36 Roijal Society. 



and the Mechanical Arts, in two volumes quarto ; a work replete 

 with the most minute and multifarious details, and with references 

 to all known writings on the diflPerent subjects. 



We have from him Elementary Illustrations of the Celestial Me- 

 chanics of Laplace, displaying such powers of rendering simple and 

 familiar the obscurities of a work in all other respects equal to tlie 

 higliest expectations of the present age, that one cannot but deeply 

 regret the sudden discontinuance of what promised so much utility 

 to the rising generation, by smoothing difficulties, and thus leading 

 on young minds to the attainment of what the Greeks xxr s^o^r^v 

 denominated Learning. 



Dr. Young did not neglect to illustrate various subjects con- 

 nected with his more immediate profession. Among several others, 

 A Treatise on Consumption has obtained a considerable degree of 

 reputation. But the most difficult investigations gave him, in all 

 probability, the greatest delight. The corpuscular and vibratory 

 theories of light ; the motions and oscillations of fluids, with the 

 theory of the tides ; the nature and powers of capillary attraction; 

 M-ere objects of his peculiar and successful attention. Magnetism 

 as connected with electricity; the magnetism and figure of the 

 earth; the whole theory of chances, with the probable duration of 

 human life; the difficult task of determining, with an accuracy 

 sufficient for scientific purposes, the exact interval between the 

 line of suspension and the centre of oscillation, of bodies not as- 

 sumed to possess any strict geometrical forms or unvarying densi- 

 ties; the different temperatures of the Diatonic scale, are among 

 the various subjects illustrated by his care: while the duties of 

 Secretary to the Board of Longitude, involving a minute and con- 

 stant superintendence of the Nautical Almanac, throughout all the 

 stages of its construction, and final publication, were sufficient, 

 during many years, to have absorbed a large portion of the time of 

 any ordinary man. But, at the very moment when these duties 

 had become, from different causes, most burdensome on his 

 mind, a new object for pursuit was found and eagerly followed 

 through fields heretofore unexplored. The military occupation of 

 Egypt by an European power in the concluding years of the last 

 century, together with the investigations made during that time 

 into the stupendous and interesting remains of antiquity still pre- 

 served in that far-famed country, did not fail of exciting an ardent 

 curiosity throughout the civilized world, respecting the figures and 

 characters engraved on the most durable materials, but of which 

 nothing had been known since the revival of letters, beyond a tradi- 

 tional account, derived from ancient writers, of their being Hiero- 

 glyphics. The discovery, however, of some Polyglot inscriptions 

 having been supposed likely to affiard a key, several men of great 

 learning and in different countries joined eagerly in the career of decy- 

 phering them; among whom Dr. Young is supposed to have maintain- 

 ed the precedence which he first gained. One very curious and im- 

 portant fact has been established beyond the reach of doubt or con- 

 troversy. When foreign nations, tlie Persians, the Greeks and the 



Romans, 



