584 Analysis of Books, $c. 



In contrasting the genius of Wollaston with that of Davy, let me not 

 be supposed to invite a comparison to the disparagement of either, but 

 rather to the glory of both, for by mutual reflection each will glow 

 the brighter. If the animating principle of Davy's mind was a powerful 

 imagination, generalizing phenomena, and casting them into new combi- 

 nations, so may the striking characteristic of Wollaston' s genius be said. 

 to have been an almost superhuman perception of minute detail. Davy 

 was ever imagining something greater than he knew ; Wollaston always 

 knew something more than he acknowledged: in Wollaston, the pre- 

 dominant principle was to avoid error ; in Davy it was the desire to 

 discover truth. The tendency of Davy, on all occasions, was to raise 

 probabilities into facts ; while Wollaston as continually made them sub- 

 servient to the expression of doubt. 



' Wollaston was deficient in imagination, and under no circumstances 

 could he have become a poet, nor was it to be expected that his investi- 

 gations should have led him to any of those comprehensive generalizations 

 which create new systems of philosophy. He well knew the compass of 

 his powers, and he pursued the only method by which they could be 

 rendered available in advancing knowledge. He was a giant in strength, 

 but it was the strength of Antaeus, mighty only on the'earth. The ex- 

 treme caution and reserve of his manners were inseparably connected 

 with the habits of his mind ; they pervaded every part of his character ; 

 in his amusements and in his scientific experiments, he displayed the same 

 nice and punctilious observation, whether he was angling for trout, or 

 testing for elements, he alike relied for success upon his subtile discrimi- 

 nation of minute circumstances. 



* By comparing the writings as well as the discoveries of these two 

 great philosophers, we shall readily perceive the intellectual distinctions 

 I have endeavoured to establish " From their fruits shall ye know 

 them." The discoveries of Davy were the results of extensive views and 

 new analogies, those of Wollaston were derived from a more exact ex- 

 amination of minute and, to ordinary observers, scarcely appreciable dif- 

 ferences. This is happily illustrated by a comparison of the means by 

 which each discovered new metals. The alkaline bases were the pro- 

 ducts of a comprehensive investigation, which had developed a new order 

 of principles ; the detection of palladium and rhodium among the ores of 

 platinum, was the reward of delicate manipulation, and microscopic 

 scrutiny.' ' The chemical manipulations of Wollaston and Davy offered 

 a singular contrast to each other, and might be considered as highly 

 characteristic of the temperaments and intellectual qualities of these 

 remarkable men. Every process of the former was regulated with the 

 most scrupulous regard to microscopic accuracy, and conducted with the 

 utmost neatness of detail. It has been already stated with what turbulence 

 and apparent confusion the experiments of the latter were conducted, and 

 yet each was equally excellent in his own style ; and as artists they have 

 not unaptly been compared to Teniers and Michael Angelo. By long 

 discipline, Wollaston had acquired such power in commanding and 

 fixing his attention upon minute objects, that he was able to recognise 

 resemblances, and to distinguish differences, between precipitates pro- 

 duced by re-agents, which were invisible to ordinary observers, and 

 which enabled him to submit to analysis the minutest particle of matter 

 with success. Davy, on the other hand, obtained his results by an 

 intellectual process, which may be said to have consisted in the extreme 

 rapidity with which he seized upon, and applied appropriate means at 

 appropriate moments.' 



