Faraday as a Discoverer, John Tyndall [children's books read aloud .txt] 📗

Seven-and-thirty years have passed since the discovery of magneto-electricity; but, if we except the extra current, until quite recently nothing of moment was added to the subject. Faraday entertained the opinion that the discoverer of a great law or principle had a right to the ‘spoils’—this was his term—arising from its illustration; and guided by the principle he had discovered, his wonderful mind, aided by his wonderful ten fingers, overran in a single autumn this vast domain, and hardly left behind him the shred of a fact to be gathered by his successors.

And here the question may arise in some minds, What is the use of it all? The answer is, that if man’s intellectual nature thirsts for knowledge, then knowledge is useful because it satisfies this thirst. If you demand practical ends, you must, I think, expand your definition of the term practical, and make it include all that elevates and enlightens the intellect, as well as all that ministers to the bodily health and comfort of men. Still, if needed, an answer of another kind might be given to the question ‘What is its use?’

As far as electricity has been applied for medical purposes, it has been almost exclusively Faraday’s electricity. You have noticed those lines of wire which cross the streets of London. It is Faraday’s currents that speed from place to place through these wires. Approaching the point of Dungeness, the mariner sees an unusually brilliant light, and from the noble phares of La Heve the same light flashes across the sea. These are Faraday’s sparks exalted by suitable machinery to sunlike splendour. At the present moment the Board of Trade and the Brethren of the Trinity House, as well as the Commissioners of Northern Lights, are contemplating the introduction of the Magneto-electric Light at numerous points upon our coasts; and future generations will be able to refer to those guiding stars in answer to the question. What has been the practical use of the labours of Faraday? But I would again emphatically say, that his work needs no such justification, and that if he had allowed his vision to be disturbed by considerations regarding the practical use of his discoveries, those discoveries would never have been made by him. ‘I have rather,’ he writes in 1831, ‘been desirous of discovering new facts and new relations dependent on magneto-electric induction, than of exalting the force of those already obtained; being assured that the latter would find their full development hereafter.’

In 1817, when lecturing before a private society in London on the element chlorine, Faraday thus expressed himself with reference to this question of utility. ‘Before leaving this subject, I will point out the history of this substance, as an answer to those who are in the habit of saying to every new fact. “What is its use?”

Dr. Franklin says to such, “What is the use of an infant?” The answer of the experimentalist is, “Endeavour to make it useful.” When Scheele discovered this substance, it appeared to have no use; it was in its infancy and useless state, but having grown up to maturity, witness its powers, and see what endeavours to make it useful have done.’

Footnote to Chapter 3

[1] I am indebted to a friend for the following exquisite morsel:—

‘A short time after the publication of Faraday’s first researches in magneto-electricity, he attended the meeting of the British Association at Oxford, in 1832. On this occasion he was requested by some of the authorities to repeat the celebrated experiment of eliciting a spark from a magnet, employing for this purpose the large magnet in the Ashmolean Museum. To this he consented, and a large party assembled to witness the experiments, which, I need not say, were perfectly successful. Whilst he was repeating them a dignitary of the University entered the room, and addressing himself to Professor Daniell, who was standing near Faraday, inquired what was going on. The Professor explained to him as popularly as possible this striking result of Faraday’s great discovery.

The Dean listened with attention and looked earnestly at the brilliant spark, but a moment after he assumed a serious countenance and shook his head; “I am sorry for it,” said he, as he walked away; in the middle of the room he stopped for a moment and repeated, “I am sorry for it:” then walking towards the door, when the handle was in his hand he turned round and said, “Indeed I am sorry for it; it is putting new arms into the hands of the incendiary.” This occurred a short time after the papers had been filled with the doings of the hayrick burners. An erroneous statement of what fell from the Dean’s mouth was printed at the time in one of the Oxford papers.

He is there wrongly stated to have said, “It is putting new arms into the hands of the infidel.”’

Chapter 4.

Points of Character.

A point highly illustrative of the character of Faraday now comes into view. He gave an account of his discovery of Magneto-electricity in a letter to his friend M. Hachette, of Paris, who communicated the letter to the Academy of Sciences. The letter was translated and published; and immediately afterwards two distinguished Italian philosophers took up the subject, made numerous experiments, and published their results before the complete memoirs of Faraday had met the public eye. This evidently irritated him. He reprinted the paper of the learned Italians in the ‘Philosophical Magazine,’

accompanied by sharp critical notes from himself. He also wrote a letter dated Dec. 1, 1832, to Gay Lussac, who was then one of the editors of the ‘Annales de Chimie,’ in which he analysed the results of the Italian philosophers, pointing out their errors, and defending himself from what he regarded as imputations on his character.

