26o GREAT MEN OF SCIENCE 



based on his equations, and this prepared the way for 

 H. Hertz to confirm them experimentally and thus discover 

 electromagnetic waves. The idea likewise of an influence 

 of magnetic field upon light sources turned out later, when 

 means of observation had been very much refined, to be 

 correct,! and became of no less importance for all further 

 developments of our knowledge right up to the present day. 



In the year 1858, Faraday left the Royal Institution and 

 went to live in a house outside London presented to him by 

 the Queen. He began to suffer from rapidly increasing loss 

 of memory, but was nevertheless able to enjoy another ten 

 years of life in his own modest fashion. He died at the age 

 of seventy-six. 



Faraday combined in a rare manner great pride with the 

 highest modesty, and this peculiarity of character depended 

 entirely upon a deeply religious foundation, which however 

 he kept concealed. He remained always true to the small 

 sect of the Sandemanians, which at that time also was 

 scarcely known to the outside world, but in which he was 

 born, and the fundamental idea of which was a simple 

 adherence to Christ's teaching, which was to be interpreted 

 by lay preachers from among the brethren. How deeply he 

 entered into everything that came into the range of his 

 thoughts, may be seen from his definition of friendship, 

 which he gave in one of his letters, in between an account of 

 chemical experiments, at the time when he was a book- 

 binder's apprentice. 'A friend is he,' he says, 'whom one is 

 ready to serve next to one's God.' This serious point of 

 view he retained in every relation, both towards men and 

 towards science, throughout his whole life. Disappoint- 

 ments in regard to human relations could not fail to occur, 

 and Davy already prepared him for such, when he smiled as 

 Faraday once remarked to him that he thought that men of 

 science are animated by higher moral feehngs than other men. 



* 'Zeemann effect.* 



