1893.] Special General Meeting. 163 



able to convert the crop at once into wholesome and palatable bread 

 for general consumption. It is as a popular expounder of science that 

 Tyndall stands pre-eminent. It is as a translator ot texts of nature 

 that but for him must long have remained hieroglyphic that he will 

 be best remembered. It is as an evangelist of science, primarily to 

 the intelligent and educated classes, but ultimately to all, that his 

 greatest influence has been exerted. He was one of the Apostles of a 

 new dispensation. His teachings altered the very spirit of the times, 

 and created a tolerance of scientific truth which it had not before 

 enjoyed. He might have been a martyr to science had he been less 

 amply endowed with weaj)ons of defence and attack. 



Professor Tyndall was wont, I believe, to trace his descent from 

 William Tyndale, one of the first English translators of the 

 Scriptures, and the argument from heredity ought, I think, to 

 compensate for some gaps in the genealogy, which, I understand, 

 existed, for the two men, if we may judge by their character and 

 work, seem to have been of the same stock and blood. William 

 Tyndale's aim was to place an open Bible within the reach of every 

 ploughboy ; it was John Tyndall's aim to make another revelation 

 accessible to all. William Tyndale was a fearless controversialist ; 

 John Tyndall was not less so. William Tyndale's writings were 

 remarkable for their perspicuity, noble simplicity, propriety of idiom 

 and purity of style. John Tyndall's writings are notable for the self- 

 same characteristics. William Tyndale's last words, before he was 

 strangled and burnt, were, " Lord, open the King of England's 

 eyes ! " John Tyndall's life-long aspiration was to open the people of 

 England's eyes. 



We who had our eyes opened by Tyndall more or less, who were 

 led by him to look deeper, to discern more clearly — we who profited 

 by his prelections, will, I am sure, always feel grateful for the en- 

 lightenment he brought. He was a brilliant expounder of scientific 

 truth ; he was an unrivalled experimentalist ; he communicated to 

 his auditors his own vivid convictions. Always earnest in manner, 

 in his latter days he became almost vehement, as if he laboured under 

 a pressing obligation to deliver himself of his message before his 

 weary vigils closed in that long, sad, silent sleep on which he has 

 now fallen. 



Professor Tyndall's juvenile lectures here deserve special mention 

 because of their popularity and educational utility. The first course 

 of these, on " Light," was delivered in 1862, and after that, year 

 after year, with only two exceptions, up to 1884, a Christmas course 

 was forthcoming ; each successive course being listened to by large 

 numbers of boys and girls, and by children of an older growth, 

 with the profoundest attention and delight. These lectures were 

 veritably " the fairy tales of science," but they were imbued with 

 " the .long result of Time," and it seems to me that we are to- 

 day drawing no small advantage from them. Many of those who 



