202 MEMORIAL OF JOSEPH HENRY. 



to stay. He swept the scene of conflict with the field-glass of a 

 commander-in-chicf, and did not set up his trophies because of a 

 brilliant skirmish on the picket lines of science. But he believed 

 in the picket line, and rejoiced in every sharpshooter who fought 

 with loyalty to truth in the forefront of the scientific army. 



A man of faith, Professor Henry was a man of prayer. But 

 his views of prayer were perhaps peculiar in their spirituality. 

 There was nothing mechanical or formal in his theory of this 

 religious exercise. He held that it was the duty and privilege of 

 enlightened Christians to live in perpetual communion with the 

 Almighty Spirit, and in this sense to pray without ceasing. Work 

 was worship, if conducted in this temper. He accepted all the 

 appointments of nature and Providence as the expressions of Infinite 

 Wisdom, and so in everything gave thanks.* He believed that 

 familiarity with the order of nature and scientific assurance of its 

 uniformity need not and should not tend to extinguish the instinct, 

 or abolish the motives of prayer by seeming to imply its futility, 

 but should rather tend to purify and exalt the objects of prayer. 

 The savage prays to his idol, that he may have success in killing his 

 enemies. The Hottentot whips and worships his fetich in blind but 

 eager quest of some sensual boon, that he may consume it upon 

 his lusts. The prayers of the Vedic Books are the childish prayers 

 of an unspiritual and childish people. "They pray," says Max 

 Miiller, "for the playthings of life, for houses and homes, for 

 cows and horses, and they plainly tell the gods that if they will 

 only be kind and gracious they will receive rich offerings in return." 

 And do we, asks the critic of comparative religions, we Christians 



*The "sweet reasonableness" into which he had schooled his temper was mani- 

 fested by the great trial which befell him in the year 1865, when the Smithsonian 

 building suffered from the ravages of a fire which destroyed all the letters written 

 down to that date by Professor Henry, as Smithsonian Secretary, in reply to innu- 

 merable questions relating to almost every department of knowledge. Besides, the 

 Annual Report of the Institution in manuscript, nearly ready for the press, a valu- 

 able collection of papers on meteorology, with written memoranda of his own to aid 

 in their digest, and countless minutes of scientific researches which he purposed to 

 make, all perished in the flames. Yet he was more concerned about the loss of 

 Bishop Johns's library, which had been intrusted to his care, than about the loss of 

 his own papers and records. Referring to the latter in a note written to his friend, 

 Dr. Torrey, a few days after the fire, he held the following language: "A few years 

 ago such a calamity would have paralyzed me for future efforts, but in my present 

 view of life I take it as the dispensation of a kind and wise Providence, and trust that 

 it will work to my spiritual advantage." 



