Professor George Wilson, in a lecture to the Scottish Society of
Arts, says: “The spectacle of these things ministers only to the
good impulses of humanity. Isaac Newton’s telescope at the Royal
Society of London; Otto Guericke’s air-pump in the Library at Berlin;
James Watt’s repaired Newcomen steam-engine in the Natural-Philosophy
class-room of the College at Glasgow; Fahrenheit’s thermometer in
the corresponding class-room of the University of Edinburgh; Sir H.
Davy’s great voltaic battery at the Royal Institution, London, and
his safety-lamp at the Royal Society; Joseph Black’s pneumatic trough
in Dr. Gregory’s possession; the first wire which Faraday made rotate
electro-magnetically, at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital; Dalton’s atomic
models at Manchester; and Kemp’s liquefied gases in the Industrial
Museum of Scotland,--are alike personal relics, historical monuments,
and objects of instruction, which grow more and more precious every
year, and of which we never can have too many.”