Royal Siociety. 35 



The self Mce of Crystallography dates a new aera from his inven- 

 tion of t!ie RcflecUve (ioaiouieter. That delicate instrument, by 

 discriminating angles previously compounded one with another, has 

 proved that a vast variety of substances have primitive forms or 

 cleavages peculiar to themselves, and consequently exhibit external 

 angles descriptive of the individual or of the class. 



Besides inventing the goniometer. Dr. Wollaston has bestowed 

 on the science of Optics, various improvements of telescopes and 

 microscopes, and a deep investigation into the arrangement and into 

 the functions of the optic nerves. 



We have also the Camera Lucida, founded on the ingenious 

 principle of allowing two pencils of rays, distinct and independenf 

 from each other, to enter (he pupil of an eye at the same tune. By 

 this contrivance the most complicated forms may be delineated 

 with perfect accuracy; and we owe to the same ingenuit}' the ap- 

 plication of concavo-convex lenses to the most extensively beneti- 

 cial of all optical contrivances, thereby enlarging the field of view 

 and rendering vision more distinct. 



We are indebted, nKU'eover, to the same powerful mind for in- 

 teresting astronomical speculations, extending beyond the limits 

 of the solar system; for several mechanical inventions; and for 

 assistance afforded to our manufacturers in their chemical pro- 

 cesses. 



These talents and these exertions have enrolled t!ie name of 

 Wollaston on the lists of all the most learned Societies of li-nrope. 



Much more remains to be noticed; but I must here close. The 

 editor of a volume can alone do justice to this extraordinary man. 



YOUNG. 



Dr. Thomas Young came into the world with all the advantages 

 of early ability cultivated by academical education and improved 

 by foreign travel, and with a confidence in iiis own talents growing 

 out of an expectation of excellence entertained in common by all 

 his friends; an expectation more than realized in the progress of 

 his future life- 



Mathematics in the most abstruse recesses of modern improve- 

 ments ; astronomy, theoretical and [)ractical ; experimental and 

 mechanical philosophy; chemistry; natural history; ancient and 

 modern languages; philology; in addition to the regular practice 

 of medicine; were carried to such an extent that each might have 

 been supposed to have exclusively occupied the full })0wcrs of his 

 mind. 



One thus highly endowed by the gifts of Nature and stored with 

 the multifarious fruits of labour and of assiduous application, might 

 well be imagined to have satisfied himself with the possession of abs- 

 tract or general knowledge, disposed rallur to speculate on systems 

 than to descend into the region of individual facts. On the con- 

 trary, Dr. Young, as if tii le could be extended at his will, lias pe- 

 culiarly distinguished himself by labour in detail. 



Wc have from hiiii .\ Coarse of Lectures on Natural Ihilosopiiy, 

 1' 2 and 



