Dr. Bowditch, President of the American Academy. xi 
a letter to that eminent mathematician, upon the general princi- 
ples of mechanics ; the profound views developed in that commu- 
nication could not fail to make a deep impression on so great a 
geometer ; and what was the result? A few days afterwards, 
La Place was appointed professor of mathematics in the Military 
School at Paris. From that moment, says his distinguished eulo- 
gist, he was enabled to bestow his undivided attention on the 
science which he had chosen ; and he gave to all his labors a fixed 
direction, from which he never deviated. This immovable and 
determined constancy in his views was always the principal char- 
acteristic of his genius ; and he passed the whole of a long life (of 
seventy-eight years) in accomplishing his great design, with a per- 
severance of which the history of science does not, perhaps, offer 
another example.* 
Contrast with this good fortune the situation, in which our Presi- 
dent was placed from the earliest period of his life. Compelled, 
by his father’s humble circumstances, when only ten years of age, 
to forego even the slender advantages of a common school, that he 
might by his personal services contribute to the support of the 
family ; then placed as an apprentice in a ship-chandler’s shop ; 
and, at length, in order to gain a livelihood for himself, obliged to 
become a seaman, in his twenty-first year, and to continue in that 
occupation for a considerable period of his life, —what an example 
does his history present of the extraordinary results that may be 
obtained by talents and industry, under the most unpropitious cir- 
cumstances! When he first started into manhood, the state of 
mathematical science in this country was extremely low; he found 
no competent judge to appreciate his attainments; no powerful 
patron, who could place him in a situation where, like La Place, he 
* Eloge, par M. le Baron Fourier. 
