consideration, in the volumes of Dr. Bence Jones; but in 'society'
they are not always so handled. Here a name of noble intellectual
associations is surrounded by injurious rumours which I would
willingly scatter for ever. The pupil's magnitude, and the splendour
of his position, are too great and absolute to need as a foil the
humiliation of his master. Brothers in intellect, Davy and Faraday,
however, could never have become brothers in feeling; their characters
were too unlike. Davy loved the pomp and circumstance of fame;
Faraday the inner consciousness that he had fairly won renown. They
were both proud men. But with Davy pride projected itself into the
outer world; while with Faraday it became a steadying and dignifying
inward force. In one great particular they agreed. Each of them
could have turned his science to immense commercial profit, but
neither of them did so. The noble excitement of research, and the
delight of discovery, constituted their reward. I commend them to the
reverence which great gifts greatly exercised ought to inspire. They
were both ours; and through the coming centuries England will be able
to point with just pride to the possession of such men.
====================
The first volume of the 'Life and Letters' reveals to us the youth who
was to be father to the man. Skilful, aspiring, resolute, he grew
steadily in knowledge and in power. Consciously or unconsciously, the
relation of Action to Reaction was ever present to Faraday's mind. It
had been fostered by his discovery of Magnetic Rotations, and it
planted in him more daring ideas of a similar kind. Magnetism he knew
could be evoked by electricity, and he thought that electricity, in
its turn, ought to be capable of evolution by magnetism. On August
29, 1831, his experiments on this subject began. He had been
fortified by previous trials, which, though failures, had begotten
instincts directing him towards the truth. He, like every strong
worker, might at times miss the outward object, but he always gained
the inner light, education, and expansion. Of this Faraday's life was
a constant illustration. By November he had discovered and colligated
a multitude of the most wonderful and unexpected phenomena. He had
generated currents by currents; currents by magnets, permanent and
transitory; and he afterwards generated currents by the earth itself.
Arago's 'Magnetism of Rotation,' which had for years offered itself
as a challenge to the best scientific intellects of Europe, now fell
into his hands. It proved to be a beautiful, but still special,
illustration of the great principle of Magneto-electric Induction.
Nothing equal to this latter, in the way of pure experimental enquiry,
had previously been achieved.
Electricities from various sources were next examined, and their
differences and resemblances revealed. He thus assured himself of
their substantial identity. He then took up Conduction, and gave many
striking illustrations of the influence of Fusion on Conducting Power.
Renouncing professional work, from which at this time he might have
derived an income of many thousands a year, he poured his whole
momentum into his researches. He was long entangled in
Electrochemistry. The light of law was for a time obscured by the
thick umbrage of novel facts; but he finally emerged from his
researches with the great principle of Definite Electro-chemical
Decomposition in his hands. If his discovery of Magneto-electricity
may be ranked with that of the pile by Volta, this new discovery, may
almost stand beside that of Definite Combining Proportions in
Chemistry. He passed on to Static Electricity--its Conduction,
Induction, and Mode of Propagation. He discovered and illustrated the
principle of Inductive Capacity; and, turning to theory, he asked
himself how electrical attractions and repulsions are transmitted. Are
they, like gravity, actions at a distance, or do they require a
medium? If the former, then, like gravity, they will act in straight
lines; if the latter, then, like sound or light, they may turn a
corner. Faraday held--and his views are gaining ground--that his
experiments proved the fact of curvilinear propagation, and hence the
operation of a medium. Others denied this; but none can deny the
profound and philosophic character of his leading thought. [Footnote:
In a very remarkable paper published in Poggendorff's 'Annalen' for
1857, Werner Siemens accepts and develops Faraday's theory of
Molecular Induction.] The first volume of the Researches contains all
the papers here referred to.
