256 M. Arago's Biographical Memoir of James Watt. 



was only of a local character ; and that for their conception, 

 superintendence, and conduct, there was no need of calling in 

 the assistance of James Watt. 



Were I now for an instant to forget my duties as the organ of 

 the Academy, and to aim at producing a smile rather than in- 

 sisting upon important truths, the fact before us would supply 

 the materials of a striking contrast. I might adduce not 

 a few authors, who, at our weekly meetings, are wont to de- 

 mand, with all their heart and might, leave to communicate 

 the solitary remark, the trifling reflection, the hasty note 

 which was conceived and viritten the previous evening. I 

 might represent them cursing their destiny, when our laws, 

 or the priority of another's communication, postponed their 

 paper for a week ; although they have the guarantee of the 

 paquet cachete being deposited in our archives. On the other 

 hand we see the great inventor of a machine destined to con- 

 stitute an epoch in the annals of the world, submit, without a 

 murmur, to the stupid neglect of capitalists, and apply his su- 

 perior genius for eight years, to the preparation of plans, to the 

 making of surveys, to troublesome calculations of levelling, 

 and to measurements of masonry. How strikingly does this 

 exhibit the serene character, the subdued ambition, and the 

 true modesty of Watt. But, indifference such as this, how- 

 ever noble its causes, was not devoid of blame. It is not 

 without reason that society stamps with its reprobation, those 

 who withdraw from circulation the gold hoarded in their 

 coffers. And is that individual less culpable who deprives his 

 country, his fellow-citizens, and the age in which he lives, of the 

 treasures a thousand-fold more valuable, which ai-e the products 

 of the mind ; who retains for himself alone those immortal dis- 

 coveries, the sources of the noblest and purest delights of the 

 soul ; and who does not bestow on the artisan, mechanical con- 

 trivances which may indefinitely multiply the products of indus- 

 try, which may diminish, to the profit of civilization and hu- 

 manity, the effects of the inequalities of om* lot, and which 

 may ere long afford us the satisfaction of visiting the humblest 

 dwellings, without discovering the heart-rending spectacle of 

 fathers of families, and wretched children of both sexes, assi- 

 milated to the brutes, and hurrying prematurely to the tdmb ? 



