MEMOIR OF HAUY. 377 



a De Saussure, a Lagrange; and who but must be startled at the ac- 

 celeration in our losses, when a few months only have snatched from 

 us Herschel and Delambre, Haiiy and Buthollet, leaving us scarce 

 power to render, within the prescribed time, the homage due to them 

 by the societies of which they were the ornament. 



We might be the more tempted to believe that Haiiy felt this irre- 

 sistible impulse of his epoch, from his having been determined, almost 

 without being aware of it, to a career for which, during the first forty 

 years of his life, he had never thought of preparing himself. In the 

 midst of obscure occupations an idea dawns upon him; a single idea, 

 but one equally luminous and prolific. From that moment he never 

 desists from following it ; he devotes to it his time, his faculties, his 

 undivided attention, until finally a brilliant success is the crown and 

 recompense of his efforts. No example could better show the grand, 

 I had almost said miraculous, results which spring from the profound 

 and exhaustive study of a subject upon which the mind is concentrated, 

 nor prove more clearly the truth of the maxim, that, at least in the 

 exact sciences, it is the patience of a sound intellect, when that 

 patience is indomitable, which truly constitutes what we call genius. 



Rene-Just Haiiy, an honorary canon of Notre Dame, a member of 

 this academy, and of most of those of Europe and America, was born 

 the 28th of February, 1743, at Saint- Just, a small market town in the 

 department of the Oise. A younger brother of his has made himself 

 known by an original method for instructing those born blind; while 

 the father of both was a poor weaver, who could probably have given 

 them no other profession than his own, had not the liberality of others 

 come to his aid. 



The first change for the better in the fortunes of the two brothers 

 may be ascribed to the pious turn of the elder, manifested in his earli- 

 est years and governing his whole life. Even in infancy he evinced a 

 singular pleasure in religious ceremonies, especially in the choirs of 

 the church ; a taste for music, the natural concomitant of tender senti- 

 ments, having thus early allied itself in him with the feelings of devo- 

 tion. A Premonstratensian prior 'of his native town, who had ob- 

 served the assiduity of his attendance at Divine service, engaged him 

 one day in conversation, and, being struck with the vivacity of his 

 intelligence, procured him the instruction of some of his monks. The 

 child's progress, promptly' responding to the care of these masters,, 

 interested them more and more, and led them to suggest to his mother 

 that by removing him to Paris she might shortly procure through their 

 recommendation such resources as would enable him to complete his 

 studies. 



This excellent woman had scarcely sufficient means for a few months 

 subsistence in the capital ; but she preferred encountering any ex- 

 tremity to proving false to the future which might await her son. It 

 was Ions:, however, before her tenderness met with any but the most 

 slender encouragement. The place of chorister in a church of the 

 quarter Saint Antoine was the only means of livelihood available to a 

 youth whose name was destined to be one day known to all Europe. 

 This post, he used afterwards pleasantly to say, was at least so far 

 propitious that it prevented him from burying his musical talents ; at 