Faraday had heard it stated that henceforth physical discoveries would
be made solely by the aid of mathematics; that we had our data, and
needed only to work deductively. Statements of a similar character
crop out from time to time in our day. They arise from an imperfect
acquaintance with the nature, present condition, and prospective
vastness of the field of physical enquiry. The tendency of natural
science doubtless is to bring all physical phenomena under the
dominion of mechanical laws; to give them, in other words,
mathematical expression. But our approach to this result is
asymptotic; and for ages to come--possibly for all the ages of the
human race--Nature will find room for both the philosophical
experimenter and the mathematician. Faraday entered his protest
against the foregoing statement by labelling his investigations
'Experimental Researches in Electricity.' They were completed in 1854,
and three volumes of them have been published. For the sake of
reference, he numbered every paragraph, the last number being 3362. In
1859 he collected and published a fourth volume of papers, under the
title, 'Experimental Researches in Chemistry and Physics.' Thus did
this apostle of experiment illustrate its power, and magnify his
office.
The second volume of the Researches embraces memoirs on the
Electricity of the Gymnotus; on the Source of Power in the Voltaic
Pile; on the Electricity evolved by the Friction of Water and Steam,
in which the phenomena and principles of Sir William Armstrong's
Hydro-electric machine are described and developed; a paper on
Magnetic Rotations, and Faraday's letters in relation to the
controversy it aroused. The contribution of most permanent value
here, is that on the Source of Power in the Voltaic Pile. By it the
Contact Theory, pure and simple, was totally overthrown, and the
necessity of chemical action to the maintenance of the current
demonstrated.
The third volume of the Researches opens with a memoir entitled 'The
Magnetisation of Light,' and the Illumination of Magnetic Lines of
Force.' It is difficult even now to affix a definite meaning to this
title; but the discovery of the rotation of the plane of polarisation,
which it announced, seems pregnant with great results. The writings
of William Thomson on the theoretic aspects of the discovery; the
excellent electrodynamic measurements of Wilhelm Weber, which are
models of experimental completeness and skill; Weber's labours in
conjunction with his lamented friend Kohlrausch--above all, the
researches of Clerk Maxwell on the Electro-magnetic Theory of
Light--point to that wonderful and mysterious medium, which is the
vehicle of light and radiant heat, as the probable basis also of
magnetic and electric phenomena. The hope of such a connection was
first raised by the discovery here referred to. [Footnote: A letter
addressed to me by Professor Weber on March 18 last contains the
following reference to the connection here mentioned: 'Die Hoffnung
einer solchen Combination ist durch Faraday's Entdeckung der
Drehung er Polarisationsebene durch magnetische Directionskraft
zuerst, und sodann durch die Uebereinstimmung derjenigen
Geschwindigkeit, welche das Verhaeltniss der electro-dynamischen
Einheit zur lectro-statischen ausdrueckt, mit der Geschwindigkeit
des Lichts angeregt worden; und mir scheint von allen Versuchen,
welche zur erwirklichung dieser Hoffnung gemacht worden sind, das von
Herrn Maxwell gemachte am erfolgreichsten.'] Faraday himself seemed to
cling with particular affection to this discovery. He felt that there
was more in it than he was able to unfold. He predicted that it would
grow in meaning with the growth of science. This it has done; this it
is doing now. Its right interpretation will probably mark an epoch in
scientific history.
Rapidly following it is the discovery of Diamagnetism, or the
repulsion of matter by a magnet. Brugmans had shown that bismuth
repelled a magnetic needle. Here he stopped. Le Bailliff proved that
antimony did the same. Here he stopped. Seebeck, Becquerel, and
others, also touched the discovery. These fragmentary gleams excited
a momentary curiosity and were almost forgotten, when Faraday
independently alighted on the same facts; and, instead of stopping,
made them the inlets to a new and vast region of research. The value
of a discovery is to be measured by the intellectual action it calls
forth; and it was Faraday's good fortune to strike such lodes of
scientific truth as give occupation to some of the best intellects of
our age.
