses, and baseless speculations."