THE 



EDINBURGH NEW 



PHILOSOPHICAL JOURNAL, 



Biographical Memoir of Dr Joseph Priestley. Read to tlie 

 Institute of France. By Baron Cuvier. 



VJTentlemeNj I have to-day to present you with an account 

 of the life and writings of Dr Joseph Priestley, an English 

 clergyman, who was born at Fieldhead, near Bristol, in 1728, 

 and died at Philadelphia in 1804. His great discoveries in 

 physics procured him the distinction of being named a foreign 

 associate of the Academy of Sciences of Paris ; and the Insti- 

 tute hastened to confer upon him the same honour. He was 

 also connected with most of the learned societies of Europe ; 

 and the homage which I now render to him, has perhaps al- 

 ready been rendered in more than one of its great cities. 



This honourable unanimity will appear so much the more 

 encouraging to the lovers of science, and will so much the more 

 prove to them the irresistible influence of real merit, that the 

 person who in this case was the object of it, used no address, 

 and employed no management, to procure it ; that his life was 

 entirely polemical ; that he always seemed to delight in com- 

 bating the most predominant opinions, and that he attacked 

 the interests dearest to certain classes of men. It is true that 

 this excessive ardour in maintaining his opinions exposed him 

 to implacable hatreds. He was long the object of every kind 

 of calumny, and more than once the victim of atrocious perse- 



JULY SEPTEMBER 1827. O 