The salient quality of Faraday's scientific character reveals itself
from beginning to end of these volumes; a union of ardour and
patience--the one prompting the attack, the other holding him on to
it, till defeat was final or victory assured. Certainty in one sense
or the other was necessary to his peace of mind. The right method of
investigation is perhaps incommunicable; it depends on the individual
rather than on the system, and the mark is missed when Faraday's
researches are pointed to as merely illustrative of the power of the
inductive philosophy. The brain may be filled with that philosophy;
but without the energy and insight which this man possessed, and which
with him were personal and distinctive, we should never rise to the
level of his achievements. His power is that of individual genius,
rather than of philosophic method; the energy of a strong soul
expressing itself after its own fashion, and acknowledging no mediator
between it and Nature.
The second volume of the 'Life and Letters,' like the first, is a
historic treasury as regards Faraday's work and character, and his
scientific and social relations. It contains letters from Humboldt,
Herschel, Hachette, De la Rive, Dumas, Liebig, Melloni, Becquerel,
Oersted, Plucker, Du Bois Reymond, Lord Melbourne, Prince Louis
Napoleon, and many other distinguished men. I notice with particular
pleasure a letter from Sir John Herschel, in reply to a sealed packet
addressed to him by Faraday, but which he had permission to open if he
pleased. The packet referred to one of the many unfulfilled hopes
which spring up in the minds of fertile investigators:
'Go on and prosper, "from strength to strength," like a victor
marching with assured step to further conquests; and be certain that
no voice will join more heartily in the peans that already begin to
rise, and will speedily swell into a shout of triumph, astounding even
to yourself, than that of J. F. W. Herschel.'
Faraday's behaviour to Melloni in 1835 merits a word of notice. The
young man was a political exile in Paris. He had newly fashioned and
applied the thermo-electric pile, and had obtained with it results of
the greatest importance. But they were not appreciated. With the
sickness of disappointed hope Melloni waited for the report of the
Commissioners, appointed by the Academy of Sciences to examine the
Primier. At length he published his researches in the 'Annales de
Chimie.' They thus fell into the hands of Faraday, who, discerning at
once their extraordinary merit, obtained for their author the Rumford
Medal of the Royal Society. A sum of money always accompanies this
medal; and the pecuniary help was, at this time, even more essential
than the mark of honour to the young refugee. Melloni's gratitude was
boundless:
'Et vous, monsieur,' he writes to Faraday, 'qui appartenez à une
société à laquelle je n'avais rien offert, vous qui me connaissiez à
peine de nom; vous n'avez pas demandé si j'avais des ennemis faibles
ou puissants, ni calculé quel en était le nombre; mais vous avez parlé
pour l'opprimé étranger, pour celui qui n'avait pas le moindre droit à
tant de bienveillance, et vos paroles ont été accueillies
favorablement par des collègues consciencieux! Je reconnais bien là
des hommes dignes de leur noble mission, les véritable représentants
de la science d'un pays libre et généreux.'
Within the prescribed limits of this article it would be impossible to
give even the slenderest summary of Faraday's correspondence, or to
carve from it more than the merest fragments of his character. His
letters, written to Lord Melbourne and others in 1836, regarding his
pension, illustrate his uncompromising independence. The Prime
Minister had offended him, but assuredly the apology demanded and
given was complete. I think 'it certain that, notwithstanding the
very full account of this transaction given by Dr. Bence Jones,
motives and influences were at work which even now are not entirely
revealed. The minister was bitterly attacked, but he bore the censure
of the press with great dignity. Faraday, while he disavowed having
either directly or indirectly furnished the matter of those attacks,
did not publicly exonerate the Premier. The Hon. Caroline Fox had
proved herself Faraday's ardent friend, and it was she who had healed
the breach between the philosopher and the minister. She manifestly
thought that Faraday ought to have come forward in Lord Melbourne's
defence, and there is a flavour of resentment in one of her letters to
him on the subject. No doubt Faraday had good grounds for his
reticence, but they are to me unknown.
In 1841 his health broke down utterly, and he went to Switzerland with
his wife and brother-in-law. His bodily vigour soon revived, and he
accomplished feats of walking respectable even for a trained
mountaineer. The published extracts from his Swiss journal contain
many beautiful and touching allusions. Amid references to the tints
of the Jungfrau, the blue rifts of the glaciers, and the noble Niesen
towering over the Lake of Thun, we come upon the charming little scrap
which I have elsewhere quoted: 'Clout-nail making goes on here rather
considerably, and is a very neat and pretty operation to observe. I
love a smith's shop and anything relating to smithery. My father was
a smith.' This is from his journal; but he is unconsciously speaking
to somebody--perhaps to the world.
