Memoir of Dr. Thomas Young. 409 



highest branches of science. Those who are competent to 

 form an opinion on their labours, never exceed eight or ten 

 in all Europe. Suppose them to be unjust, indifferent, 

 nay, even jealous — for such is often the case — the public, 

 obliged to depend upon their information, would be igno- 

 rant that Alembert had traced the great phenomenon [of 

 the precession of the equinoxes to the principle of univer- 

 sal gravitation; that Lagrange determined the physical 

 cause of the libration of the moon ; that from the researches 

 of Laplace the acceleration of the motion of this star is 

 found to be connected with a particular change in the 

 form of the earth's orbit, &c. Scientific journals, when 

 they are conducted by men of distinguished merit, acquire, 

 in this way, an influence on certain subjects, which is often 

 distressing. Such is the power which the Edinburgh Re- 

 view has sometimes exercised. Among the first contribu- 

 tors to this celebrated journal, a young writer was highly 

 distinguished, in whom the discoveries of Newton had 

 produced a powerful admiration. This feeling, so natural 

 and so legitimate, made him unfortunately misconceive all 

 that was plausible, ingenious, and fertile, in the theory of 

 interferences. The author of this theory did, perhaps, not 

 always write his decisions, his opinions, and criticisms, in 

 such polished language as is proper on common occasions, 

 and as was most imperiously required, when proceeding 

 from the immortal author of the Natural Philosophy. The 

 penalty of retaliation was applied to him with interest. 

 The Edinburgh Review attacked the learned man, the 

 writer, the geometrician, the experimenter, with a vehe- 

 mence and acrimony of expression almost unexampled in 

 scientific debates. The public are commonly on their 

 guard when they are addressed in such passionate lan- 

 guage ; but, on this occasion, it adopted the opinions of the 

 reviewer, without accusing him of levity. The reviewer 

 was not one of those youthful critics unqualified, by want 

 of previous study, from undertaking the task which he had 

 assigned to himself. Several good memoirs in the collec- 

 tion of the Royal Society attested his mathematical know- 

 ledge, and assigned him a distinguished place among the 

 cultivators of physical optics. The bar of London pro- 

 claimed him already as one of its most shining lights. The 



