What is wax?

Wax

Waxes are a class of chemical compounds that are plastic (malleable) near ambient temperatures. Characteristically, they melt above 45 °C (113 °F) to give a low viscosity liquid. Waxes are insoluble in water but soluble in organic, nonpolar solvents. All waxes are organic compounds, both synthetic and naturally occurring.

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Famous quotes containing the word wax:

    the young men who watch us from the curbs:
    They hold the glaze of wonder in their stare
    Our crooked backs, hands fetid as old herbs,
    The tallow eyes, wax face, the foreign hair!
    Allen Tate (1899–1979)

    Fowls in the frith,
    Fishes in the flood,
    And I must wax wod:
    Much sorrow I walk with
    For best of bone and blood.
    —Unknown. Fowls in the Frith. . .

    Oxford Book of Short Poems, The. P. J. Kavanagh and James Michie, eds. Oxford University Press.

    Generally, about all perception, we can say that a sense is what has the power of receiving into itself the sensible forms of things without the matter, in the way in which a piece of wax takes on the impress of a signet ring without the iron or gold.
    Aristotle (384–323 B.C.)