His description of the Staubbach, Giessbach, and of the scenic effects
of sky and mountain, are all fine and sympathetic. But amid it all,
and in reference to it all, he tells his sister that 'true enjoyment
is from within, not from without.' In those days Agassiz was living
under a slab of gneiss on the glacier of the Aar. Faraday met Forbes
at the Grimsel, and arranged with him an excursion to the 'Hôtel des
Neufchâtelois'; but indisposition put the project out.
From the Fort of Ham, in 1843, Faraday received a letter addressed to
him by Prince Louis Napoleon Bonaparte. He read this letter to me
many years ago, and the desire, shown in various ways by the French
Emperor, to turn modern science to account, has often reminded me of
it since. At the age of thirty-five the prisoner of Ham speaks of
'rendering his captivity less sad by studying the great discoveries'
which science owes to Faraday; and he asks a question which reveals
his cast of thought at the time: 'What is the most simple combination
to give to a voltaic battery, in order to produce a spark capable of
setting fire to powder under water or under ground?' Should the
necessity arise, the French Emperor will not lack at the outset the
best appliances of modern science; while we, I fear, shall have to
learn the magnitude of the resources we are now neglecting amid the
pangs of actual war.' [Footnote: The 'science' has since been applied,
with astonishing effect, by those who had studied it far more
thoroughly than the Emperor of the French. We also, I am happy to
think, have improved the time since the above words were written
[1878].]
One turns with renewed pleasure to Faraday's letters to his wife,
published in the second volume. Here surely the loving essence of the
man appears more distinctly than anywhere else. From the house of Dr.
Percy, in Birmingham, he writes thus:
'Here--even here the moment I leave the table, I wish I were with you
IN QUIET. Oh, what happiness is ours! My runs into the world in this
way only serve to make me esteem that happiness the more.'
And again:
'We have been to a grand conversazione in the town-hall, and I have
now returned to my room to talk with you, as the pleasantest and
happiest thing that I can do. Nothing rests me so much as communion
with you. I feel it even now as I write, and catch myself saying the
words aloud as I write them.'
Take this, moreover, as indicative of his love for Nature:
'After writing, I walk out in the evening hand in hand with my dear
wife to enjoy the sunset; for to me who love scenery, of all that I
have seen or can see, there is none surpasses that of heaven. A
glorious sunset brings with it a thousand thoughts that delight me.'
Of the numberless lights thrown upon him by the Life and Letters,'
some fall upon his religion. In a letter to Lady Lovelace, he
describes himself as belonging to 'a very small and despised sect of
Christians, known, if known at all, as _Sandemanians_, and our hope is
founded on the faith that is in Christ.' He adds: 'I do not think it
at all necessary to tie the study of the natural sciences and religion
together, and in my intercourse with my fellow-creatures, that which
is religious, and that which is philosophical, have ever been two
distinct things.' He saw clearly the danger of quitting his moorings,
and his science acted indirectly as the safeguard of his faith. For
his investigations so filled his mind as to leave no room for
sceptical questionings, thus shielding from the assaults of
philosophy, the creed of his youth. His religion was constitutional
and hereditary. It was implied in the eddies of his blood and in the
tremors of his brain; and, however its outward and visible form might
have changed, Faraday would still have possessed its elemental
constituents--awe, reverence, truth, and love.
