192 MEMORIAL OF JOSEPH HENRY. 



iarity with fiction dated, as we have seen, from early boyhood, and 

 in this fountain of the imagination he continued to find refreshment 

 for the "wear and tear" of the hard and continuous thought to 

 which he was addicted in the philosopher's study. His knowledge 

 of history was accurate, and it was not simply a knowledge of facts, 

 but a knowledge of facts as seen in the logical coherence and rational 

 explanation which make them the basis of historic generalization. 

 The genesis of the Greek civilization was a perpetual object of 

 interest to his speculative mind, as called to deal with the phenom- 

 ena of Grecian literature, art, philosophy, and polity. 



He was a terse and forcible writer. If, as some have said, it is 

 the perfection of style to be colorless, the style of Henry might 

 be likened to the purest amber, which, invisible itself, holds in clear 

 relief every object it envelops. Without having that fluent deliv- 

 ery which, according to the well-known comparison of Dean 

 Swift, is rarely characteristic of the fullest minds, he was none 

 the less a pleasing and effective speaker the more effective be- 

 cause his words never outran his thought. We loved to think and 

 speak of him as "the Nestor of American Science," and if his 

 speech, like Nestor's, " flowed sweeter than honey," it was due to 

 the excellent quality of the matter rather than to any rhetorical 

 facility of manner. 



He was blest with a happy temperament. He recorded in his 

 diary, as a matter of thanksgiving, that through the kindness of 

 Providence he was able to forget what had been painful in his past 

 experiences, and to remember only and enjoy that which had been 

 pleasurable. The same sentiment is expressed in one of his letters. 

 Radiant with this sunny temper, he was in his family circle a per- 

 petual benediction. And, in turn, he was greatly dependent on his 

 family for the sympathy and watch-care due in a thousand small 

 things to one who never " lost the childlike in the larger mind." His 

 domestic affections were not dwarfed by the exacting nature of his 

 official duties, his public cares, or his scientific vigils. He had none 

 of that solitary grandeur affected by isolated spirits who cannot 

 descend to the tears and smiles of this common world. He was never 

 so happy as when in his home he was communing with wife and chil- 

 dren around the family altar. He made them the confidants of all 



