240 DISCOVERY 



are minor events. Until it is clearly realised that the 

 gravest crime of the French Revolution was not the 

 execution of the King, but the execution of Lavoisier, 

 there is no right measure of values ; for Lavoisier was 

 one of the three or four greatest men France has pro- 

 duced." 



Lavoisier lived for his fellow men ; and he died because 

 he was the champion of the French Academy of Sciences 

 against the National Convention which desired to sup- 

 press it and all the other learned societies of France. 

 Even when the Convention had decreed the destruction 

 of the Academy, he urged the claims of men of science 

 to national consideration. 



" There is not," he said, " an academician who, if he had 

 applied his intelligence and means to other objects, would not 

 have been able to secure a livelihood and a position in society. 

 It is on the public faith that they have followed a career, honour- 

 able without doubt, but hardly lucrative ... if you allow the 

 men of science who composed the defunct Academy to retire to 

 the country, to take other positions in society, and to devote 

 themselves to lucrative occupations, the organisation of the 

 sciences will be destroyed, and half a century will not suffice 

 to regenerate the order. For the sake of the national honour, 

 in the interests of society, as you regard the good opinion of 

 foreign nations, I beseech you to make some provision against 

 the destruction of the arts which would be the -necessary conse- 

 quence of the annihilation of the sciences. ' ' Sir T. E. Thorpe. 



Scientific discoveries of direct and immediate applica- 

 tion to human affairs rarely spring forth full-grown and 

 clothed, like the goddess Minerva from the head of 

 Jupiter. Their beginnings are usually inconspicuous, 

 and their development slow. As the acorn gives birth 

 to the giant oak, so what seems to be a trivial experiment 

 or observation is often the seed of a great industry. 



Electric telegraphy of every type depends upon the 

 work of men of science of many nations, Volta, an 