It is worth enquiring how so profoundly religious a mind, and so great
a teacher, would be likely to regard our present discussions on the
subject of education. Faraday would be a 'secularist' were he now
alive. He had no sympathy with those who contemn knowledge unless it
be accompanied by dogma. A lecture delivered before the City
Philosophical Society in 1818, when he was twenty-six years of age,
expresses the views regarding education which he entertained to the
end of his life. 'First, then,' he says, 'all theological
considerations are banished from the society, and of course from my
remarks; and whatever I may say has no reference to a future state, or
to the means which are to be adopted in this world in anticipation of
it. Next, I have no intention of substituting anything for religion,
but I wish to take that part of human nature which is independent of
it. Morality, philosophy, commerce, the various institutions and
habits of society, are independent of religion, and may exist either
with or without it. They are always the same, and can dwell alike in
the breasts of those who, from opinion, are entirely opposed in the
set of principles they include in the term religion, or in those who
have none.
'To discriminate more closely, if possible, I will observe that we
have no right to judge religious opinions; but the human nature of
this evening is that part of man which we have a right to judge. And
I think it will be found on examination, that this humanity--as it may
perhaps be called--will accord with what I have before described as
being in our own hands so improvable and perfectible.'
In an old journal I find the following remarks on one of my earliest
dinners with Faraday: 'At two o'clock he came down for me. He, his
niece, and myself, formed the party, "I never give dinners," he said.
"I don't know how to give dinners, and I never dine out. But I should
not like my friends to attribute this to a wrong cause. I act thus
for the sake of securing time for work, and not through religious
motives, as some imagine." He said grace. I am almost ashamed to
call his prayer a "saying Of grace." In the language of Scripture, it
might be described as the petition of a son, into whose heart God had
sent the Spirit of His Son, and who with absolute trust asked a
blessing from his father. We dined on roast beef, Yorkshire pudding,
and potatoes; drank sherry, talked of research and its requirements,
and of his habit of keeping himself free from the distractions of
society. He was bright and joyful--boy-like, in fact, though he is
now sixty-two. His work excites admiration, but contact with him
warms and elevates the heart. Here, surely, is a strong man. I love
strength; but let me not forget the example of its union with modesty,
tenderness, and sweetness, in the character of Faraday.'
Faraday's progress in discovery, and the salient points of his
character, are well brought out by the wise choice of letters and
extracts published in the volumes before us. I will not call the
labours of the biographer final. So great a character will challenge
reconstruction. In the coming time some sympathetic spirit, with the
requisite strength, knowledge, and solvent power, will, I doubt not,
render these materials plastic, give them more perfect organic form,
and send through them, with less of interruption, the currents of
Faraday's life. 'He was too good a man,' writes his present
biographer, 'for me to estimate rightly, and too great a philosopher
for me to understand thoroughly.' That may be: but the reverent
affection to which we owe the discovery, selection, and arrangement of
the materials here placed before us, is probably a surer guide than
mere literary skill. The task of the artist who may wish in future
times to reproduce the real though unobtrusive grandeur, the purity,
beauty, and childlike simplicity of him whom we have lost, will find
his chief treasury already provided for him by Dr. Bence Jones's
labour of love.
********************
XIX. THE COPLEY MEDALIST OF 1870.
THIRTY years ago Electro-magnetism was looked to as a motive power,
which might possibly compete with steam. In centres of industry, such
as Manchester, attempts to investigate and apply this power were
numerous. This is shown by the scientific literature of the time.
Among others Mr. James Prescot Joule, a resident of Manchester, took
up the subject, and, in a series of papers published in Sturgeon's
'Annals of Electricity' between 1839 and 1841, described various
attempts at the construction and perfection of electro-magnetic
engines. The spirit in which Mr. Joule pursued these enquiries is
revealed in the following extract: 'I am particularly anxious,' he
says, 'to communicate any new arrangement in order, if possible, to
forestall the monopolising designs of those who seem to regard this
most interesting subject merely in the light of pecuniary
speculation.' He was naturally led to investigate the laws of
electro-magnetic attractions, and in 1840 he announced the important
principle that the attractive force exerted by two electromagnets, or
by an electro-magnet and a mass of annealed iron, is directly
proportional to the square of the strength of the magnetising current;
while the attraction exerted between, an electro-magnet and the pole
of a permanent steel magnet, varies simply as the strength of the
current. These investigations were conducted independently of, though
a little subsequently to, the celebrated enquiries of Henry, Jacobi,
and Lenz and Jacobi, on the same subject.