The style of this letter is unexceptionable, for Faraday could not write otherwise than as a gentleman; but the letter shows that had he willed it he could have hit hard. We have heard much of Faraday’s gentleness and sweetness and tenderness. It is all true, but it is very incomplete. You cannot resolve a powerful nature into these elements, and Faraday’s character would have been less admirable than it was had it not embraced forces and tendencies to which the silky adjectives ‘gentle’ and ‘tender’ would by no means apply.

Underneath his sweetness and gentleness was the heat of a volcano.

He was a man of excitable and fiery nature; but through high self-discipline he had converted the fire into a central glow and motive power of life, instead of permitting it to waste itself in useless passion. ‘He that is slow to anger,’ saith the sage, ‘is greater than the mighty, and he that ruleth his own spirit than he that taketh a city.’ Faraday was not slow to anger, but he completely ruled his own spirit, and thus, though he took no cities, he captivated all hearts.

As already intimated, Faraday had contributed many of his minor papers—including his first analysis of caustic lime—to the ‘Quarterly Journal of Science.’ In 1832, he collected those papers and others together in a small octavo volume, labelled them, and prefaced them thus:—

‘PAPERS, NOTES, NOTICES, &c., &c.,

published in octavo, up to 1832.

M. Faraday.’

‘Papers of mine, published in octavo, in the “Quarterly Journal of Science,” and elsewhere, since the time that Sir H. Davy encouraged me to write the analysis of caustic lime.

‘Some, I think (at this date), are good; others moderate; and some bad. But I have put all into the volume, because of the utility they have been of to me—and none more than the bad—in pointing out to me in future, or rather, after times, the faults it became me to watch and to avoid.

‘As I never looked over one of my papers a year after it was written without believing both in philosophy and manner it could have been much better done, I still hope the collection may be of great use to me.

‘M. Faraday.

‘Aug. 18, 1832.’

‘None more than the bad!’ This is a bit of Faraday’s innermost nature; and as I read these words I am almost constrained to retract what I have said regarding the fire and excitability of his character.

But is he not all the more admirable, through his ability to tone down and subdue that fire and that excitability, so as to render himself able to write thus as a little child? I once took the liberty of censuring the conclusion of a letter of his to the Dean of St. Paul’s. He subscribed himself ‘humbly yours,’ and I objected to the adverb. ‘Well, but, Tyndall,’ he said, ‘I am humble; and still it would be a great mistake to think that I am not also proud.’

This duality ran through his character. A democrat in his defiance of all authority which unfairly limited his freedom of thought, and still ready to stoop in reverence to all that was really worthy of reverence, in the customs of the world or the characters of men.

And here, as well as elsewhere, may be introduced a letter which bears upon this question of self-control, written long years subsequent to the period at which we have now arrived. I had been at Glasgow in 1855, at a meeting of the British Association. On a certain day, I communicated a paper to the physical section, which was followed by a brisk discussion. Men of great distinction took part in it, the late Dr. Whewell among the number, and it waxed warm on both sides. I was by no means content with this discussion; and least of all, with my own part in it. This discontent affected me for some days, during which I wrote to Faraday, giving him no details, but expressing, in a general way, my dissatisfaction.

I give the following extract from his reply:—

‘Sydenham, Oct. 6, 1855.

‘My Dear Tyndall,—These great meetings, of which I think very well altogether, advance science chiefly by bringing scientific men together and making them to know and be friends with each other; and I am sorry when that is not the effect in every part of their course. I know nothing except from what you tell me, for I have not yet looked at the reports of the proceedings; but let me, as an old man, who ought by this time to have profited by experience, say that when I was younger I found I often misinterpreted the intentions of people, and found they did not mean what at the time I supposed they meant; and, further, that as a general rule, it was better to be a little dull of apprehension where phrases seemed to imply pique, and quick in perception when, on the contrary, they seemed to imply kindly feeling. The real truth never fails ultimately to appear; and opposing parties, if wrong, are sooner convinced when replied to forbearingly, than when overwhelmed. All I mean to say is, that it is better to be blind to the results of partisanship, and quick to see good will. One has more happiness in oneself in endeavouring to follow the things that make for peace. You can hardly imagine how often I have been heated in private when opposed, as I have thought, unjustly and superciliously, and yet I have striven, and succeeded, I hope, in keeping down replies of the like kind. And I know I have never lost by it. I would not say all this to you did I not esteem you as a true philosopher and friend.[1]

‘Yours, very truly,

‘M. Faraday.’

Footnote to Chapter 4

[1] Faraday would have been rejoiced to learn that, during its last meeting at Dundee, the British Association illustrated in a