Olituary. 77 



DR. JOHN MURRAY. 



It gives us much regret to have to announce this month the 

 death of that emhient chemist Dr. John Murray, of Edinburgli. 

 •He died at his house in Nicolsou's street on Thursday, 22d July. 

 The death of this distinguished philosopher, snatched from us in 

 the prime of Ufe, and full vigour of his faculties, will long be felt 

 as a national loss. His works, now of standard celebrity at home 

 and abroad, have, from the spirit of profound and accurate 

 analvsis, which they every^vhere display, and from the force, clear- 

 nessj and precision of their statements, most essentially contri- 

 buted to advance chemistry to the high rank which it now holds 

 amcno- the liberal sciences. His very acute, vigorous, and com- 

 prehensive mind has been most successfully exerted in arranging 

 its numerous and daily multiplying details, defining its laws, and, 

 above all, in attaching to it a spirit of philosophical mvestigation, 

 which, while it lays the best foundation for extending its practi- 

 cal application, tends at the same time to exalt its character, and 

 dignify its pursuit. As a lecturer on chemistry, it is impossilile 

 to praise too highly the superior talents of Dr. Murray: always 

 perfectly master of his subject, and very successful in the per- 

 formance of his experiments, which were selected with great 

 judgement, his manner had a natural ease and animation, which 

 showed evidently that his mhid went along with every thing he 

 ' uttered, and gave his lectures great freedom and spirit. But his 

 peculiar excellence as a teacher was a most uncommon faculty, 

 arising from the great perspicuity and distinctness of his concep- 

 tions, of leading his hearers step by step through the whole pro- 

 cess of the most complex investigation, with such admirable 

 clearness, that they were induced to think that he was following 

 out a natural order which could not be avoided, at the very time 

 when he was exhibiting a specimen of the most refined and sub- 

 ' tie analysis. With him the student did not merely accumulate 

 facts, note down dry results, or stare at amusing experiments : 

 he was led irresistibly to exercise his own mind, and trained to 

 the habits of accurate induction. To those solid attainments 

 which entitled Dr. Murray to stand in the first rank as a man of 

 science, was united a refined taste, and a liberal acquaintance 

 with every subject of general interest in literature. His manners 

 were easy, polite, and unpretending, regulated by a delicate sense 

 of propriety, with much of that simplicity which so often ac- 

 companies strength of character and originality of mind. He 

 ■fSse to eminence by the intrinsic force of his talents; he was 

 above all the second*hand arts by which so many labour to at- 

 tract attention ; and a native dignity of sentiment, and manly 

 spirit of independence, kept him aloof from all those petty in- 

 trigues which are so often employed with success to bolster up 

 inferior pretensions. 



