20 Biographical Memoir of M. Daubenton. 



every thing that related merely to reasoning. To approach liim 

 was to love him ; and never did any man receive more numerous 

 testimonies of affection and respect from others, at all the periods 

 of his life, and under all the successive governments. 



He has been reproached with having submitted to a homage 

 unworthy of himself, and odious from the very names of those 

 who rendered it to him ; but this was a consequence of the sys- 

 tem which he had adopted, of judging even public men by their 

 words, and of never suspecting any other motives than they ex- 

 pressed : — a dangerous method, no doubt, but one which has 

 perhaps been a little too much abandoned at the present day. 



Another disposition of his mind, which also contributed to 

 those odious imputations of pusillanimity or self-conceit which 

 have been brought against him, even in printed works, and 

 which, however, does not the more justify them, was his perfect 

 obedience to the law, not as being just, but simply as law. 

 This submission to human laws was absolutely of the same na- 

 ture as that which he had for the laws of nature; and he no 

 more permitted himself to murmur against those which deprived 

 him of his fortune, or of the rational use of his liberty, than 

 against those which caused his limbs to be deformed by the 

 gout. Some one has said of him, that he observed the knots on 

 his fingers with as much coolness as he would have observed 

 those of a tree; and this was true to the letter. This was 

 equally true of the coolness with which he would have given up 

 his offices and emoluments, and gone into exile, had the tyrants 

 required it of him. 



Besides, admitting that when the maintenance of his tranquil- 

 lity might have been the motive of some of his actions, will not 

 the use which he made of that tranquillity justify him.^* And 

 this man, who could wrest so many secrets from nature, who laid 

 the foundations of an almost new science, who gave to his coun- 

 try an entire branch of industry, who erected one of the most 

 important monuments of science, who formed so many accom- 

 plished pupils, of whom several have already attained the high- 

 est rank among the learned, will such a man require, at the 

 present day, that I should justify him for having managed the 

 means of doing all this good to his country and to humanity ? 



The universal acclamations of his fellow-citizens reply for me 



