Decline of Science in England. 343 



1. The death of Sir H. Davy, Dr Wollaston, Dr Young, 

 Mr Watt, Dr Marcet, Mr Gregor, Dr John Murray, Mr 

 Chenevix, and Mr Smithson Tennant, within a short time of 

 each other, was almost a death-blow to English science, and 

 particularly to the science of chemistry ; and it behoves those 

 who allege that science, and especially chemical science, has 

 not on this account declined, to favour the public with the list 

 of those who fill the shoes of those great men, or of the young 

 aspirants after chemical fame, who hold out the promise of 

 placing themselves in the wide breach so unexpectedly effected. 



In order to answer this argument, our learned foreigner re- 

 sorts to the following singular artifice, in which he uninten- 

 tionally admits its full force. 



" In chemistry," continues Mr Herschel, " the case is not 

 " much better. But to us foreigners it appears hardly just to 

 " complain of the state of chemistry, when the losses of Davy 

 " and Wollaston are still so recent. With the exception of 

 " Berzelius, whose mind, however, is of a quite different turn, 

 " we will ask Mr Herschel what continental chemist can be 

 ' ; compared to the two eminent men whom England has to 

 " lament?" 



Now this is a truly admirable counterpart to our author's 

 former reasoning. When he wished to estimate the condition 

 of French mathematics, he cuts off Legendre as old and infirm, 

 and therefore forming no fraction even of French talent ; but 

 when we wish to estimate the condition of English chemistry, 

 he will not allow us to cut off Sir Humphry Davy and Dr 

 Wollaston after they have been years in their tomb ! Nay, 

 lie insists that no foreign chemist but Berzelius can be com- 

 pared with them, and yet he will not permit us to bewail their 

 loss as an immediate and irreparable injury to science. 



When we maintain that science has declined in consequence 

 of the loss of such great men, we surely do not mean to un- 

 dervalue those whom they have left behind. We, on the con- 

 trary, value them the more, anil we implore, with double 

 earnestness, their eminent successors, Mr Dalton, Dr Henry, 

 Dr Thomson, Mr Phillips, Dr Trout, Dr Turner, Mr John- 

 ston, and others, to come forward with new zeal, and call forth 

 new powers to restore chemistry to its wonted glory. As Mr 

 Faraday considers his character attacked by the allegation of 



